A talented teenage footballer may not have died had paramedics not been sent to the wrong location, a coroner has said.
Luke Bennett, 17, died after he was hit by 11,000-volts when a metal pole he was playing with touched overhead power lines. But an inquest into his death was told he may have survived had paramedics not been initially sent to a college almost two miles away.
Coroner Kate Bisset has now given the North West Ambulance Service 28 days to give more detail about training given to staff to help avoid a repeat of the tragedy. She has also asked for more answers from Electricity North West whose overhead power lines at Euxton Villa FC's ground delivered the shock to Luke and his two friends.
READ MORE: Dad's tears as he tells inquest son, 17, was 'life and soul of the party'
Ms Bisset deferred issuing both organisations with a Regulation 28 requiring more action to be taken to reduce the risk of future deaths until she has more answers. The coroner described the death of Luke, from Chorley, as 'an utter, utter tragedy', telling his distraught parents: "There are no words here."
His dad, former professional footballer Tom Bennett, told the inquest he dropped Luke off around 2:30pm on March 6, 2021, to play football with his pals. At around 6pm, Luke and friends Lewis Geszke and Ben Wilcock picked up a heavy metal pole from behind a goal at the Euxton ground and stood it up on its end.
The inquest heard that the pole, which was used to weigh down the back of the net, was 7.3-metres long. The power lines running over the back of the pitch were all less than 6.6-metres high.
Other youths playing on the same pitch heard a crackle and saw flames and at the top of the pole and all three boys collapsed. But it took paramedics more than 20 minutes to reach the scene to administer first aid after being wrongly sent to Runshaw College almost two miles away.
By that time, Luke had lost the chance of being revived, a cardiac specialist told the inquest. The inquest heard a call-handler twice misheard the location from one of the youths on the 999 call.
Then they failed to use a Find My Phone button on their system to locate the real address. A defibrillator at the gate of the club did not flash up on the controller's screen because of the incorrect location.
And the handler also ordered the boys not to touch Luke for fear of being electrocuted themselves, therefore delaying any first aid they could have given. Luke's dad Tom broke down in tears as the coroner delivered her conclusion.
She told the court: "I am satisfied that if the ambulance service had attended the correct address, it's more likely than not that Luke would have survived."
Euxton Villa's chairman Graham Keyte told the inquest the metal pole, from an old perimeter fence, was used to anchor down the back of the goal net instead of pegs. He said it was heavy and needed two people to carry it.
Of the electric cables above the ground, Mr Keyte said: "Obviously you know they are there, but you just forget about them because they don't interfere with the games."
The club had even reduced the length of one pitch to make sure the lines didn't interfere and obstruct the game, the inquest heard. Asked if anyone at the club had thought the pole was a hazard, Mr Keyte answered: "No."
He added: "I just never foresaw the pole being used in any way like that. I never envisaged someone picking it up. If I had, that pole would never have been there. Electricity North West never raised that the pole was an issue on the site."
The club has around 600 active players and about 90% of those are children. They also have around 70 volunteers.
Mr Keyte told the hearing at Preston Coroners Court that nobody has ever been concerned about the safety of the pole.
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