Our
Rescue Expertise
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Our
Rescue Expertise
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Ambulance Rescue provides a range of rescue services to the community. Let’s look at the rescue role from the first hand perspective of a Rescue Paramedic:
An officer of the NSW Ambulance Service who is trained up in Rescue has a large number of skills to draw on. These skills will enable the Officer, with the assistance of other fellow Officers, to safely untangle and extricate a person who, for one reason or another, has found themselves in need of their services.
The training is “on going” and rigorous and Ambulance Rescue Officers may need to draw on these skills at any time.
People looking on at the scene of a motor vehicle accident where rescue skills are being used may think that the Rescue Officers are there just for that reason, but remember, the Rescue Officers are also Paramedics, officers who don’t just see a crumpled wreck that needs to be cut up, but see past that to the unfortunate people trapped inside. The Ambulance Rescue Officers have the best interests of the patient, or in some cases patients, first and foremost in their minds.
OK, so what are these skills and what could you do as a rescue officer? What could I be called to do in the next half an hour? I can tell you. I can think of a few things that I have done in the past. Let’s have a look at a job we specialise in: a ‘vertical’ or cliff rescue.
Cliff rescue
§ You gather information – reconnoitre and report
§ You stablish safety/work zones
§ You set up safety lines
§ You set up an anchor system
§ You abseil down to the patient
§ You treat and stabilise the patient – you provide emergency medical care, which may include pain relief, fluid resuscitation, stabilisation of fractures, etc
§ You get the patient out and onto a stretcher
§
Your partner would have set
up a hauling system up on the cliff edge
§ Organise a hauling party
§ Be responsible for scene safety, so nobody falls off the cliff
§ Then haul the patient and yourself up to the top
§ You and your partner may have used many knots including: Figure 8, Double figure of 8, Prussic knot, ˝ fisherman’s bend, Round turn 2 ˝ hitches, Alpine butterfly, Tensionless hitch, Re-reaved figure of 8, and Tape knot to name just a few
§ Then you also need to know how to set up a mechanical advantage, eg are 3:1 bolt on 2:1 bolt on, 2:1 stand-alone or maybe use a cliff edge machine called an oz pod. This thing stands several metres high and is like a meccano set, no pressure mate! This is my job.
What else can we do?
§ I can get your child out of a locked car
§ I can get you or a member of your family out of a lift
§ I can cut your ring off your finger
§ I can rescue you from a trench collapse
§ I can carry out confined space rescue
§ I can test an area for toxic gases or low oxygen levels, or increased carbon monoxide and ventilate the area
§ I can go down a mine with Mines Rescue
§ If a building collapses I have been trained in urban search and rescue (USAR).
§ I can rescue you or your family from under a train.
§ I can jack the train with hydraulic jacks or move it to the side using bags filled with compressed air
§ I can get a bird (in one case a cockatoo, don’t laugh!) out of a tree or a savage dog off his owner’s chest
§ I can get your child’s finger out of a drain hole
§ I can get your child’s leg out of between the bars on their cot
§ I can find you in the bush using navigation and bushcraft skills and stay with you overnight
§ I can restrain the airbags that do not go off in your car minimising the risk to you, your family and other emergency service workers, including me
So, these are a few things that I can do, or have done in the past.
And foremost in my mind is the patient. Remember – ambulance rescue: it’s medical ………not mechanical!
