Charity Magazine Article
The North West Air Ambulance (NWAA) charity published an article about my rapid transportation to hospital in their newsletter – see page 6. I’ve included snippets of the article in the sections below.
Keen cyclist, forty-five-year-old David Wozny was enjoying a thirty-mile bike ride from his home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire on Friday 31st July 2015, when he was hit by a car near to Nantwich in Cheshire.
A severe head injury rendered David unconscious. It was apparent to paramedics when they arrived on the scene that his injuries were life threatening. With a head injury requiring urgent expert care, the paramedics made the decision that David should fly by air ambulance to the Royal Stoke hospital in Stoke-on-Trent.
David always used a GPS tracking app on his mobile phone when out on his bicycle. On the day of the accident, it recorded his cycling route AND the flight in the air ambulance to the hospital. The blue line on the map between annotations 1 and 3 illustrate David cycling along roads towards Nantwich. The straight line between annotations 3 and 5 illustrate his air ambulance flight to the Royal Stoke hospital.
GPS data recorded the duration of the flight, demonstrating that the fifteen-mile journey which may have taken approximately thirty or forty minutes in regular traffic by land, took just nine minutes by air. The speed of being transported by helicopter (miles 16 to 30) compared to David’s cycling speed (miles 1 to 16) is illustrated in the graphic.
David explains: “Before my accident I was a highflyer professionally speaking, but after high flying in a helicopter I’ve only recently recovered well enough [July 2017] to resume professional work again. I’d learned that I desperately wanted to feel useful again, so I took on many volunteering activities as soon as I was able to (about twelve months after my accident) – including with the Midlands Air Ambulance Charity. I subsequently worked for the Royal Voluntary Service (RVS) in a befriending role and then at my local library in an IT buddy role on the shared computers. In these latter roles I gained the confidence that I could get out and about and do useful stuff.”
Video Acknowledgement
I recorded a selfie video, where I expressed my respect and appreciation of air ambulance services.
Midlands Air Ambulance Public Event
In July 2022, the Midlands Air Ambulance held an open day at one of their three airbases – in Tatenhill, Staffordshire (near to Burton-on-Trent)
The following map illustrates the regions covered by the Midlands Air Ambulance emergency services.
