Busy Busy

Just thought that I would drop a quick note about what has been going on lately. Things have been very busy at the fire dept. Monday night I responded to a three vehicle accident that required 3 ambulances. We transported 10 people to the hospital, 6 of those were kids under the age of 5. I got on scene just behind the second ambulance and was immediately assigned to an ambulance and put in charge of 3 screaming children while the guys on the fire trucks extricated their mom from her car. I had a 4 year old, a 2 year old, and a 5 week old. the four year old came in attached to a 17 year old who had witnessed the wreck and got out to help so that was good. He was able to finally calm the 4 year old down and distract him while I did my assessment. The 5 week old was screaming when she came into the ambulance but with a little rocking settled down and went to sleep. The 2 year old was another matter. She screamed most of the time. I finally got her to calm down after about 20 minutes and then her dad shows up and comes into the ambulance so she immediately starts screaming again but stops as soon as dad holds her. Then he decides that he needs to be out with his wife so he hands the 2 year old back to me which of course starts the screaming again. It took a while to get her to calm down again and once I did, Dad came back in and was in the ambulance for about 2 minutes and then he left again, so of course we start the process all over again. He did this like 3 times. I was about ready to hurt him. Anyway all the kids in the accidents were fine a few bumps and bruises but all were fine. Thank Goodness for CAR SEATS! Anyway, the mom was pretty bad off, but we took them all to the hospital and they are taking good care of her.
While we were on that call they dispatched another ambulance to an accident on Highway 20 which ended up being fatal. I was kinda glad I didn't go on that one, those ones are the hardest.
We finally cleared from our accidents and then got dispatched to a girl who got hurt sledding up on campus. That call had barely gotten over when we were dispatched to another call accident, this time a roll-over, on highway 20. That one got done and then we had to take the mother from our first car accident down to EIRMC so she could got specialized care for her injuries. So by the time we were done with calls it was 1:30 am and I was really tired.

Then on Tuesday I worked all day at my PSR job and then went to the station to use the excercise room to work out for an hour. When I finished I went in the station to write my reports on the three kids from the car accident when we got toned out to a car accident. Since I was there I ran out and got my turn outs and responded in the Fire Truck! I was excited cause I don't get to go out on the trucks much. So we get on scene and they assigned me to get in the car and work on the patient that was still trapped in the car. So much for being on the fire truck I still end up doing ambulance stuff. This car had missed a corner and had buried the front end into a snow drift about 3 feet and we couldn't get the driver out. So the other guys on the truck with me had the idea to hook the car up to the winch on the front of the truck and just pull the car out. So we did, and the lady screamed bloody murder everytime the car moved even a little bit, which was great as I was sitting right next to her. I will give it to her, that she did say she was in a lot of pain and the car was being jerked. Anyway so they start pulling it out and can only pull it little ways and then it won't move anymore. They get to looking around and realize that she had hit a tree and the car was stuck on the stump. So we had to dig out three feet of snow around the back of the car to the drivers side so we could open the door and get her out. After we were done I was driving the chase, our pickup truck that follows the ambulances to calls, back to the station and the second out ambulance gets toned out. Well I knew that we had the firefighter that was supposed to go on that call still out in the fire truck so I asked if they had enough people or if they needed me to respond with them. They requested that I respond with them so they picked me up by Porter Park and off we went. So here I am on this call with my Turn-Outs on. Turn outs are the really nice gear that we wear in fires so that we don't burn to death and they are great......on fires. They kinda are big and bulky and very annoying on ambulance calls. So here I was looking all sweet in my turn out bottoms and just a t-shirt, cause I can't move very well in my jacket, and I go on this other call. I wasn't even covering a shift and I ended up working for 3 hours. I got home at about 1130 and had to take a shower cause I was all sweating from working out and going on calls so I got to bed kinda late and then had to get up early for a meeting this morning. And then after work today I had to go to training at the fire station and I got home at about 103o again. I am also on call tonight so we'll see how much sleep I get tonight. Well this is longer that I had planned and it is late so I am going to bed.