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Firefighters slam attacks by yobs

Oct 11 2009 Sunday Sun

Firefighters fight to bring flames under control at a lorry fire on the A1

FIREFIGHTERS in the North are being attacked by yobs more than five times every week, a Sunday Sun probe today reveals.

The crews’ efforts on life-saving rescue operations are being hampered by callous louts.

Firefighters are pelted with rocks, stones and fireworks, verbally abused and even physically attacked on a regular basis.

Our investigation reveals there were 606 serious incidents recorded over the last two years - equivalent to five attacks every week.

Today, a North fire chief slammed the yobs who are diverting our fire service’s valuable time and energy.

Tom Capeling, Assistant Chief Fire Officer for Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service, said: “We are aware of these attacks and those people should know we will always seek to prosecute offenders.

“It distracts from the job that we are trying to do and costs time, effort and money.

“It means we will be delayed getting to an incident, or we will have to spend more time at relatively non-serious incidents like rubbish fires because we are having to deal with this sort of thing.”

Tyne and Wear recorded the highest number of incidents over the last two years with 446.

Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue and Cleveland Fire Brigade were next in line with 76 and 73 attacks respectively.

Northumberland saw the least number of incidents, with just 11 over that time.

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