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London's longest-serving paramedic today told how he still loved saving lives as he hit 50 years of service.

Kevin Walker, 70, joined London Ambulance Service in 1966 and still works 12 hours a week after spending just a month in retirement in 2012.

Mr Walker, pictured, cycles to Ilford Ambulance Station, where he has spent his whole career.

He said: “I joined up because I wanted to help people. I still enjoy the job. [It feels] worthwhile.”

He memorably recalls saving a woman he knew as a hospital receptionist: “When you see someone you know in cardiac arrest, it’s not nice. [Later] she came to my wife and said: ‘Your husband saved my life.’”

He remembers battling through pea soup fogs in an ambulance in the Sixties. “[A man] would walk in front with a foot-long wax taper,” he said.

In 2013 Mr Walker was awarded the British Empire Medal.

LAS boss Ian Johns said he was “extraordinary”.