Gang halts air ambulance take-off

A helicopter ambulance may be forced to demand a police guard when it lands - to stop youths clambering on board.

The move was prompted after teenagers tried to scramble over the aircraft and refused to move after it landed in Bilton, near Rugby.

Paramedics were inside the helicopter treating a woman with serious injuries.

Operations manager Danny Hopkins, of Warwickshire & Northamptonshire Air Ambulance service, said the youths' antics were extremely dangerous.

'Poorly patients'

He told BBC WM in Coventry & Warwickshire: "The issues are quite serious.

"At the moment we are having a spate of incidents where people are refusing to move. Not only are they risking the lives of the patients, who are already extremely poorly, they are also putting their own lives at risk as well."

He added: "If you get hit by the aircraft's rotor, it will kill you - there is no second chance. It will also render the aircraft non-operational and it will have to be kept where it is and checked by maintenance staff before we can move it."

Warwickshire & Northamptonshire Air Ambulance is a registered charity based at Coventry Airport and provides emergency air cover for more than a million people Coventry, Warwickshire and Northamptonshire.