Mass Casualty Transport

 LightRock says:

After I attended all 3 days of the Firehouse Expo in Baltimore last week, the Geezer asked if there was anything at the show that was of interest and that would be worth writing about. Especially as I sit here watching events unfold in the Twin Cities, one vehicle that caught my eye at the show seems particularly relevant. In addition, watching this bridge incident has put me in a decidedly unopinionated frame of mind.

Since the September 11 attacks there has been a huge amount of money spent under the banner of homeland security. For example, there have been a significant number of mobile command units acquired by localities using – in whole or in part – federal grant funding. Radio and communications equipment have been a favorite, with “interoperability” being a word that has become routinely used. Another area that has gotten a lot of attention is decontamination. Decon showers, tents, trailers, trucks…you name it. As I have watched and, to an extent, participated in all of this, one area that I have always thought about is what I’d describe as “mass transit” from mass casualty incidents. At what point does the typically 1 on 1 patient to ambulance relationship become an impractical and ineffective way to move patients to medical facilities?

While I am not sure that there is any particular magic number of patients – there are certainly lots of variables in the equation – what does seem clear is that at a certain point, regardless of the locality, there will be incidents that outstrip the use of conventional ambulances to move patients. In the current security environment, one obviously has to consider a terrorist act in say an airport, school or shopping mall. A couple other examples that come to mind are a passenger train derailment or a tornado that moves through an urban area. The potential scenarios are limitless. So, let’s pick a number. The number I have in my head is 500. Let’s say that there are 500 people injured in a real mass casualty incident. They need medical attention and transportation to hospitals. The scenarios that go through my head aren’t those where everyone is dead (as is usually the case in a plane crash) but where there are scores who are injured.

Clearly, I haven’t been the only one thinking about this.

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Using a bus as a platform, a North Carolina based company, working with the fire/rescue departments in the Washington, DC metropolitan area (with Montgomery County, MD being the “lead” agency), has produced a group of vehicles that can transport 20+ patients at one time. While vehicles similar to this have been previously used in some military applications, it is the first time I think I have seen something like this purpose built for use by fire/rescue departments. Scatter some of these units around a metropolitan area or region and muster them for the mega incident and you can start moving a lot of patients at one time.

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While at the show I heard some people nitpicking the unit that was on display, and as an apparatus guy I could certainly see some things that I might fine tune, but that isn’t what we should be focusing on. As our great country continues to grow and become increasingly more urbanized, we’ll continue to see mega incidents on a regular basis. Hopefully, introducing these units into the DC area will not only be a real plus the next time the inevitable “big one” hits, but will also get people thinking more about moving significant numbers of patients.

Hats off to those who worked this project from concept to reality!

To read more about the Sartin Mobile Evacuation Bus click HERE.

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