Ambulance boss was in meeting when asked to attend crash which killed dad-of-five

Aaron Morris was left lying in the road for almost one hour after his motorbike was involved in a collision with a car in Esh Winning, County Durham, an inquest has heard

An ambulance clinical team leader was tied up in a meeting she didn't need to go to when she was asked to attend a motorcycle crash in which a dad died, an inquest heard.

Aaron Morris was left lying on the road for nearly an hour after his motorbike collided with a car in Esh Winning, County Durham. An ambulance should have arrived within 18 minutes of the initial 999 call, but Aaron waited 54 minutes for a paramedic, his inquest was told on Wednesday. The father later died at University Hospital of North Durham.

And the inquest heard North East Ambulance Service (NEAS) has since admitted there were failings in handling Aaron's case. Sam Harmel, representing Aaron's family, asked Senior Assistant Coroner, Crispin Oliver, to consider neglect in his conclusion of how Aaron died. The inquest is set to conclude today.

NEAS, praised by Aaron's family and the coroner for its transparency and honesty during the inquest, told the court a specialist medic, known as a Clinical Team Leader (CTL), was based approximately 9.1 miles away in Stanley, County Durham, at the time of the collision and could have attended on July 1, 2022.

But it emerged CTL Sarah Hall was tied up in a non-essential meeting and failed to respond to the critical incident when her colleague enquired about her availability. At the time, she was the sole active CTL, the inquest heard.

The role of CTL was relatively new within the Trust at that point. Benjamin Barber, a locality manager and paramedic with the NEAS, conceded in court that Ms Hall ought to have interrupted the meeting to attend the emergency.

When pressed by the Coroner on whether she should have "stopped that and gone", Mr Barber affirmed: "Yes". He explained to the court, "I think it was just a misunderstanding that day that when Sarah was offered that job she should have responded."

He continued, "The CTL role had only been in fruition for about six to eight weeks. The role that most of the people had moved into that position from was more of a managerial role before that day. Previously you would stand yourself down to support staff in those meetings."

It remains uncertain exactly when Ms Hall was requested to head to the scene, but if she had acted at 12.40pm, the moment when 999 call operators had enough details to consider dispatching a CLT, she might have been the first on the scene, as per the inquest's findings. The court heard that she could have arrived between 1pm and 1.13pm, which would have allowed her to call for air ambulance support.

Instead of a local service, an ambulance from the private company Ambulanz was dispatched at 1.08pm, arriving at 1.21pm. The crew was heading to Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary (RVI) with Aaron when he went into cardiac arrest and they were diverted to the University Hospital of North Durham.

Tragically, Aaron was declared dead at 6.40pm. A NEAS serious incident report uncovered following his death revealed Aaron had a staggering 95% survival chance from his injuries.

Mr Barber, who penned the report, admitted during the inquest, "There was a lot of failings through [Aaron's case] which led unfortunately to the outcome."