Trains as ambulances/clinics

[theageofthetra]

I have been reading an interesting post on an Aussie heritage site which shows the public health trains which used to visit remote cattle stations and other rural areas. The one shown checked childrens health & provided vaccinations.

It made me wonder if we ever used the railways for this sort of purpose in the UK? Say in some remote part of the Dales or in the highlands, roads could be impassable during snow but a train may get through- were the railways used as an ambulance to to get a patient to a major hospital?

I'll exclude military ambulance trains from this as they are better known.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Isn't there a charity called "the smile train" or something where they (the charity workers, including medical staff) travel around the Indian railway network doing cleft palate correction surgery?

 

[krus_aragon]

I expect this might happen ad-hoc at a quarry or mine, to get an injured person out. The Quarryman's Hospital at Llanberis springs to mind.

 

[Tim R-T-C]

On the Borders Line in Scotland, the small community at Riccarton Junction was accessible only by train and so people requiring hospital treatment would be sent by any available train to the nearest towns.

Apparently even the pilot locomotive was called into use on at least one occasion as a railbound ambulance.

There are details on this at the local museum in Newcastleton.

 

[theageofthetra]

I guess these days air ambulances are used but there must be days in the highlands and elsewhere where winds and low cloud cover could prevent their use.

 

[randyrippley]

On many of the BR Mk1 compartment coaches, and some of the early Mk2, the central compartment was set up for possible use in carrying a stretcher patient. On the corridor side the middle doorway was directly opposite the compartment entrance to allow direct access from the platform, while on the other side the whole window could be lifted up to allow a stretcher to be slid in. There were a pair of thumb catches low down left/right on the window frame.
No idea if the facility was ever used in anger, but I can remember seeing the catches on Mk1 coaches on the Waterloo-Exeter.

 

[randyrippley]

A postscript to my last
A photo of a stretcher window on a Mk1 composite (not mine) https://www.flickr.com/photos/70023venus2009/5888641136/

it seems only corridor composites had them

 

[randyrippley]

pps
This photo shows the door arrangement from the other side on a similar coach
https://www.flickr.com/photos/robertcwp/4674164777/in/set-72157603653607671/

note the central two-part door arrangement to enable the width for a stretcher.
On another forum its mentioned that the original TransPennine Swindon DMUs also had them

 

[30907]

A postscript to my last
A photo of a stretcher window on a Mk1 composite (not mine) https://www.flickr.com/photos/70023venus2009/5888641136/

it seems only corridor composites had them

I suspect because so many trains had them in their formation?

 

[theageofthetra]

Did MK1 derived EMU's have this feature?

 

[Phil.]

The Eastern region (southern area ie below Doncaster) had a Gresley coach fitted out with the necessary which travelled around to carry out staff medicals. It stopped being used - I believe - around 1973.

 

[randyrippley]

Did MK1 derived EMU's have this feature?

I can't answer that - I've no idea. But were there any Mk1 corridor composite EMU coaches?

 

[Busaholic]

I guess these days air ambulances are used but there must be days in the highlands and elsewhere where winds and low cloud cover could prevent their use.

Darkness too in some areas.

 

[Ianno87]

Isn't there a charity called "the smile train" or something where they (the charity workers, including medical staff) travel around the Indian railway network doing cleft palate correction surgery?

I thought Smile Train actually flew round Africa in a plane doing that, but you could well be right!

 

[headshot119]

Snowdon Mountain Railway provided a train to go up to the summit a couple of years back to take mountain rescue to a young woman suffering from an asthma attack. I think the story at the time was the helimed attempted the rescue but was beaten back by the strong winds. I suppose this would count as an ambulance train as they brought her back down in it.

 

[185143]

Saw a 142 I was waiting for get used as an ambulance when someone had jumped in front of a train heading in the opposite direction once. Train was full of ambulance crews who detrained when the train came into the station, with the injured individual on a stretcher.

Is this common procedure? Thankfully it is the only time I have directly witnessed such a thing!

 

[notverydeep]

During the two world wars ambulance cars and whole trains were set up to deal with casualties returning from the front. Some of these would have worked to regular schedules between ports and stations conveniently located for destination hospitals where soldiers were sent to convalesce.

There are two Pullman cars (Maid of Kent and Elmira) located at Ravenglass station in Cumbria. They were first moved there by British Rail for use as camping coaches in the 1960s and continue in that role today owned by the Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway.

These were completed during the First World War and used for some years as ambulance coaches between the channel ports and London. This continued for sometime after the end of hostilities as wounded, first treated for their injuries nearer the battlefield were gradually repatriated. Only then did they finally take up their designed role in Pullman trains. There would have been significant numbers of vehicles in this role at that time.

I recommend them as an excellent place for a rail enthusiast with a younger children to stay. Steam trains to the hills and class 37s on the coast. Plenty of wildlife, hill walking and scenery plus good pubs as well. Details are on the RER's website...