Swing rescues are no child’s play warn fire service

The advice comes after South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue (SYFR) revealed firefighters have rescued 16 people from children’s play equipment in the last five years.

Most of the unusual rescues involved children getting wedged in swings they are too big for, like older children and teenagers using toddler’s swings in public parks.

Other incidents involved youngsters getting stuck in things like slides and climbing frames.

These rescues fall under the 1,400 special service incidents SYFR attend each year, including freeing people from road traffic collisions, water rescues, flooding, animal rescues and lift releases.

Head of emergency response Steve Helps, said: “It's simple really.

“Parents should keep an eye on their children to make sure they are using play equipment which is appropriate to their age, as nearly all of the rescues involved children and teenagers using play equipment they are too big for.

“But it's also worth remembering that rescues like this form another, unusual aspect of our rescue work, on top of the many fires and traffic collisions we attend each year. “People probably don’t associate the fire service with rescues like this, but they often require specialist skills and equipment and we wonder which other service could help if our resources weren't available.”

There were four play equipment rescues in 2013/14.

Two were in Sheffield, one in Doncaster and one in Rotherham, which occured on Coronation Park, Muglet Lane, Maltby when a 14 year-old was stuck in a child’s swing