Charlie Gauvain

In April 2002, Charlie was driving to Laxfield in Suffolk for a meeting when he was involved in a road traffic collision and needed the help of the new East Anglian Air Ambulance.“I was driving to a meeting with Frank, the founder of Eye Film. I was taking him a new digital stills camera we’d just bought, and we were going to discuss a drama that we were developing.

I was driving on a country road in the Stradbroke area beside a field of rapeseed, which I remember thinking had grown really tall, when a van travelling in the opposite direction misjudged a corner and lost control – heading directly at me. We both braked but we collided. I suspect the combined impact still would have been in the region of 80mph.

My car was spun 90 degrees and ended up in a field next to the road. I think I must have blacked out for a few seconds. When I came round, the seatbelt and airbags had done their job and had saved my life because the car was completely crumpled. One of the vehicle recovery workers later said that when he saw the car, he didn’t expect that anyone would have come out it alive.
 

 
 
I was trapped in my seat, and it felt like a while before help arrived. In reality, it was probably only around twenty minutes before the police, fire and rescue service and ambulance service arrived. The new air ambulance was called to the scene too.

The fire and rescue service cut off the door of the car. When I was removed from the car and put onto the stretcher, the emergency services tried not to move my neck in case of any spinal damage. The decision was taken to transfer me by the air ambulance helicopter to the James Paget Hospital. I was strapped in and remember feeling claustrophobic in the small space while the paramedics calmly assessed me and chatted to me throughout the flight. I was their second patient that day, and the journey to hospital by air was much faster than if I had been transferred by road.

Having stayed in touch and worked with the air ambulance over the years, the difference of what it was like then to the difference it is today is quite incredible. It’s like having your emergency A&E turning up on site.

It’s not a service that’s paid for through the NHS, and it is through donations and it’s through support. Having the best medical care, as soon as you can possibly get there, is something we all want, we all need. Anyone who can donate to them, anyone who can get involved with them, should.”