Railway stations and trains across the north of England and Scotland will have life-saving defibrillators installed, to help customers who suffer a heart attack or cardiac arrest.
All 19 TransPennine Express (TPE) managed stations will be equipped with at least one of the devices under the new roll out. Busier stations including Manchester Airport and Huddersfield will receive two defibrillators. Alongside this, all 44 of their brand-new Nova fleets of trains will also have defibrillators installed on board.
The devices will be prominently located in stations with access using a key code available from the local ambulance services. To ensure that any member of staff or a customer can make use of them until emergency services arrive, each defibrillator provides audio guidance to talk users through the process.
A defibrillator is a device which delivers a high-energy electric shock to help restore a stable heart rhythm. After a cardiac arrest, every minute without CPR and defibrillation reduces someone’s chance of survival by 10 per cent making the devices truly life-saving for train passengers.
Funding for the TPE defibrillators was provided by a collaboration between Network Rail, TfGM, as part of the Greater Manchester Rail Stations Alliance Partnership and Grand Central. With TfGM contributing towards Manchester Airport and Stalybridge and Grand Central contributing towards Thirsk and Northallerton.
Charlie French, Accessibility and Integration Manager at TransPennine Express commented: “We are very happy to be able to provide a defibrillator at the majority of our stations as well as on-board our upcoming Nova trains. We want all our customers to feel safe when they travel, with the comfort of knowing that should they need it, a defibrillator is on hand to provide life-saving treatment until the emergency services arrive”
Stations that will receive defibrillators are: Barnetby, Brough, Cleethorpes, Dewsbury, Grimsby Town, Huddersfield, Hull, Malton, Manchester Airport, Middlesbrough, Northallerton, Scarborough, Scunthorpe, Seamer, Selby, Stalybridge, Thirsk, Thornaby and Yarm.
