A 999 call handler took almost five minutes to understand where a collapsed bypass worker was in Aberdeenshire before dispatching an ambulance, according to a resident who was first on the scene.
Lorraine Smith, a mum of one who lives close to the hamlet of Cookney, was taking her son Isaac to school last Friday morning when she noticed a woman on the ground at the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route (AWPR) construction site near her home.
The woman – who was working at the site – was “very, very pale and disorientated”, and was being looked after by worried colleagues.
Mrs Smith called 999, but she said that despite giving a the full postcode and directions to her house – which lies only a few hundred feet from the new road – the call handler struggled for much of the call to locate Cookney.
Mrs Smith said: “I was put through to the call centre, and I explained that I was at the AWPR construction site, close to my postcode, and that I needed an ambulance for someone that collapsed.
“I was told to repeat the postcode, but got told that it wasn’t registering.
“And so I did, but it didn’t work, and I tried to explain that I was very close to Cookney, but they said it wasn’t showing up on their system – I even spelled it out for them.
“I have no doubt that if the call handler had better knowledge of the local area, there wouldn’t have been any confusion at all, and they would have known where Cookney was.
“I’m just glad it wasn’t a more serious situation for this poor woman.”
A Transport Scotland spokesman said: “We understand that an AWPR employee became ill outside the construction site. A passer-by immediately offered some assistance, including calling an ambulance. Support from the AWPR team followed immediately.
“Emergency arrangements are in place with each of the emergency services, using the GPS co-ordinates for access to each site. On this occasion, the incident occurred outside the site boundary.”
A spokesman for the Scottish Ambulance Service said: “We received a call at 8.59am on Friday, May 5 to attend an incident at an address in Aberdeenshire.
“We dispatched one ambulance which arrived on scene at 9.14am.
“One female patient in her forties was taken to the Aberdeen Royal Infirmary.”
