When the worst happens on the UK’s roads, our roadside trauma cleaning teams deal with human or animal fatality and non-fatal serious accidents
As we often say in this blog, the UK road network is huge: in 2020, all vehicles on UK roads clocked up 280 billion miles. (Successive lockdowns meant that was substantially lower than the 356 billion miles travelled in pre-Covid 2019). Regardless of just how many miles are travelled in a particular year, roads have got progressively safer over the years. But sadly, serious accidents do happen on the UK road system every day. Dealing with the aftermath of road traffic accidents (RTAs) requires sensitive handling and specialist knowledge. In this blog, we’re going to look at how REACT is ideally placed to meet the challenges of roadside trauma cleaning.
Serious accidents do take place, even against a backdrop of safer roads
The UK government publishes annual statistics on reported road casualties in Great Britain (>> Link to government statistics on road traffic accidents). Compared to the situation in 1979, Britain’s roads are now much safer than they were. In 2021, there were an estimated 1,390 fatalities on Britain’s roads, against 6,352 in 1979. (There were a further 23,140 accidents which involved serious injury in 2020). This long-term decrease in the most serious RTAs has come despite roads being much busier than they were 40 years ago. In 1979, vehicles on the UK’s roads covered 159 billion miles; as mentioned above, this was nearly doubled even in the exceptional circumstances of 2020. And in international comparison too, Britain’s roads are some of the safest in the world.
Of course, this long-term trend in improved safety has several causes. It’s partly a function of car design, legislation to make seatbelts compulsory, and better education regarding shared road use. Even so, it’s come despite a huge increase in shared road use; in recent years, there’s been an increase in people commuting to work in urban areas by bicycle. Dedicated cycle and bus lanes have changed the shape of urban roads and will continue to do so in coming years.
REACT delivers sensitive and effective roadside trauma cleaning
Yet whatever the safety context, there are occasions when animal or human fatalities occur, and of course, every fatality on the road is a tragedy. Dealing with its aftermath of serious RTAs is a delicate matter for the emergency services, especially when it comes to trauma cleaning. Legislation and safety standards in the field of roadside trauma cleaning requires deep specialist knowledge. REACT is an industry leader, providing these emergency services to a substantial proportion of the UK’s police authorities, highways operators and property owners. Indeed, we’re one of the very few firms with cleaning specialists trained in dealing with trauma on the road network, including cleaning in the aftermath of serious injury and fatalities.
We have a team of highly trained, fully certified operators available across the UK 24/7. Our team will move fast to provide a respectful response in every situation, whether that’s human or animal fatality or non-fatal accidents. They’ll clean and decontaminate the location, while ensuring the body is handled and passed on with care, compassion and in accordance with the law. In the case of non-fatal accidents, we’ll safely remove hazardous, biohazardous or pathological waste.
Looking after our staff, protecting the environment
We know that dealing with situations such as these is tough work. That’s why we provide and promote free access to a telephone counselling service for our staff. And we also have our eyes on protecting the environment, as an upper-tier licensed waste carrier. What’s more, we hold ISO14001: Environmental Management, ensuring that our environmental policies and procedures are of the highest standard.
When the worst happens on the UK’s roads, REACT can take the call to deal with roadside trauma cleaning. Whether it’s a human or animal fatality, or a non-fatal serious accident, we’ll act quickly and sensitively to help the emergency services clear everything up.
To find out more about REACT Specialist Cleaning and our roadside trauma cleaning services, contact one of the team today.
Telephone: 01283 550 503
Email: info@reactplc.co.uk
Website: www.reactsc.co.uk
Post by Shaun D. Doak
Shaun is the CEO of REACT Group plc., a business dedicated to specialist cleaning, hygiene, and decontamination. He is deeply committed to making sure that every one of our company’s clients receives the highest possible level of service. An expert in HVAC and commercial and industrial cleaning methodologies, Shaun has extensive experience in the facilities management and renewable services sector.