ONLY one ambulance in Wiltshire was available to respond to the Mannings’ 999 calls, an inquest was told.

On the Saturday night last October when Lynda Manning fell and hit her head, 12 of the 13 ambulance crews on duty were having their legally-required break - and the other one wasn’t in Swindon.

Paul Birkett-Wendes, South West Ambulance Service Trust county commander for Wiltshire, explained: “In a normal shift, ambulance crews will work 12 hours with two meal breaks.

INQUEST: Lynda's family heartbroken - 12 months on

INQUEST: Ambulance delay did not contribute to death, coroner says

“The start of each crew’s shift is staggered and their 30-minute meal breaks can be taken within two two-hour windows, so that the ambulances don’t go on breaks at the same time. During hours of high demand, they don’t have a break and go from emergency to emergency.

“After a certain point, they have to have a protected break and can only respond to the highest-level emergencies.

“If they still end up working through that time, they stop and don’t attend to any emergencies.

“At the time of the calls, a number of ambulances in the area had reached the point where they had worked for such a long time that they were in need of a protected break and must return to their stations.”

The highest category of emergency is Purple.

Lynda’s call was originally classed as Amber, then upgraded to Red after the second call, so crews on break wouldn’t have been able to respond to her.

The only active ambulance at the time was said to be near Trowbridge.

Lynda’s widower Richard told the Adver: “In all my years, I’d never had to phone an ambulance before and the one time I needed one, they failed me.

“I have a lot of respect for the ambulance service but it’s atrociously-managed and under-resourced.

“I blame the government for this, their austerity policy has consequences.”

Kevin Morse, partner of Lynda’s daughter Debbie, said: “Instead of giving us false hope, we would have preferred that they’d been honest and said no-one’s coming.

“We could have got her in the car a lot earlier and taken her to hospital in five minutes instead of waiting around for an hour and that could have made a difference.”

Debbie’s sister Paula said: “People need to be aware of the state of the ambulance service, more pressure is being put on the NHS and it’s at breaking point.

“How many more people need to die before the government gives the NHS more funding?

“I hope I never have to have an ambulance called for me, the thought fills me with fear.”

Paul Grzatorex, deputy head of operations at SWAST clinical hubs, said at the inquest: “On Fridays and Saturdays, 2,600 calls is considered extreme, but we’re seeing some days with 3,400 calls."

Mr Birkett-Wendes added: “We’ve undertaken an external company to look at what we resources we need and it’s identified a shortfall in the number of ambulances we need to meet standard response times, and a shortfall of frontline staff.

“We’re seeking £12 million of funding for this which could be ready for agreement in November. We’re also looking to recruit 135 paramedics, including 60 from New Zealand, to fill that gap.”