EMERGENCY services helped rescue dead and injured people from a stricken tour boat on the River Ouse in York today.

But, thankfully, the 180-person operation was just a training exercise for the York River Ouse Safety Advisory Group - which includes North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue, North Yorkshire Police, the Yorkshire Ambulance Service’s HART team, City of York Council, York Rescue Boat, the Canal and River Trust and City Cruises York.

The exercise involved a pleasure boat which had been damaged by a falling tree, injuring several passengers, and rendering it immobile at a hard-to-reach point of the river, close to Bishopthorpe Palace.

Councillor Andrew Waller, interim deputy leader of the council, said: “This is about testing the plans, the equipment and the training to ensure that everything comes together when we need it.

“There’s a wide range of emergency services, but also civilians. There are 180 people in total involved, it’s such a large exercise that this is done every three to five years rather than annually, and it really is the worst case scenario that can be drawn up for this situation on the Ouse.”

More than 50 passengers were rescued from the stricken boat with varying degrees of ‘injury’, and taken by boat to the nearby Bishopthorpe Marina where they were assessed.

Colin Hunter, of the fire service, said the exercise was vital for public safety, and one of the biggest in recent years.

He said: “We have a number of people who are injured, some are in the water, and some are still on the boat, but all of those people need to be rescued and taken to a place of safety. We’ve got the river, we’ve got the craft on the river with all the casualties, we’ve got the rescue boat, and all the other emergency services, so this is very, very realistic. It’s not very often we get the opportunity to train with a scenario such as this, so we have to make the most of it.”

Mr Hunter said the relationships between the emergency and civilian services had changed greatly since the last similar exercise several years ago, and feedback from the event would be assessed at a later date.

York Rescue Boat, which is run as a charity, was one of the civilian groups taking part in the event.

David Wilson, training manager with YRB, said crews had helped on the water, but also maintained safety around the exercise itself.

He said: “It’s the first major exercise we’ve been involved in at York, and it’s getting our expertise to assist the operation here.

“Full time emergency services see this kind of incident either for exercise or for real quite often, so as a voluntary organisation it’s great for us to come down and see how the exercise unfolds, how the teamwork comes together and the various principles they use, and it’s great training for us to be involved in such a large exercise.”