On the evening of Wednesday, July 16, a passenger fell ill aboard a train at Cheltenham Spa station, prompting emergency response and causing significant disruption to rail services. The incident occurred shortly before 9 p.m., leading to delays and cancellations as the situation was addressed.
The South Western Ambulance Service responded promptly, deploying a double-crewed land ambulance to the scene. The patient was then transported to Gloucester Royal Hospital for further medical care. A spokesperson for the ambulance service confirmed, “We were called at 19:55hrs on Wednesday 16 July to an incident in Cheltenham. One patient was conveyed by land ambulance to Gloucester Royal Hospital.”
Despite the emergency, British Transport Police confirmed they had no official record of the incident. National Rail took to X (formerly Twitter) at 9 p.m. to inform passengers that some lines were temporarily closed due to the medical emergency, resulting in train cancellations and delays of up to 30 minutes.
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Several CrossCountry routes were impacted, including services between Cardiff Central and Birmingham New Street/Nottingham, Plymouth and Birmingham New Street/Edinburgh/Leeds, and Bristol Temple Meads and Edinburgh. By 9:40 p.m., all services had resumed normal operations.