An off-duty Metropolitan Police officer who courageously jumped onto train tracks to give first aid to a severely injured man has won a London Police Bravery Award. On the morning of May 4, 2024, PC Dan Burdett was on his way to work from Prittlewell train station in Essex. He noticed a stationary train further down the platform, and two men who looked agitated.
He guessed that something was wrong, so he walked towards the men and saw a seriously injured man on the tracks – he realised he had been hit by the train. PC Burdett recalled: “I shouted to the men, ‘Are you on the phone to emergency services?’. I told them to request heli-med and that I needed a first aid kit.
Read more: Closed historic Dick Turpin pub could be brought back to life, plans reveal Read more: Young Billericay woman, 22, dies suddenly after collapsing playing football “I jumped down on the track and assessed the injured man. I could see his right leg had been taken off at the ankle by the train. He had a massive bleed on his head, and his leg was pumping blood, so my main thought was it was a critical bleed.
“I needed a tourniquet and I remembered from my training the kinds of things I could use. I had a quick look around and thought, ‘shoelaces’. So I took the shoelaces off his good foot.
” Luckily, there was a pen lying on the tracks, so PC Burdett fashioned a tourniquet out of the shoelace and the pen, which helped him tighten it around the man’s leg. Eventually he managed to get t.
