NEW Year's Eve was one of the busiest nights on record for the ambulance service.

Crews from across Greater Manchester were called to 970 incidents throughout December 31.

The busiest time was between 11pm on New Year's Eve and 5am on January 1, when paramedics dealt with 510 injured or ill people.

Bob Williams, deputy chief executive at the North-west Ambulance Service, said: "New Year's Eve is always one of our busiest nights and this year was no exception. However, we anticipated this surge in demand and managed it appropriately by increasing resources.

"All our staff worked hard, both in control rooms managing emergency calls and deploying vehicles and on frontline vehicles, tending to patients.

"It is their dedication and commitments that enables us to deliver excellent service to the people of Greater Manchester - a fact that I am sure the general public will recognise."

The service was backed by three crews from Bolton Mountain Rescue Team, which along with St John Ambulance provides support to ambulance crews during busy periods.

The team dealt with 24 calls across Bolton, Wigan, Leigh and Manchester between 7pm and 5.30am.

Communications officer Dave Healey, aged 40, said most of the calls were due to alchohol related incidents.

"We had a record year last year, dealing with 207 jobs and we have already answered 14 calls in 2008," he said.

"Providing cover for the ambulance service provides our medically-trained staff with invaluable experience so that when we have a mountain rescue job where casualty care is needed, they are much better-prepared."

Mr Healey celebrated the new year with partner Carol Carey at the team's Ladybridge Hall base, where colleagues kept up a supply of food to see them through the night.

"It was a very busy night and in one 13-minute period I counted more than 100 emergency calls across the North-west," he added.