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A little excitement this morning.

Last new years eve there was a hell of a party going on in the rented house that backs on to my parents property, people were still arriving at 02:30 on new years day, dumping their cars over peoples driveways and blocking all of the side roads.

At 03:33, just as my dad was climbing the stairs to bed, he hears gunfire outside, looking out of an upstairs window he witnesses people exiting the house via any means possible, doors, windows, on to the roof and then down the gutter; some climbed the fence and sought refuge in my parents garden. My dad called 999 to report the gunfire and what he'd witnessed, unsurprisingly the operator questioned the report and said it was most likely fireworks (being new years they must get a lot of false reports). My dad informed them of his knowledge of gunfire from his professional experience and they reluctantly dispatched a police response.

Arriving on scene the police found a casualty lying in the road, not far from the house in question, with gunshot wounds consistent with being shot from behind, the road was gridlocked and there were over 100 people in the street who had bailed out of the house. No, it wasn't fireworks.

A full forensic police investigation followed, bullet holes were found in the side of a car parked opposite the party house, and in the gutter of the house opposite (not particularly good with his aim). Clothes and personal items were scattered in the road and street from people escaping the gunfire. The road was shut off until 17:30 on new years day, which was most inconvenient for the family new years day lunch at my parents, we had to park a distance away and be escorted through the police cordon, with our shoes checked afterwards to make sure we hadn't picked up any evidence on our soles, names and addresses had to be supplied, which is ironic when visiting the street that you lived in for most of your life, and you share the same family name with the person who reported the gunfire.

Did the police ever take a statement from my dad? No. To date the shooter remains at large, and victim (who is registered to an address over 100 miles away from the party) suffered non life threatening injuries.

Once the police cordon was lifted the police were quite happy to leave all the illegally parked cars that were blocking the road and driveways (only taking the vehicles related to the investigation), it was totally impossible to enter or exit my parents dead end road, blocking in 70 households; when the police originally arrived on scene they couldn't even get a van down the road! Apparently illegally parked cars that block emergency vehicles from getting through don't even warrant a ticket let alone being towed, even when a copper has to stand next to them for a whole day. Fortunately two were collected which allowed cars to squeeze past, some cars took three days to be collected.

It used to be such a nice area, people are hoping that the occupants of the rented property move on now that they are on the police radar. Its a property that has some strange goings on, I feel sorry for the young children that live there.

So if you think its a genuine emergency its always best to act.

Clive, hats off to you for your quick response diving into the pool. Dave, there would have always been that nagging doubt over what was in the water if you hadn't contacted the emergency services to clarify was out there.
 
It’s funny, but I’ve had more thanks from you guys than I had off anyone at the time :lol:

Not looking for that at all, but the Ambulance crew were supportive and grateful for the action.

Mostly I was upset by the inaction of the so-called lifeguard because even though he didn’t see the lad go down, he didn’t respond at all even after getting him out of the pool.

Secondary drowning (which can happen up to 24 hours after such an event) is serious but accounts for 1-2% of drowning victims. He didn’t even know what it was.

My hat goes off to the Scout movement generally, we did a lot of first response training, and it’s stuck with me, maybe not all of it, it was a long (looooong) time ago, but the basics stay with you.

EDIT I’d grossly over stated the %age... just looked it up :oops:
 
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Secondary drowning (which can happen up to 24 hours after such an event) is serious and can account for up to 30% of drowning victims. He didn’t even know what it was.
I've never even heard of secondary drowning.
 
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