Last Call

Pager tones during dinner.  Truck versus motorcycle.  Been there, done that.  Don’t know any of the details, but the scene looks familiar upon arrival.  Driver’s side front corner of the truck damaged, motorcycle down, rider down and bleeding.  Our EMTs are treating him, doing excellent work.  He was wearing a helmet, so he’s alive.  I don’t want to hear any ridiculous anti-helmet theories. 

If you are whacked on a bike by a car and you are not wearing a helmet, the only way you survive is some miracle of energy dissipation before your head hits concrete or, far more likely, life-ruining traumatic brain injury.  They’re called “donor-cycles” in the medical field for a reason.  And if you think you’re such an outstanding athlete and excellent motorcycle rider that you’re the exception, Nicky Hayden died in a car vs. bicycle crash.  If you don’t know who Nicky Hayden is (most recent American Moto GP Champ) you got no business on a motorcycle.  Wear a helmet, leathers, air bag, gloves and boots, and ride like every four-wheeled vehicle is intent on killing you. 

Sorry not sorry, bit of a rant.   

Nothing’s on fire, so I’m doing scene safety stuff.  Tasked to contain the bike liquids, keep traffic clear of our ambulance and guide the medevac angels from and to the helicopter.  “We’re in the red one”, I shout above the din of spinning turbines and whirling chopper blades.  Somewhere back in the Probie series, I noted how awesome the medevac docs were, but let me say a word here about the nurses.  Two words, actually.  Even cooler.  Badasses in flight helmets and jumpsuits dripping with instantly accessible medical gear.  Bucky Badger patches on their shoulders the only cuteness allowed in an aura of get out of my way, I am here to save someone’s life, right fucking now.  Were I not a married man, serious swoonage. 

I am a married man, and I need to get back to dinner.  Chopper takes off and we clear the scene.  Dinner is in the fridge when I get back.  Heat it up in the microwave and wonder whether the rider is pondering an antelope-agile supermoto instead of a bison-plodding BMW GS to avoid the next four-wheel assassin entirely.  Who knows?  Not me.  But rake, trail and mass is basic physics.  Basic physics, I know.

Next day at the station, learn a little more about the call (which I’ll get to) before trotting out some basic physics.  Rolled over Hyundai in the back parking lot means there’s gonna be some toy usage soon and tonight’s the night.  Chief 2 wants us to practice stabilizing and lifting the rolled car and he doesn’t give us any other guidance.  Not that we need task guidance.  You don’t get step by step instructions on scene; you’re supposed to know how to do stuff. 

The practice tasks tend to be a little different than the actual tasks in at least three ways.  Most fundamentally, the practice tasks are mock-ups of scenes.  Tasks on actual scenes tend to be much more definite.  Search the second floor.  Stop the bleeding.  Put out the fire.  Get the kitten out of the tree.  Whatever.  Tasks on scene are (or become) physically obvious, rather than imagined.  Secondly, there’s explicit command and hierarchy on actual scenes.  You are either specifically or generally told what to do and you do it.  Practice is more of a learning exercise, so there’s really no rank involved, and much more discussion. 

Given the first two distinctions, a third arises.  The practice stuff typically takes longer.  Unless the practice specifically includes a ticking clock (sometimes it does), the difference in how we all imagine the task and discussion about how to complete it adds time.  That’s not a bad thing, because there’s quite a bit of learning happening in the discussion.  But it honestly drives me a bit crazy.

We stabilized the rolled Hyundai with one set of wonder toys and raised it with two other sets of toys; one wonderous, one just blocks.  It was well-done, professional and safe.  Rock solid.  If the rolled Hyundai was real, out on an Interstate somewhere and an off-duty firefighter drove past with her family, she’d think to herself, “that department knows what it’s doing”. 

But it took time.  What if we didn’t have time?  What if the car was on fire with an occupant bleeding out under it?  Cheap, fast or good; choose any two goes the saying.  So I didn’t necessarily raise my hand and ask.  It wasn’t a classroom.  Instead, I went over to Squad 39 and hauled out two hi-lift jacks – the kind you see on the back of Jeeps.  How bout we try these, I suggested, just to see how quickly we could get the front of the car off the ground. 

It was a sketchy experiment, and there was some learning as we went.  But on version three of the experiment, it became just about the fastest way possible to get a couple thousand pounds off the ground, and someone pulled out from under a car.  Fastest way would be two levers, but that’s for another day.  Neither levers nor jacks are safe enough to put a firefighter under the car, but sometimes the perfectly safe approach does not fit the situation.  If you gotta pull somebody away from something in a hurry, create the space and pull.  Time can be the enemy.

Turns out, time was the enemy for one of us.  Before we headed out for Hyundai levitation, we learned a PDFD member had resigned.  A good guy who had been with the department for years, but life got complicated and he couldn’t devote the time needed for training, so he’s hanging up the halligan.  I honestly don’t know how the family guys in their thirties and forties do it.  Most everyone is a dual income family these days, and doing all you need to do to stay current in the fire service while also having kids at home is nothing short of heroic, especially as a volunteer.  Chief Cam read his email to us and it was obvious it was difficult decision.  Volunteer firefighting is a love of the game sort of thing, and it’s hard to give up.  What was not obvious is he was on the truck v. motorcycle call with me, and never said a word about that being his last call. 

Last anythings are often like that.  Even if you know it’s the last of whatever it is (you often do not) you don’t want to say it.  Better to experience it, and let it seep into your soul, than call it out and ruin it.  Songs, jokes, smiles, laughs, hugs, looks.  Let every one of them seep into your soul, because it just might be the last, and you don’t know it. 

Someday, the pager is going to tone during dinner for the last time, and I’ll never have to heat up a missed meal in the microwave again.  Not anytime soon, I hope.