A Lifesaving Opportunity
Have you ever used What3words? Do you know what it is?
I’ve known about it for years and used it occasionally, but today we had need to use it in an emergency.
If you don’t know, What3words is a “system designed to identify any location on the surface of Earth with a resolution of approximately 3 metres (9.8 ft).”
It’s remarkably simple and is recognised by the emergency services as a way to get a location easily.
As we were walking along the beach between Overstrand and Cromer (a beautiful part of the world) an elderly gentleman caught up to us as his friend was in trouble and he didn’t have a mobile phone.
A 79 year of woman had been stung by a bee and collapsed.
Since there were no landmarks to point to, I used What3words to identify our location and we passed this information to the coastguard and the ambulance service.
Due to the secluded location, and with very little access; there was no possibility of reaching us overland, by ambulance or car, or anything on wheels. It was an hour until paramedics and coastguard team arrived.
We told them what had happened then left the lady in their capable hands.
Having done our bit, we continued our walk to Cromer.
Whilst having lunch we saw a team prepare to receive a patient, and not long afterward, a small RNLI inshore boat arrived.
It was quite amazing to see the services spring into action, and it wasn’t long before she was ashore and in the hands of the paramedics in the ambulance.
We certainly didn’t set out to be lifesavers, and whilst I didn’t need to perform CPR or first aid, had we not been present the outcome could have been very different.
If you haven’t used What3words, you can find out more, download it and use it for free here