[22 June 2007]

Working with the local community to achieve safer roads.

In a bid to reduce the number of road traffic collisions throughout East Sussex and the City of Brighton & Hove, fire crews from The Ridge Community Fire Station in Hastings have teamed up with Wilmoths Citroen. The car dealership has agreed to brand three of its courtesy cars with the slogan ‘speed kills, slow down’ in a bid to tackle the amount of accidents on the road and reduce the number of associated casualties.

The number of accidents on the road in the UK has dramatically increased in recent years. Every year there are 300,000 road casualties in the UK. With that in mind, one of the main objectives for East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service is to reduce road deaths through education and partnership working and also to reduce the psychological effect of a road traffic accident on both the casualty and the rescuer.

The courtesy cars will be launched at Wilmoths Citroen, Telham, Hastings Road, Nr. Hastings on Friday July 6th at 4.30pm and will subsequently be driven on our roads by customers of Wilmoths Citroen. Fire crews from The Ridge Community Fire Station will be attending the launch along with Senior Fire Officers from East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service.

John Keen, Blue Watch from the Ridge Community Fire Station, Hastings, had the initial idea of working with Wilmoths and explained; “We hope the courtesy cars are seen by as many people as possible. East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service is absolutely dedicated to reducing the number of road traffic collisions, road deaths and serious injuries on our roads. In order to do this, we need to increase awareness of the dangers and really make people think about the serious repercussions of speeding.”

[Allison Gilson]