Casualty fans have had a long wait to discover the fate of Ngozi Okoye (Adesuwa Oni) after the beloved character had an alcohol relapse before banging her head in a fall. While her on-off girlfriend, Nicole Piper (Sammy T. Dobson). rushed to the airport to convince Ngozi to not move back to Nigeria, she was entirely unaware that the character had been rushed back to Holby General, where the team was desperately trying to revive her. While the BBC hasn’t officially confirmed when the show will be returning, we don’t have too long to wait.

The BBC has confirmed that Casualty will be returning to screens before the end of the year. When the season finale aired back in September, the official social media released a teaser for the next season. Sadly, it didn’t reveal whether Ngozi will survive her fall, but there were plenty of tears from the remaining cast members, so something horrible might have happened to our favourite doctors.

Other moments saw a helicopter landing at the hospital with someone running towards it, Teddy Gowan (Milo Clarke) running towards a seemingly abandoned building in the woods and Flynn Byron (Olly Rix) having another confrontation as the character is thrown up against a wall by one of his colleagues. And it appears that Ngozi isn’t the only character at risk, as Cameron Mickelthwaite (Barney Walsh) was seen on a stretcher being pushed into the ER. The caption only teased: “#Casualty will return.”

Fans were divided with the announcement, with many wanting the show to remain on screens. One lamented: “3 months with no Casualty. Saturday night won’t be the same,” while another added: “3 months to find out if she’s actually gone. This is gonna be a painful wait,” and a third commented: “I’m guessing that’s Casualty finished till Christmas now.”

Others were feeling worried for Ngozi, as one penned: “Please let Ngozi survive… we need a feel good story, now Ian and Faith have gone down the pan!” Another wrote: “Oh no please let her survive. And I’ve got to wait till December to see if she does. Blimey talk about a spoiler,” while a third shared their fears for Cameron, posting: “LEAVE MY CAM ALONE!”

What happened in the season finale?

Away from Ngozi’s tragic relapse, there was plenty of drama at Holby City Hospital. The Supply and Demand mini-series focused on a ruthless gang of drug dealers causing havoc in Holby, with Ngozi struggling to keep away from alcohol with the temptations around. In the finale, Iain Dean (Michael Stevenson) managed to capture the drug lord behind the recent heartache after Sunny Callahan (Jamie Marie Leary) spoke about being blackmailed by the gang.

Although Iain’s dangerous mission was successful, he decided to end his relationship with Faith Cadogan (Kirsty Mitchell) after realising they weren’t together for the right reasons. There were, however, happier moments, with Flynn Byron (Olly Rix) seemingly getting his life back on track after his daughter, Millie, invited him to a dance recital. Meanwhile, Rash Masum (Neet Mohan) was sent on a Paeds rotation, leaving him one step closer to his CESR, while sparks continued to fly between Cameron and Indie Jankowski (Naomi Wakszlak) following their recent date.

Upcoming changes

When Casualty returns for its 40th series, there will be plenty of big changes as the show is set to move away from Holby and instead to a location in Wales. An announcement at the time read: “We are asking tenderers to include [an] authentic representation of Wales and reflect the reality of the Welsh NHS. This is not about radical change of the show, although the move to Welsh portrayal will mean a new fictional hospital based in Wales, and tenderers will need to address this core change in their editorial pitch to the evaluation panel.

“The successful tenderer will need to be able to demonstrate how to incorporate Welsh portrayal and maintain familiarity at the same time. The move to Wales will present opportunities for new cast members, but we would expect much-loved characters to remain part of the editorial shift to the location of the new Welsh hospital.”