As we rejoined the staff at Holby City in last night’s Casualty, we first saw Charlie both praising and bemoaning the state of the NHS to a documentary film crew who are documenting life in the emergency department.

As Charlie was talking to camera, we got flashes of footage from the main storyline which started with two teenage girls bullying and thumping another young girl who then ran away from them.

Meanwhile, Adam sought Alice’s advice as to how he could win over Jessica but Alice cautioned that he needed to be aware of how fragile Jessica is and that she doesn’t need ‘rescuing’ from one bad relationship only to find herself in another. Next, Charlie informed Adam that Zoe was in a meeting with the Director of Critical Care and that her demotion is definitely going ahead. Charlie told Adam that this meant the Clinical Lead job is still open but Adam didn’t seem too keen.

Meanwhile, Zoe was told by the Director of CC – who appeared to be more like Alan Sugar than a hospital administrator – that the decision to demote her didn’t reflect on her abilities as a Doctor but was because she allowed her personal life to infringe on her work.

Ruth and Toby are the next to be filmed by the documentary crew and they talked about how the Farmead Estate accounts for around 70 to 80% of ED traffic. They talk about the drug problems on the estate and the high level of violence spawned by the residents but as Toby rambled on about how bad the estate is, he then remembered that Ruth was brought up there and hastily backtracked. He apologised on camera to Ruth for implying that everyone from the estate is ‘rough’ and though she assured him it was fine and she wasn’t offended, her facial expression said otherwise.

We then cut to seeing a community spirited chap called Vic delivering prescriptions to residents in a high rise on the estate. The first old man he visits, Joe, lives in fear of the local kids and is constructing a strong door by way of defense against them. He worryingly has welding equipment in his flat. Vic then went upstairs to deliver more tablets to an elderly lady, Mrs Treavers, and her educationally subnormal adult grandson Michael. As Vic was chatting to them, they all heard a ruckus outside which turned out to be the two bullies shouting insults to the girl they earlier chased and thumped.

Then the real drama started as the bullied girl – who we later learn is called Sammy – produced a huge firework and set it alight. She was clearly out for revenge against the bullies who lived there.

The elderly Mrs Treavers fell to the ground as the impact of the fireworks reverberated through the flats and the agoraphobic Joe opened his front door which allowed a firework to shoot into his flat, igniting a pile of old newspapers. The bullies had been injured too and as the flats filled with smoke, one of them shouted to Vic that she’d hurt her arm and also shouted threats at the girl who’d set off the firework.

Meanwhile, Dixie and Jeff were being filmed for the documentary as the call came in for them to attend at the flats. Curtis and Snezana were already there and trying to help Michael’s Gran. He didn’t understand that they were only trying to help because the old lady screamed as they tried to treat her. He became aggressive towards the paramedics so Curtis radioed for a doctor to attend to anaesthetise the old lady. We then saw Sammy hiding in a derelict part of the estate and saw that she had large and painful burns to her hand.

Back on the ED, Kelsey went outside to find Zoe who was having a cigarette. Kelsey told Zoe that she was needed to administer fluids and pain relief to a ten year old terminal cancer patient but Zoe refused to attend until she’d finished her cig. Kelsey, disgusted by her attitude asked, ‘Don’t you care?’ to which Zoe coldly replied, ‘No’.

We then returned to the flats, where poor old Joe’s flat is by now full of smoke and the flames are licking the surface of the oxy acetylene tank.

In the department, the girl who lit the firework, Sammy, was having her burns treated by Tess but she became aggressive and hurled a nasty tirade of insults at both Tess and Charlie, so the pair left her in the cubicle to calm down.

Back on the estate, the paramedics and Adam – with film crew in tow – heard Joe shouting for help but amidst the rivalry and banter between Adam and Jeff, the cries are at first ignored. It was only when they noticed that the floor was getting hot that they called the fire brigade. Then, as the medics were taking Mrs Treavers out of the flat on a stretcher, Michael went back inside to get his tablets, just as the welding equipment belonging to Joe exploded.

The floor in front of Michael exploded upwards leaving him hanging on by his fingernails to what remained of the floorboards. By now, a huge fireball was racing through the entire block of flats as Jeff, Adam and Dixie pulled Michael up and out of immediate danger.

However, they soon found that the floors below them were impassable and so they tried to go upwards instead but Adam insisted that he must go back and rescue the trapped old man. In a flashback, we then saw Dixie and Jeff telling the film crew that the Doctors don’t like to get their hands dirty and only enjoy the money and glory of the job. Back to present, Adam jumped down into Joe’s flat while everyone stood above waiting to see if he’d get the old man out. They themselves were finding it hard to breathe through all the smoke and the condition of Mrs Treavers was deteriorating.

Back on the department, Charlie quizzed Tess as to why she’s been so snappy and distracted. Tess told him that she’s angry because Sam got engaged to which Charlie responded by saying that everyone has trouble with their kids but they don’t bring it into work with them. He angrily told her to take her break early and to calm down before returning to the department. Tess however had no intention of following Charlie’s orders so she returned to the cubicle to treat Sammy, but the girl had gone.

In the flats, Adam rescued Joe with the help of the paramedics and the fire brigade finally arrived. All the medics, as well as the patients and film crew – who were still filming – were now trapped as there was fire above and below them. As they tried to find a safe place to await rescue, Dixie heard on the radio that parked cars were blocking the path of the fire engines.

Back in the ED and Zoe was touched by how brave Amy, the little cancer patient, was being and much to Kelsey’s surprise, Zoe offered to help clean the little girl up when she had an ‘accident’. Tess meanwhile returned to her office to find it had been trashed and a Nazi symbol drawn in spray paint on the wall. She immediately suspected that Sammy was the vandal and was sickened to realise that the girl had also defecated on her desk.

In the burning flats, the medics tried to get the patients to a window so they could get some air but to get there, they had to negotiate a huge hole in the floor and unstable floorboards. They did so, amid much will-they-won’t-they fall to their deaths, and finally got across just as the fire brigade smashed open a window and poured in water. We next saw everyone downstairs, safe, and being loaded into ambulances.

In the ED, Tess was determined to find Sammy so she left the hospital to search for the girl on the estate. She went to Sammy’s home where she encountered the girl’s mother and menacing brothers. The family insisted that as the girl is ‘tagged’, she couldn’t possibly have left the house and they forced Tess inside to witness this for herself. However, when they went to the girl’s room, they found that Sammy had attached her tag to a cat and wasn’t there.

Tess hurriedly left the house and spotted Sammy in a playground. She called out to the girl who, on seeing Tess, ran away. She ran into a building site with Tess in hot pursuit yelling at her to stop. Eventually, Tess caught up with Sammy who had come to an abrupt halt at the mouth of a gaping hole which was filled with metal spikes. Tess was running too fast and couldn’t stop in time to avoid falling into the pit.

Back in the ED, a coughing Adam told Charlie that he’s going to apply for the job of clinical lead after all but ended the conversation when he spotted Jess. Deciding to seize the moment, Adam told her that he loves her and wants to be with her, however Jess didn’t reply and hurriedly left when Alice arrived to treat Adam for his smoke inhalation.

Back in the ambulance, which was still on the estate, Dixie and Jeff were desperately fighting to revive Mrs Treavers and just as it was looking like the old lady had gone, they managed to bring her back.

Returning to Tess, we see that she has been impaled through her abdomen on a large spike and – somewhat unbelievably – she was still trying to console Sammy and assure her she’s not in trouble. As the girl looked on, Tess begged her to phone for help but instead of calling for an ambulance, Sammy took Tess’s mobile and video’d Tess before calming walking away, smirking and ignoring Tess’s screams for help.

Sammy went back to the estate but by then was unsure whether she could just leave the dying Tess. However, as she was deliberating, she spotted her brother who was looking for her so she ran away. Dixie meanwhile was driving the ambulance back to Holby with the film crew, Mrs Treavers, Michael and her partner Jeff all on board.

Believing that the worst was over and in a light-hearted mood, Dixie and Jeff joke around with the film crew just as Sammy runs into the road and directly into the path of the ambulance. She hit the windscreen and was thrown over the top of the ambulance into the path of an oncoming car.

Dixie stopped the ambulance and she and Jeff raced to help the girl, but Dixie was so shocked, she couldn’t help Jeff as he tried to save the girl. The film crew were still filming and as the cameraman focused on a shocked Dixie, footage cut to the closing scene which was of Tess, groaning and crying while still alone in the pit.

Part two is on tonight at 8pm on BBC1 so don’t miss it! I’ve not watched Casualty for some time until recently but I used to be an avid fan, so it was nice to realise that it’s still got it, drama-wise!