YORK Rescue Boat volunteers have been practising a special form of CPR to ensure they're prepared for the worst after saving people from the city's rivers.

A spokeswoman tweeted that a team member was given a ‘task’ to do last night, with four minutes of compression only CPR.

"This is just over half the target response time for ambulance services to attend a category 1 call - an immediate response to a life threatening condition, such as a cardiac or respiratory arrest.

"All of the team can perform Full CPR but this ‘task’ is designed to concentrate on fine tuning the speed and depth of compressions.

Good result,"she added.