Wigan officers’ life-saving actions at ‘chaotic’ machete incident praised

Quick thinking by two Wigan emergency officers helped save a man’s life after he was seriously injured during a fight with a machete.

Quick thinking by two Wigan emergency officers helped save a man’s life after he was seriously injured during a fight with a machete.

PC Ellen Fazackerley and PC Rebecca Hamer, who are based in Leigh, were called to the incident in January this year. It was reported that numerous people had been fighting and that a machete was involved.

PC Hamer was first at the scene, where there were two seriously injured men inside a house with a broken window and bloody walls, furniture and floor.

Remaining calm, PC Hamer spoke to both men and called for an ambulance due to heavy blood loss. One man was bleeding profusely from a leg wound and a second man had a deep cut to his hand and also needed urgent medical attention.

Without hesitation, officers administered life-saving treatment by applying a tourniquet to the man’s leg.

PC Hamer said: “Initially when we arrived at the scene the street was quiet with no one around and something didn’t seem right. Then I saw a man in the distance slightly raise his arm and so I approached him. Here I saw that the windows had been broken and there were three men there – one of whom had been injured.

“The men told me that the criminals had left the scene and I called the ambulance because of the bleeding coming from the injured man’s hand. I then asked who else was at the address, when I was told a friend of theirs was in a “bad way” in the living room.

“There was blood on the floor, on the walls and on the furniture. The second injured man was on the couch and had a leg wound and a stab wound to the chest – he was bleeding profusely and required urgent medical attention.

PC Fazackerley recalled: “When we arrived I immediately got the first aid kit out of the car and one out of the other officer’s car because there is more than one cause.

“I went into a house where there was a man who was bleeding from a leg wound covered by a jacket. I took a pressure bandage out of my first aid kit and applied it because I didn’t want to risk the blood flow getting worse.

“I applied pressure to the wound as it was still bleeding through the jacket but it wasn’t enough so that’s where I made the decision to apply the tourniquet – it was the first time I’d done that on the pitch but I felt confident. doing so because of the good first aid training we receive.”