Within minutes of the sickening bang that signals another road traffic accident, emergency medical teams from the ambulance and fire service are on the spot.

They witness harrowing scenes of human carnage that most of us hope we will never have to see.

And while the emergency medical technicians (EMTs) from the fire and ambulance services behave with professional calm, there are some nightmares that will always haunt them.

Chief EMT at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital Raymond Santucci has almost 30 years' experience, but he will never forget one case about 15 years ago when a man was killed by a drunk driver at Scaur Hill.

"I've seen some quite messy ones but that one I will take home with me, even when I retire," he said.

"He was broken in a couple of pieces and we immediately thought he was gone. Both of his legs were still on but with the body was so limp and with the facial injuries he was so badly broken up. It will always be with me.

"When I go home I don't really take much of work home with me, but that one really stands out."

His colleague, David Pilgrim, said there were crashes resulting in arms and legs being ripped off and "horror stories of heads that are supposed to be facing forwards, facing backwards. The accidents you see in the US, we've seen them here. "The worst thing I've seen was massive major facial and head injuries, but I can't even enlighten you as to what the injuries were because they were so hard to describe."

As if the stress of seeing these horrific injuries on a daily basis was not bad enough, ambulance crews are increasingly having to deal with hostility from crowds gathered at the accident scenes.

"A lot of the time when you get there, the crowd are very aggressive and they don't think we are doing enough quickly enough to pick them up. You have to hope there is a policeman there," said Mr. Santucci. "The aggression seems to be a common thing."

He said it was probably because friends or relatives of the victim were worried and wanted to ensure they received the best treatment.

But help is on hand for harassed crews as King Edward VII Memorial Hospital has an in-house counselling service for staff run by Doris DeCosta.

Mr. Santucci said: "Some of the guys are very macho and don't want to talk, but there are times when you have low periods and she will come in for maybe two or three days and ask if you want to talk.

"She won't let up on us just because we are being macho. If I'm real bad, I'll be the first to go to Doris and David is the same. She will recommend a few days off if she thinks its warranted, and no questions will be asked."

Mrs. DeCosta, the manager of the employee assistance programme at the hospital, said: "We do one-on-one debriefings after say a fatal road traffic accident and give them recovery skills to help them recover to get back to work.

"It is valuable to staff because they know if they go to an accident and see a child die, it's pretty horrific and it doesn't just affect the family, it affects everyone else involved.

"We call them secondary victims of an accident and we try to tell them it is quite normal to experience after this."

Vance Hassell and Josonne Smith are fire service EMTs at Port Royal station who have attended harrowing road crashes for seven years.

Mr. Smith admits it does have a toll on his personal life. After a few years in the job, he realised he could no longer watch blue light dramas.

"I've seen a ten-year-old on a bike who had no helmet who had severe brain damage and died a few days later," he said.

"That was pretty heart-breaking because he was so young and it made me realise just how important it is wear helmets.

"When we are doing our job, we don't think about what we see because our main objective is to relieve pain, but it does affect us on a personal level."

Mr. Hassell said: "The thing that really gets to me is children. I don't have any children of my own but just being able to play with my nephews and nieces, it brings it home to you."

Both officers are appealing to young riders to slow down, and Mr. Smith has given talks to members of the Bermuda Motor Cycle Racing Club, to warn them if they want to speed, not to do it on the roads.

Mr. Smith said: "Don't think it can't happen to you. Everyone thinks it won't happen to them and it is only by the grace of God that I have made it this far and haven't killed myself or someone's child.

"If you don't think about yourself, think about someone else's little child, or mother or daughter or granny on the street being put in danger for no reason at all."