BRIGHT yellow ambulances equipped with state-of-the-art medical equipment are to take to the county's roads.

The vehicles, hailed by Hampshire Ambulance Service as the "new generation" of vehicles, are the start of a multi-million-pound replacement scheme that will see the entire fleet upgraded by 2008.

The £130,000 specialist Mercedes machines are dual purpose - meaning they can be used for moving critical care patients between hospitals as well as undertaking routine journeys.

Four vehicles will hit the county's streets during the coming months, and it is planned that, eventually, all emergency vehicles will be replaced as part of the programme.

The service says that the new fleet of ambulances will be equipped with the most modern technology, including the ability to send vital patient information directly to hospitals from the scene of an accident.

They will be yellow in colour to increase their visibility.

Rob Ellery, the ambulance trust's head of support services, said: "The first four specialist ambulances, which will be based at Portsmouth, Southampton, Winchester and Basingstoke, are planned to be on the road within a matter of months.

"All of the new vehicles will be the European standard bright yellow, which improves safety for crews and members of the public because they are hard to ignore in queues of traffic.

"Research has shown that the human eye gives measurable responses when looking at different colours.

"In this research, yellow was identified as giving the highest human eye response, and has therefore been voted by ambulance leaders as the universal colour to adopt."

Some older vehicles are to be kept for use in emergencies in order to maintain service standards.