AN OKEHAMPTON man completed his last shift with the ambulance service last Friday after more than 35 years helping to save lives. Peter Ingham, who will be 60 this month, has been with the ambulance service for 37 years, 30 of them based in Okehampton. Peter said: ?I have enjoyed my work. I love it as much now as I did when I first joined.? Peter said he spent a lot of time in hospital at an early age, following an accident and this may have proved an inspiration in his choice of career: ?When I was six years old, I fell off a bicycle which put me in hospital for four years. When I came out of hospital I had to wear a leg iron for quite a long time.? Peter said he was grateful for everything the nurses and hospital staff did for him, and he felt that joining the ambulance service was a way of giving something back for the great care he had received. One of the most memorable emergency situations he had been called to, was when Meldon Dam was being constructed and he had to help rescue a man who had fallen more than 60 feet from the tower at the top of the dam to the foundations. Despite serious injuries, the man lived to tell the tale. A more recent memory was of a young boy falling into a bath of scolding hot water and receiving severe burns all over his body. ?I was on duty on that fateful day. We are friends of the family now I am pleased to say,? Peter said. ?You have your good times, you have your bad times, where people don?t survive. The joy for me is when I have taken someone to hospital with a medical complaint or from a road accident, and then you see them later on crutches or walking around and you know the part you played in helping that person onto the road to recovery.? Peter said the job could be traumatic, but there was a good team spirit among the ambulance staff in Okehampton which helped people to cope with the injuries they treated. Peter began his career as relief ambulance driver in Tiverton, before moving to Okehampton as leading ambulanceman in charge of the station in 1976. He said he had seen many changes in the ambulance service in the last 40 years. ?When I first joined all we had was a mixture of oxygen. We didn?t have a quarter of the equipment we have now. We would have been lucky if we even knew what a defibrillator was, let alone carry one.? Peter did his last shift between 4pm and 2am last Friday, though he does not officially retire until the day before his 60th birthday later this month. Ambulance crews in Okehampton currently work ten-hour shifts, regularly through the night, so Peter said he was looking forward to spending more time with his family. He also plans to do some travelling, he will be visiting Germany this summer and also plans to visit New Zealand at a later date.
