It has taken me a while to write this post and the main reason is because I didn’t know how to tell you everything you need to know about the children’s air ambulance and really I still dont. I suppose the easiest thing to do would be to tell you that this special helicopter is the only one in the country, I could tell you that this helicopter is not a trauma helicopter, I could tell you that when a baby needs to be transferred to a more specialist hospital and it is too risky to do that by road then this is the helicopter they use. You see it is a very important helicopter but the most shocking thing about this helicopter is that it receives no government funding. In fact most of the emergency helicopters dont.
The children’s air ambulance is special though, it has been built like a mini ICU. It can transport a very sick baby hundreds of miles very quickly whilst carrying specialist staff who ensure the safety of the baby. Below is a picture of the Baby Pod. The childrens air ambulance are currently waiting approval for a stretcher that will allow transportation of older children as the pod can only currently hold babies. However the majority of the transportation cases all over the UK are very young babies mostly within hours or days of being born.
The children’s air ambulance is special though, it has been built like a mini ICU. It can transport a very sick baby hundreds of miles very quickly whilst carrying specialist staff who ensure the safety of the baby. Below is a picture of the Baby Pod. The childrens air ambulance are currently waiting approval for a stretcher that will allow transportation of older children as the pod can only currently hold babies. However the majority of the transportation cases all over the UK are very young babies mostly within hours or days of being born.
We are very lucky in that we live near a major hospital but what if you only had your local hospital and something went wrong? The childrens air ambulance is the only option apart from a road transfer and somethings going by road can be just too risky.
After we had a good look around the helicopter we were given the chance to experience what it was like to be flown in the air ambulance and I was amazed at how smooth the take off and landing was. As a nervous flyer and someone who is scared of heights I didnt think I would enjoy it but it was fantastic, definitely a once in a lifetime experience and for all those babies that it has helped save I suppose it is exactly that. A once in a lifetime experience that helped save their life.
After we had a good look around the helicopter we were given the chance to experience what it was like to be flown in the air ambulance and I was amazed at how smooth the take off and landing was. As a nervous flyer and someone who is scared of heights I didnt think I would enjoy it but it was fantastic, definitely a once in a lifetime experience and for all those babies that it has helped save I suppose it is exactly that. A once in a lifetime experience that helped save their life.
The view out the window
Coming in to land
The Childrens Air Ambulance needs our support and working with some other bloggers we hope to be able to do some fund raising for them later in the year but for now its about making people aware that this service exists. We have all heard of air ambulances, the ones that attend crashes on the motorway or other trauma sites but this is different, this is saving the lives of babies up and down the country and ensuring they get the specialist care they need no matter where they were born.
The pilots
