FOI 25-436 SAS Major Incidents
Freedom of Information Request
- Reference
- FOI 25-436 SAS Major Incidents
- Request Date
- 03 Oct 2025
- Response Date
- 17 Oct 2025
- Information Requested
I am doing a study into the educational importance of major incident training for student paramedics - I am looking specifically for how many major incidents your trust has declared in the last 2 years (01/10/2023-01/10/2025) and if possible broken down into incident type, ie natural disaster, bombing, MTFA incident, RTC etc. The data I have been sourcing online is conflicting with NHS reporting not seeming to include several known high profile major incidents, such as the Manchester arena bombing for example. This data will be used to formulate my post graduate thesis on simulation based major incident training
- Response
Under section 17(1) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS) can confirm that it does not hold the requested information in a format that would allow us to accurately report the number and type of major incidents declared during the specified period.
To provide this information, a bespoke report would need to be created or a manual search of incident records undertaken. Both approaches would be resource-intensive and exceed the cost threshold set out under FOISA.
In line with guidance from the Scottish Information Commissioner, public authorities are not required to create new information to respond to a request. FOISA applies only to information that is already held at the time the request is received.
Additional Information:
The Scottish Ambulance Service follows the nationally agreed doctrine for declaring and responding to major incidents, as published by the Scottish Government. This guidance is publicly available and can be accessed via the following link:
Preparing for Emergencies: Guidance for Health Boards in Scotland (2023)
For context, the definition of a Major Incident currently used by SAS is:
“Any event which, due to its perceived potential or actual severity, complexity, location or the number or type of patients it produces or requires special arrangements to be implemented by the Service.”
