TALENTED firefighters from Hereford and Worcester Fire and Rescue Service have won prizes in a national challenge.

The National UK Rescue Organisation Challenge's competition, this year hosted by Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service, featured six award categories including extrication that saw casualties freed from road traffic collision scenarios, water rescue, trauma, urban search and rescue, animal rescue and rope rescue.

The HWFRS trauma team gave an outstanding performance to win the trauma challenge, which consisted of being assessed on their scene safety, initial patient contact, assessment of injuries and condition, treatment of casualty and patient handover.

Other successes from HWFRS teams occurred throughout the three day competition.

HWFRS' extrication team from Ross-on-Wye finished in second place after being tested on a complicated two car, two casualty scenario.

An inaugural animal rescue challenge was held, with a combined HWFRS team from Bromyard and Pershore also taking second place, after putting their skills to the test in a large animal rescue simulation in which a horse needed rescuing from a horse box.

Evesham's HWFRS water rescue team were tasked with a scenario that tested boat handling techniques and casualty rescue ability. Although not managing to make the top three, they learned valuable techniques during the challenge.

HWFRS chief fire officer Nathan Travis said: “Competitions of this kind are an integral part of our training process as they allow our firefighters to learn new techniques, hone their existing skills and share best practice with fire services from across the UK.

"Teams have been faced with an array of challenging exercises.

"All of the scenarios that they have tackled have been carefully designed to further educate them and enhance their skills."

The service's website can be found at hwfire.org.uk.