More officers have been trained to respond to and investigate the most serious road traffic collisions.
Previously, only members of the force’s Serious Collision Investigation Unit were qualified to take control of incidents resulting in death and/or serious injury.
Additional officers from across the force’s Operational Support department have now received enhanced training to optimise their decision-making in the immediate aftermath of incidents.
The training, recently delivered to 31 new officers, included input from forensic collision investigators and Home Office pathologists.
Significantly, it has already proved its worth in the real world, after one of the newly qualified officers took expert control of a recent multi-car collision in Nottingham where a man lost his life.
Detective Inspector Jamie Moore, head of Roads Policing at Nottinghamshire Police, said:
“Serious road traffic collisions are some of the most chaotic and challenging scenes any officer will be asked to deploy to.
“In the moments after a collision, our officers’ primary responsibility is to save life and limb, but they also need to be aware that they may be operating in a crime scene where their actions and treatment of evidence will prove vital to the subsequent investigations.
“Their decisions in those moments – such as what they record or what they move – are of the utmost importance and it is vital they get them right.
“Existing members of the Serious Collision Investigation Unit have traditionally been the lead responders to these incidents but are rarely the first officers on the scene.
“Whilst those officers will always still attend and retain primacy, most often it is other roads policing colleagues or armed response officers who are among the very first on the scene, so this is about empowering them to make the right decisions in the immediate aftermath of an incident.
“Primarily that means ensuring injured people get the attention they need, that the scene is properly preserved, and that all necessary evidence is protected.
“As a result of this additional training, we have more than doubled the number of qualified officers and have already seen the benefit of this training in the real world.”
