Are you prepared for emergency situations in English?
I'm Oliver and welcome back to the Easy English Podcast.
And today we are going to talk about a very important and slightly more serious topic.
English for emergencies.
While we hope to never be in a dangerous or bad situation, knowing some basic phrases in English around these more serious emergencies can be a great help, and it can even save lives.
And today I'm going to try something a bit different to teach you these phrases.
Instead of just listing phrases and words, I'm going to put them into realistic situations to help you remember what to say if you ever need to call for help or tell someone that you're in distress.
But first, as always, we are going to look at some key vocabulary.
And this section of the podcast, I tell you five key words that I want you to learn, if you don't know them already, and to listen out for during the episode.
This helps you to practice your active listening.
And remember if you're new or you've been listening for a while, make sure you're following or subscribed to the podcast.
It really helps us to grow and keep on improving.
Let's look at our key vocabulary.
I will give you the word and then the definition and perhaps with a little example as well.
The first keyword for today is, of course, emergency.
Emergency.
This is a noun.
It means a serious or unexpected situation that needs some kind of immediate action.
For example, a car accident is a medical emergency.
Our next keyword today is location.
Location, and this is a noun, and it means a place or position.
For example, please tell the police your exact location, tell them where you are.
The third word is unconscious unconscious, and this is an adjective, And it means to be in a state similar to a deep sleep due to some kind of an injury or illness.
It's when we're unconscious.
It's almost like you're sleeping, but it's more dangerous than that.
For example, the person on the floor is unconscious.
The fourth word is evacuate.
Evacuate.
And this is a verb.
It means to move people away from a dangerous place.
We must evacuate the building immediately because of a fire.
And finally, our fifth word today is symptom.
Symptom.
It's a word that we had in our episode about doctors.
Symptom is a sign of a physical or mental problem.
For example, a headache is a common symptom of a cold.
Okay, hopefully some of those words were new for you today.
They're quite difficult, I think some of them are.
But please remember these words as we learn about how to communicate during emergencies.
So the most important phrase to remember is the simplest one.
And that is, of course, help.
Help.
If you're in danger or you see someone in danger and you need immediate assistance or help.
Shouting this word can help bring attention and it can get you the help that you need.
You can also say that longer version, I need help.
This is a clear, simple phrase that everyone will understand.
So whether you're traveling in the UK or the US, if you say help, help, people will understand.
And to be honest, I think in most countries, people understand this word.
But of course, I want to help you to understand a little bit deeper some more complicated and useful phrases for some different emergencies or scenarios that hopefully you will never have to use or encounter.
And the first is a medical emergency.
A medical emergency, something to do with someone's health, where they need medical help from a doctor, a hospital, etc.
Imagine you are walking down the street and a person suddenly collapses.
They suddenly fall over.
This is a medical emergency and you need to act quickly.
First, of course, you should try to get their attention.
Are you okay?
If they don't answer, they might be unconscious.
Now you need to call for help.
Remember the emergency number of the country that you are in.
In the UK, the emergency number is 999.
When the operator answers, they will ask you what the problem is, and you must tell them there is an emergency here.
Someone has collapsed.
They've fallen over.
But the most important line is there is an emergency here.
The operator, the person on the phone, will ask for your location, where you are, and you must give them as much information as possible.
For example, in this scenario, let's say my location is 123 main street, near the big supermarket, and they will understand and work out where you are.
They might also ask about the person's condition to prepare the emergency staff for what they are going to.
You can say he is unconscious.
You should also try to describe any symptoms that you see.
So the conditions or feelings you could say he is having trouble breathing or she is bleeding from her head, if this is someone who has fallen over.
Keeping a calm voice as much as you can is important in emergencies, especially if you want to make sure that the person on the phone understands you.
You can say if you think this person needs medical help, you can say I need an ambulance.
Or we need an ambulance.
An ambulance is the vehicle, the big car which will take that person to the hospital and they will get help from the staff.
So that is our emergency scenario number one.
I hope that was helpful for some phrases for a medical emergency.
But we still have two more emergency scenarios for this episode.
But first I want to remind you that, if you would like more bonus episodes every week, as well as the full transcripts for each episode, where you can read, along with the audio, With the vocabulary lists, the new words from each episode, make sure you check out our Patreon page.
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Okay, back to our episode.
And our second scenario today is a fire or safety emergency.
Now, let's imagine that you are in a large building.
Maybe you're in a city and you're in an office or a hotel, something similar.
And a fire alarm starts to ring.
Your first action is, of course, to get to a safe place.
You might hear someone shouting there's a fire or we need to evacuate.
And if you remember, this word evacuate means to get to a safe place. away from a dangerous place.
Follow the instructions that you hear if you hear them, and look for exit signs and follow other people that perhaps have found the way.
If you see someone who's confused, you can say, follow me to the exit.
On the way out, you might also see signs with instructions.
For example, do not use the elevator.
During a fire we should not use elevators in case they stop working and we get stuck inside.
So make sure you use the stairs.
And emergency exits.
Once you're outside and in a safe place, you need to call and report the fire so that emergency services can send the fire department to extinguish it.
To get rid of the fire, that verb to extinguish.
When we get rid of a fire, when we put it out, we extinguish it.
It's quite a hard word, extinguish.
And when you call your emergency number, so in the UK 999, you would want to say I need the fire department or the fire service.
And then again, you simply give your location.
Our third scenario today is an unexpected situation, such as a crime.
When someone, a criminal, does something that breaks the law.
So this is our last type of emergency for today.
Imagine you're in a crowd and someone steals your wallet.
Perhaps you're a tourist in a busy area and someone takes your wallet and your money out of your pocket.
This is an emergency that requires the police service.
You can say, help, someone stole my wallet.
When you call the emergency number, you need to ask for the police and describe what happened.
Let's do our example.
So I need the, hello, I need the police.
Someone stole my wallet from me at the bus station.
You should also try to describe the person who did it.
And to do that, You should listen, if you haven't already, to my previous episode about describing appearance, describing a person what they look like.
So in this case, let's say the suspect is a man in a red shirt with blue trousers.
He is about 180 centimeters tall and of a slim build.
And you can say the direction that they went in as well, maybe where they went.
And remember if you don't feel safe, you should always say to the person in authority a policeman or whoever it is on the phone I feel unsafe.
To let them know that you feel there is a dangerous situation.
So now for my favorite section of the podcast, the listener spotlight, where I ask you a question and in each episode I like to pick one or two answers to that question and read them out for everyone else to hear.
It's a great way to practice your English writing, an excellent way, I think.
So in last week's episode, in one of the episodes last week, I asked you to tell me about a time where you have had to adapt.
Maybe an example of when you have adapted, when you've had to change or get used to something.
And I had some really great comments, but two of them especially were fantastic and I would love to read them out.
So remember, the question was a time when you had to adapt.
So the first comment was from a commenter, the name was Bren, and they said Hello teacher, I recently found your podcast and I find it super helpful for improving my English listening.
About today's topic.
I think that the most recent adaptation that I have made was when I got married.
Luckily, my husband made the process really easy.
He supports me and helps me with everything around the house.
So I'm really grateful to have such a lovely husband.
What a great comment, Bren.
A very, very sweet comment and it sounds like your husband is a great man.
Thank you very much for leaving that comment and sharing it with us all.
The next comment was from a user with the name Ambiguous and this comment was left on YouTube and they said great episode.
Thank you.
I think adaptation is human, the same for animals and other creatures, with the goal of surviving in the surrounding environment.
Once a person is born and grows, they try to improve this skill in different ways.
Without traveling to a new place, living in a different country or jumping to a new job.
We all deal with daily situations that require us to adapt.
For example, if the power goes off or we don't have enough money to buy more items.
We have to be flexible enough to deal with these situations.
The more that we adapt quickly to new situations, the more we are able to survive and evolve.
Excellent, excellent comment from Ambiguous.
A great comment and they are very right.
In the last episode, I talked about some specific situations when we adapt.
But I think this is a great point.
In our day-to-day life and daily situations, we adapt all the time.
Humans are so adaptable.
So excellent comment, great vocabulary and very good use of grammar.
One of the best comments I've read in a while.
So great job.
So today we have learned basic English for emergencies.
We've looked at three real life scenarios, and within each of those scenarios you have learned some phrases with calling for help and some of the vocabulary around these topics too.
This might be describing a medical emergency, perhaps reporting a fire or dangerous situation and lastly, even a crime.
Remember our keywords for today.
Emergency, location, unconscious, evacuate. and symptom.
I hope that you never really have to use these emergency phrases, but of course it's always useful to know some of this vocabulary for when we are traveling or visiting another country.
Thank you so much for joining me today on Easy English.
Remember, if you would like to support the Patreon, you can click the link in the description below.
And there's also a link to my brand new book, which is phrasal verbs are easy.
Thank you so much for listening.
And I will see you in the next episode of the easy English podcast.
Goodbye.
