Congratulations to our brilliant bravery nominees
PC Chelsea Rudge and PC Christopher Beevers were South Yorkshire Police’s nominees for the National Police Bravery Awards 2016. They were nominated after fighting off and arresting a murder suspect while trying to rescue an unconscious man from a fire.
They talked about their experience as they prepared to go into a reception at Downing Street with all the other nominees from England and Wales.
Q: How do you feel being at Downing Street?
PC Chelsea Rudge: Quite excited. It’s a new day, isn’t it, for everyone. So, looking forward to it.
PC Christopher Beevers: I think it’s a great honour. I feel very proud to be coming here. I’ve never been to Downing Street, I don’t think I’ll ever get this close again, looking forward to it.
Q: Tell us about your nomination.
PC Christopher Beevers: It came in as someone just running down the road calling for help. As soon as we got there it was clear that there was a male who we thought was unconscious in the doorway. Myself and Chelsea, we got him to the middle of the road, Chelsea’s done CPR and then two males that were with him initially who turned out to be suspects for the murder in the end, ran into a flat above that was full of smoke, so I’ve gone in to evacuate them, got those out and I’ve evacuated some nearby flats. Meanwhile Chelsea’s been trying to give lifesaving treatment to the, unfortunately, fatally injured male.
Q: You’re there doing CPR, trying to save somebody’s life. What was going through your mind as that was happening?
PC Chelsea Rudge: I was mainly trying to concentrate on two things, because obviously when we first got there, there was just myself and Chris, there was no one else, no other resources, even travelling we were first pulled up. I wanted to try and do my best for this gentleman, but I also had to think about my colleague and obviously helping get other people out of the house, so my mind was in two places all the time. But you just do what you do.
Q: And obviously you were running into danger where other people would run away. You hear a lot of police officers say, ‘It’s part of the job’. What do you think about it?
PC Christopher Beevers: I think we’d both say the same. You don’t have time to think. We’re just first on scene, there’s someone who’s fatally injured, you don’t know how bad it is, and your first priority is just saving life.
PC Chelsea Rudge: It’s just instinct.
PC Christopher Beevers: Fear doesn’t come into it until afterwards when you kind of think about what could have happened.