Brothers from Portsmouth set up cleaning firm and take on crime scenes, movie sets and Covid-19

The pair set up firm Bio Response and undertook training at The National Academy of Crime Scene Cleaners.

Since then their work has seen them cover some of the most gruesome crime scenes, dangerous drug dens, huge stacks of fly-tipped rubbish, dirty house clearances and even movie sets.

When they set up Bio Response, they didn’t realise the pandemic was about to bring a whole new demand for their services – and since March they have been operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Sam, 34, said: ‘We have been in the cleaning industry since leaving school, working for our dad Keith at Bell’s Cleaning. We'd always done the usual cleaning work, office cleaning, carpet and window cleaning, that sort of thing.

‘We sometimes came across biohazards like blood spills, we never knew the dangers of the work we were doing.

'One day we had a call from one of our window cleaning customers, she was very distraught as her pet cat had gone missing and was found at the bottom of her garden in the shed.

‘It had been mauled by a fox, the blood was all over and the smell was terrible.

‘She asked if we could help, so we went round, to be honest we had no clue of what we were doing but we managed to clean the shed so she could move on.

‘We felt a sense of pride when her eyes filled up with tears when we showed her we managed to clean the area, it was at this point we both knew this was what we wanted to do.’

Danny, 45, from North End and Sam, from Anchorage Park, decided to branch out and they started Bio Response, a specialist cleaning company.

Sam said: ‘Little did we know, that the pandemic was on its way.

‘It has been relentless, most days during the peak we have been doing 16 hour days not getting home until 4am and back out again the next morning.

‘We’ve adapted and we do shifts now so we can get some rest.

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‘We’ve been to some really interesting sites and have even worked at Warner Bros Studios many times this year doing Covid cleans.

‘One night we were cleaning on a set, it was surreal as we had to be deadly quiet while they were filming.’

Despite the pair’s dedication, they still urged people to take care.

Sam added: ‘We all need to take extra care. The death toll is rising and it is worrying to think where we could be in terms of daily deaths in the coming weeks.

‘The new strain is spreading rapidly and we have noticed a sharp increase in demand for our decontamination service, so we must take extra care to keep our most vulnerable safe.’

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

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