Member Article

Fergusons Transport delivers 75 Covid-19 hospital beds to NHS Nightingale Hospital Birmingham

Fergusons Transport, the largest privately owned haulier in the North East of England, has transported 75 specialist Covid-19 beds to the new NHS Nightingale Hospital in Birmingham.

The beds, ordered and designed by healthcare specialists Accora Ltd. , have been manufactured by Universal Wolf in Blyth, and will support patients at the newly opened Midlands hospital, based at the National Exhibition Centre (NEC). The Nightingale Hospital in Birmingham will have 500 beds with capacity to increase beds to 4,000. It is based in the National Exhibition Centre to cover the Midlands. The beds were successfully delivered by Fergusons on Good Friday.

Universal Wolf is continuing to manufacture the COVID-19 beds for other NHS Nightingale Hospitals. Over the Easter weekend Universal Wolf and Fergusons Transport also delivered 100 beds for the NHS Louisa Jordan, Glasgow’s Nightingale Hospital based in the Scottish Events Campus on Easter Monday.

The whole team at both Fergusons and Universal Wolf have worked through the Easter weekend to ensure the beds have been built and delivered on time.

Stuart Arkle, Director, Fergusons Transport Ltd, comments:

“Can I say how delighted we at Ferguson’s are by being given the opportunity to work with another Blyth valley company in these extraordinary times. Universal Wolf are one of most respected and flexible fabrication companies in England and the project of supporting the delivery of the emergency care beds to the nightingale sites is one of real satisfaction.

We are proud that our area has been able to show that we can fulfil every aspect of the supply chain to combat this dreadful disease. From concept to design, manufacture and delivery we have met every challenge head on!“

Martin McKenna, Commercial Director, Universal Wolf, comments:

“It’s fantastic to be involved with the NHS projects at this difficult time. We’d like to thank Acorra for trusting us to deliver the critical care beds that are urgently required for the Nightingale Hospitals. We would like to thank all of our suppliers who have delivered all the raw materials required at incredibly short notice, and we would like to especially thank all of skilled workforce who have worked tirelessly over the last few days. We are very fortunate to have such a committed work force in, and around, Blyth. The people of Blyth should be very proud of this achievement. I’m especially pleased that we have had the opportunity to link up with another great local company, Ferguson Transport, who have come to the support of the NHS by collecting and delivering beds to the Nightingale Hospitals in Birmingham and Glasgow when other companies could not.”

Alan Ferguson OBE, Executive Chairman & Owner, Fergusons Transport Ltd, comments:

“I am delighted that we could help towards the excellent work that the NHS is doing during this difficult time. Everyone at Fergusons is here to help in any way we can, and I am so proud of the hardworking team we have”

Tim Drake, Operations Director, Accora Ltd, comments:

“Universal Wolf are one of Accora’s key manufacturing partners, who have helped get production capacity of the Covid19 bed up to 3500 per week, from a standing start 2 weeks ago, when the bed was first designed – a truly incredible effort that shows what UK manufacturing is capable of! This bed is a rapidly deployable, cost effective Covid19 Treatment bed, which will help give the NHS the bed capacity that is needed at this time of crisis.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Nick Till .