helicopper

How does the dual response work when neighboring departments are also in the parade or other activity that ties up personnel and resources.
Great idea to have the PD help with navigating for the guest department - all too often the calls are in strange locations.
Now if a large number of member FF are leaving for the parade and social activities thereafter, how do you insure adequate staffing for the duration of the parade and say the next 12 hours or so?
For local parades, do you have plans that would enable you to pull apparatus and personnel from the parade for the emergency?

Now a moderator note: If you don't like the thread, don't read it. There's no need to bash the thread just because you disagree with it. If we all did that there'd be one or two substantive posts and 20-30 negative ones in a great many threads on the forum. There's just no need for that.
Answer the question if you choose to. Ignore the issue if you choose to. But please don't disrupt the conversation that other people choose to have.

I would like to keep the ball rolling that Bobby Benz started a few weeks ago and help keep this sight for what it was intended, TRAINING!
I received an e-mail this morning from a close friend of mine who is assigned to Special Hazards 1 in Providence, RI. He has a buddy who is on the job in Belgium and was working the day of the train wreck that killed 18 people and injured many more. I normally send these e-mails out to my distribution lists, but felt this would be a great place to discuss if we are prepared for something like this happening here in the North East. Look trough the photos in the link below, especially photo #81 on. The body of the rail cars tear apart from the truck portion and ended up high in the air. Aside from stopping all rail traffic and making sure we have enough help on the way, stabilization would be our first and foremost priority before we started the evacuation and disentanglement process. What equipment do we carry on the rigs that would do the job? What resources do we have that can be called in to assist with this task? This is beyond normal wood cribbing and pneumatic equipment. Are there cranes that would be available to assist us in stabilizing and can we get them in to the location of the wreck? OK, the scenario is out there, lets see what you got! LOL
http://picasaweb.google.com/TomVier/15_02_10Treinramp#

Good morning Mike,
I'd call for Spanky if it was Metro North. Power shut-down, all tracks. Total rail traffic stoppage. Call for everybody, activate WSOTF, have Control notify every agency that they have a phone number for.
Mass EMS mobilization, and hospitals, trauma-center notification. Control is going to be very busy. Call for some air-med transport and establish a triage and landing zone in an open area somewhere nearby; plan for an EMS ferry system for multi-victims to the triage site, get that Command Board set up and get all the agency heads together there.
You're going to need rail-mounted cranes for stabilization, haevy duty air-bag system for some temp-stabilization, all portable stabilization systems available to the scene, maybe some tractor-trailer sized wreckers to spin out some cable and get a grip on something, even calling a few light duty Holmes wreckers might help.
Very important to establish NIMS ICS, especially get a staging officer out there to organize all the help coming in, I'd assign a firefighter or LT immediately, no sense in blocking up the area we might need road access to the site. How about a drop off point as close to the scene as possible, where rigs can roll up and stage equipment, then roll out to a parking area?
Depending on the time, you might need some heavy lighting systems, plus the generator-lights that we carried, portable 1000 watt lights.
Get the hydraulic rescue tools (you're going to need at least 4-6 systems maybe more?) out to the site. Ground ladders, Back-boards, stretchers, EMS equipment, lines stretched. Tread VERY carefully. Make entry into the cars in a stable area, and work your way forward, after evacuation of the able bodied. Then get ready for some serious PTSD scenes, some very dangerous and strenuous work lay ahead.
Then my superior officer would show up and change everything

I know up in my town. We are 100% percent volunteer. We usually discuss who and what apparatus we will be taking to the parade. The only parades we go to is our own during July 4th, and 3 towns that border us, and it is a 10 minute ride into the town. We ALWAYS let control know that we are taking X amount of trucks to XXX town for a parade, and estimate we will be back at XXXX hours. If it is a parade that is farther away (sometimes we get invited and just don't go), we will have control automatically start another engine or rescue for mutual aid depending on the call. If it is the town over, we usually take Tanker-1, Engine-1, and Ambulance-1. They are staffed with a full crew when they are out. Which leaves E-2, Rescue-1 and brush-1 in town.

We have previously established the fact that many departments in the area have a real tough time with having an adequate number of trained firefighters able to cover incidents in their jurisdiction. In light of this, I would be interested to know with as much specificity as possible, what type of preplans various departments have made to ensure that when members and apparatus participate in a parade in another jurisdiction, there will be no diminution in fire protection during the time these members and apparatus are not available????

I as well do not like Monday morning quareterbacking an incident which I was not a part of BUT, this appears to be a total breakdown of all the things "we" as firefighters train and prepare for. From the command structure (or lack there of), to the actions of the firefighters, everything just looks really, really bad. I actually grew up only about 15 minutes from where this incident occurred and started my fire service career in that area, so I have some knowledge of the departments involved. I agree with most of what has already been posted, but I will reinforce some problems I saw: the FF's on air or wearing their facepieces outside the building is ridiculous, the lack of ground ladders placed before the mayday is a problem, the member operating the line from the outside in the rear (wearing his mask, but no helmet) while other members appear to be making entry from the front, the lack of horizontal ventilation, making entry through a second floor window with a handline, the yelling and screaming by members in reference to placing the ladder for FF rescue yet none of them actually appeared to lend a hand, the ladder was not extended to reach the member in distress, no one ascended the ladder to assist the FF in need, the lack of patient assessment before dragging the downed member.
The list seems to go on and on and I don't even want to start to touch on what the heck the guy who was filming this was doing. He appeared to be aimlessly wandering around the fireground w/o any real purpose. At one ponint he was holding the line in the rear and looked like he was heading towards an area where fire was showing from a window like he was going to operate the line into it until someone redirected him to the ladder. He seemed to be on air and talking to himself and then started yelling "Mayday, Mayday, mayday" after the FF was out of the building and later was yelling "Firefighter down, firefighter down" as the injured member was being dragged to the front of the building. Apparently he was a member of the RIT. After the situation was handled there was more radio traffic about a Mayday, not sure what that was all about. This guy then walked back and forth behind the building about another 6 or so times.
Did anyone else notice the color, volume and velocity of the smoke issuing from around the member in distress as he exited the window? It appeared very light in color and not pushing with any great force or volume. To me this indicates that conditions were not that bad in that immediate area requiring that type of exit. I'm not sure what the bail-out situation was all about (out of air, deteriorating conditions, structural failure, etc.), but it didn't look like he was being chased out rapidly extending fire conditions. I certainly could be wrong though...
To be fair this footage only gives a very narrow view of what was truly happening, but I hope any departments that view this do not repeat the same mistakes in the future.

Rye Brooks politicians used this argument when the broke away from Port Chester. "We pay more in tax and the they use the services more" so they split and brought in Rual/Metro. So they went from paying 60-80% (I dont remember what the % was) to paying 100% and getting very little service. Don't some property owners in town A pay more than others in town A? do they get the same level of service or do they get more because they pay more?
We need to teach the public that fire stations and fire trucks do not fight fire or respond to emergencies. It takes firefighters. The main reason that stations are closed in a consolidation are there are too many empty fire stations or the building has not been maintained/is at the end of its life and is no longer safe to use.
Everytime I hear this I have to explain the economic value of a fire department. This is something that the fire service is very poor at doing. Now if you have a poor ISO rating and high tax this one does not work well, but in our case:
The average home owner in NR pays $425 per year in tax that gets to the FD. we have an ISO of 2. If we give back the $422 and get rid of the FD, that property insurance will go up $1,200 - $1,400 per year. That means if we never do another call we save that property $800 - $1,000 per year. We also make development more competative, if it is cheaper for a company to come to us than go somewhere else.

My point with that post was that consolidation maybe coming to Larchmont regardless of what depts it consolidates with. The Mamaroneck (Town & Village) and the vilage of larchmont are talking about a number of different consolidation areas. What is interesting is they did not include VMFD in the FD consolidation. My guess is they are strong enough politically that no one wanted to go there. There have also been many public discusions about TMFD taking over and getting rid of LFD including firing all career members. This has been proposed in the local paper by a group of volunteers that quit LFD and want to punish the career members for pushing to get a career chief. The 6 or so studies that have been brought to the table only talk about how much money could be saved, and no consideration for FD capabilities.
The County has nothing to do with any of this and there has been no interest expressed on anyones part to include them. The 100% volunteer departments are not included in this planning because the gap is to great. When NYS has one standard for all firefighters and they believe that NFPA 1710 is the minimum standard that should be meet, then they could be included.
YFD helped the rest of us get up to speed, they are the head of WSOTF and would continue to be so.
Very well said. We have looked carefully at that and you are 100% correct. When speaking with one of the council members from a smaller community, that concern was expressed, that his rigs would be in the cities covering them, why should his taxpayers subsidize the cities? My answer was, have you ever had a fire that you did not call mutual aid? I asked him if he new that the cities tax payers have been subsidizing his dept for years. He later told me he never considered that. He also never considered that 2 - 5 firefighters would not be able to get the job done at a working fire, much less one in a large multiple dwelling.

Helmet Cam Video: N.J. FF's Close Call
http://www.firehouse.com/topics/top-headlines/helmet-cam-video-nj-ffs-close-call
I don't even know where to start with this video. I'm usually the one saying it's easy to Monday morning qb and giving the benifit of the doubt but I think a good discussion on safety can be learned from this.
Right off the bat
1. We see the fire in and to the left. Yet there's a bunch of guys with a line and the nozzle on the little porch creating a traffic jam putting their regulators in. Get off to the side out of the venting smoke on a knee get your PPE squared away bleed the nozzle make entry and put out the fire.
2. A discussion is ongoing about who's inside how many? Obviously there are accountability issues. You must know who you have and a general idea where they are.
3. I hear a pass alarm going off as the guy is making his way to the back. Is anyone addressing it?
4. Why is a line operating from the exterior while interior operations are underway?
5. Obviously companies have been on scene at least a little while and a FAST and additional companies are being requested. This should have been requested quickly. We are more than 2 minutes into the video.
6. Differing people giving orders and they are contridictory. Honestly it looks to me as if the first and subsuquent lines should have gone through the front door. This is a basic concept. Protect the interior stairs and the escape route of the occupants. As the subsuquent lines come in they reinforce the first line, back it up, or go above for extension. This is a pretty fundamental concept of firefighting.
7. Now a member shows up in the window. They decide to move the ladder which under the circumstances is necessary.
8. Guy in the window has a haligan. He should have taken the window and the sash. I probably would have bought his some time by venting the heat and smoke a couple of feet above him while he waited for the ladder.
9. If you don't practice the basics like portable ladders it shows when the S* hits the fan. If you are going to ask the guy to come down head first the angle should have been decreased and footed. With all the people there with the ladder why didn't someone ascend to help the member down? You could have gone up and pinned the guy to the ladder for the descent. It wouldn't have been pretty but he probably wouldn't have fell.
10. Now the guy falls head first off the ladder. He is now out of the IDLH and immediate danger. I would have brought EMS back to him or had FF/EMTs board him. There was no good reason to handle him by dragging him to the front. It's a good idea at this point to question the downed FF about who was with him and their whereabouts.
11. Now the MAYDAY, first a roll call or PAR is needed a minute ago, assign a chief to supervise the mayday and give him resources and get him on another channel.
12. The practice of donning the facepiece without the regulator and walking around the fireground limits your field of vision greatly. Practice taking your knee and donning your facepiece and hood just prior to entering the IDLH. It allows you to see what your doing prior to entering, keeps your mask from fogging up, and limits your air consumption. At this fire its appears some firefighters may have used up their air prior to even operating inside.
My conclusions may not be entirely correct on all these items but this in no way seems like a smoothly run fire. No doubt these guys were faced with a working fire with entrappment and probably inadequete initial manpower. But if you train for the fundamental tasks you will be more efficent when adrenilin and emotions are high. Ever go to a fire when the fire department seems to be running the operation and not the fire running the fire department?

Doesn't every Property Owner in Westchester County pay taxes both the the local municipality that they reside in as well as a County Tax? If part of the Property Taxes paid goes to the County, then the way it could be explained would be now the portion of your taxes that you currently pay for Fire Service will now be paid to the County.
I believe that the proper way to "Communicate" this to ALL citizens of Westchester County would be for those Fire Service Professionals (Bnechis, Fitzpatrick, Flynn, etc, etc, etc) to "Collectively" put this "MASTER PLAN" (for both the Southern Westchester Fire District AND the Northern Westchester Fire District) and have town/city/village FORUMS and invite citizens to sit in on the presentation and have these Professional Senior Fire Officials explain in "Common Man/Women Language" (so that everyone can understand) why this is being proposed, the impact (Positively) it will have on their Fire Service/Emergency Response as well as the relief that they could see from a Tax Payers prospective.
I'd bet that if they were to see/hear this with their own eyes and ears, AND if they had the SOLID backing of all City/Town/and Village Officials as well as the New County Executive, that it would be POSITIVELY RECEIVED BY ALL.
I totally agree with Chris' statement that by leaving this in the HANDS of the Senior Level Fire Management Professionals in Westchester County to work on "PRO-ACTIVELY" rather than wait for the "Hammer to Come Down" and be forced to make decisions "On the Fly" with input coming from those "Not In The Know" in a "RE-ACTIVE" manner, is the "WAY TO GO" - Let's get it done NOW rather than waiting for LATER!

Just to add my two cents in here guys--I was one of the FF at this job (Caryl Ave) I was also the one which called in the MAYDAY, as well as the FF who located (and dragged down the hall) the single (one) fatality at this job (A 66 yr. old woman). Knowing the job first hand, and being there on a first due truck company, I can confirm all that has been written about the job. The bulk of the fire was in the Southwest rear of the building; it was caused by a broken gas main on the first floor which the super had "drilled" through while making ordinary repairs. Within minutes of arriving at the scene, there were literally 20 to 30 active rescues underway; many of which were extremely hazerdous and extremely difficult. While later on in the job, additional manpower may have helped relieve the exhausted crews; Yonkers FD responded (as usual) with the appropriate dispatching and backup dispatching as the job called for. I do think that many lives would have been lost that night if Yonkers was not staffed they way we are.
Having also been at the BRR job from start to finish, I can also attest to the fact that FDNY did show up and was extremly helpful and appreciated. This very large job had a tremendous amount of fireload and lifehazard. Once again, Yonkers FD dispatched to the best of their ability, recalling all off-duty manpower and manning additional units. But once all of our resources were depleted, it was nice to have helping hands from our brothers to the South.
I'm not here to tout Yonkers as the best, nor to chime in on the debate over departmental consolidation (although, I'm not a fan, and will reserve comments for another thread)I simply wanted to make sure the facts were known about these two referenced jobs, and to thank our neighbors (FDNY, New Rochelle, Eastchester, Mt. Vernon, etc) for the times we needed them and they answered the call). It's always nice to have an extra set of hands...now if we can just get past the politics........

I for one truly believe that the time has come in today's fire service to seriously consider "Regionalization and/or Consolidation".There are many driving factors that cannot be ignored any longer, with first and foremost being the economy driven cutbacks we see rolling across the country. Many cities and small towns are already sorely understaffed and now are looking to cut even further. It seems it's only a matter of time until the system becomes so insufficient that something will have to be done.
My question is; do we sit idle and wait to see if it happens? Or, do we try to start the momentum and get people to understand that this is a matter of survival. Should we push our governments to start taking a serious look at this option instead of cutting vital services further and putting ourselves and the public at greater risk? The time has come to step up and promote the idea and get people thinking in a proactive direction instead of waiting for the Sky to Fall.

"We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately" - Benjamin Franklin (How ironic that he was a fire chief).
I think he was one of our MANY Chiefs!!!!!!!

3 years ago the Province of Quebec ordered 100's of its FD's to merge. They mad it simple since they collect & redistribute the taxes. In talking with fire officers from Montreal, they said they had never done Mutual aid before the consolidation they said the biggest challanges included different types of equipment, no common radios, different terminology and here is the best one, 25% of the departments only speak english while the majority only french.
They claimed that as of last March it was working well.
If they can get past those issues and we already do work together, we should have no problem.
The big issue in most consolidations (like No. Hudson or Quebec's) it was forced on the FD's by the oversight governments. We are proposing to do this on our terms.

Well said, Thanks Chris. Unfortinatly it has become very clear that many are not in it for the public. To many politicians are afraid of lossing power, same for the unions, volunteers, and some of the chiefs (I say some, because they supported the study). Now I have always said that consolidation is in the best interest of the members (as well as the public). Arriving with enough ff's to be safe, requiring enough officers to supervise (thus also promoting more officers)and not having to fight for table scraps (tax base)is in every firefighters best interest. With the issues that are affecting many of the depts in the study (Budget cuts, layoffs and forced ellimination).
"We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately" - Benjamin Franklin (How ironic that he was a fire chief).
What is coming down the road over the next 3-5 years will shape the fire service, if we do not lead this change, it will roll right over the top of us.
But, I am sure that many will try hard to dispute the idea. I believe that consolidation is coming, I do not know if it will be during my career, my lifetime or my childs, but it will happen. Then we will look back at this time in the future and question why we did not fight harder to make it happen sooner.Yonkers is the only dept that meets the 3ff/1of per rig and 16 ffs/of on a 1st alarm, but that does not meet NFPA 1710. The standard also says that staffing is based on a 2,000 sq ft structure without a basement. Based on that YFD is under staffed and all other depts. are in worst shap than YFD.
They are not even close and almost every thread here has shown that. Yes they would, but we would not want that because ____ (fill in BS reason here) & pound on ones chest at the same time.
If that fire occured in any of the other 57 departments in Westchester we would make the cover of every magazine in the country. THe only difference from one dept to another would be the body count. This is when the public will start asking questions of their fire chief and this is when the "we did our best" will be tested in the court of public opinion.
Because it cant work, I will no longer be king, just because it works everywhere else does not mean it will work here, We dont needed it since everything here is perfect, We cant work with them they have yellow trucks....etc....etc...

Some of the short comings of the Mohegan FD have come to light with this recent spate of working fires. Among them, 7 positions apparently left vacant, 3 fire stations staffed with one firefighter alone in each station, and the apparently consistent practice of putting a mutual aid "FAST" company to work as a means of supplementing their inability of adequate fire attack.
For starters.......
You lost me after the word "monday." But WHAT has changed if a department cannot field an adequate number of firefighters for a working fire (if this is the case)? The answer is apparent is it not? That community might be in serious trouble if it cannot field a firefighting force effective enough to suppress a "simple" working fire. What about (as someone already pointed out earlier) a school, an elderly care facility, or another place of public assembly?
There have been multiple threads of discussion regarding fire emergencies within Westchester County on this board, and manpower has and is an ongoing issue in this forum.
And sometimes, even in the fire service, with adequate preparation and an effective workforce; things can go right. Peoples' lives have/can/and will continue to be saved, peoples' homes and businesses shall continue to be saved, and that is no fantasy.

Are there any career guys on here who would be interested in running? Or, does anyone know of someone who is not a volunteer who lives in the area who we might convince to run? Maybe a lot of us who care about this issue could get behind such an individual and support them?
It seems like the situation in Mohegan is the classic case of insiders running a Fire District for their own benefit and disregarding what is best for the public. I am willng to write letters, go to meetings and demonstations, whatever. I think a win on this issue in Mohegan would be a win for the fire service as a whole and the public we are sworn to protect.
And. BTW, it doesn't have to be a "bloody battle"...hopefully, if given the proper information, some of the volunteers who serve as Fire Commissioners, or their supporters, will see the light and make some immediate, concrete moves to both add more career staff as well as give the career staff the authority and respect they need to properly serve the public.

How sad (but true) that a union, career Firefighter would be scared of retribution for posting on a website. Many of us on other jobs really don't appreciate what we have when you look at what we complain about. I am sorry you guys have to put up with this and you have my support.

Thanks Chief may speak to you in the future
Kurt if you are calling for other Depts from the get go doesn't this call for consolidation now. If you are on Auto Mutual Aid now how many depts will be called before a firefighting force is raised in the future. Lets think ahead for a 2 year plan and 5 years and 10 years. This is forward thinking and all depts will be better by the planning that is done today.
We should all stop thinking about stop-gap measures. The actions that are taken today will have consequences tomorrow and for years to come. True leadership is taking care of the people that we serve and FFs & EMS that work so hard to provide this service. Having enough response now and in the future is for most.

You see that through your whole rant and rave you have missed my point. My point was not to claim fame for all the dead people I have recovered from cars accidents or fires, it was to point out that you posted a link to the graphic pictures of the scene for others to watch. I did not go on the Internet to search out the pictures, as probably a lot of other members here who have seen it first hand and quite frankly could care less about seeing them. You made it easy though to click and open. Had you not pasted the link I would have taken you post more seriously. So as one of the top rated members on the forum say's QTIP.

Yeah, complaining about something being out there and then putting it out there yourself makes you part of the problem. Its not about how accessible the video is. Its that you're doing the very thing you're ranting against. As to the appropriateness of the video and photos, yes it is appropriate. When you benefit from public exposure then your victories, losses, and in this case his death are all fair game. This wasn't a private figure who died in an accident. What about the compilation "fail" videos and entire TV shows dedicated to accidents and injuries. Its all in the same vein of voyeuristic experiences.

I can appreciate this sentiment, but I have found this same statement is usually made time and again in reference to ICS programs and NIMS. Anyone who's taught ICS in many areas will have heard,"We don't really need all this BS, because when the real Big Job" happens, we'll pull together and get it done. We always have."Time and again, far more areas all over the country run large scale incident drills only to have major holes found in their plans.Sadly, second and third exercises often reveal most of the previously identified issues have not been corrected. As BNECHIS pointed out, drills tend to show that it takes far longer to get the first critical patient to the appropriate facility that we'd ever consider. Time and again, unit to unit communication cannot take place off the main channels, many agencies fail to follow basic ICS principles and fail to understand them despite mandated training, and a failure of a true Unified Command system leading to multiple individual incident command systems. It seems all agencies have their hands out when the money and equipment is being passed out, but asking them to live up to the expectation that they can function in a 21st century IC system still alludes them.
This is not the case everywhere, but I know we see it in the Northeast corner. Maybe our forefathers set us up for this by imposing a strong sense of "home rule", but we're finding that in emergency services failure to work together well will cause problems. The best thing you folks have going for you there is that a healthy number of people are interacting many times a week, discussing problems. I could only wish the people in our area would even admit there are issues with covering calls, second and third tones, training deficiencies and the silly number of apparatus as compared to the number of incidents.

Agreed. This is a pretty broad topic.

As someone who has worked more EMS jobs then I care to remember, I can tell you this. Every VAC / FD-EMS has changed in the time I've been involved. Some agencies should be proud of themselves, others need to check their egos at the door and come up with a solution FAST! I'm not going to use any agency names, but I will share some examples.
One VAC that I used to belong to is almost not a VAC anymore, rather it is nearly all paid. Part of the problem here was that certain people seemed to want it all to go paid and made it almost fail completely as a VAC. Luckily, some of the volunteers are still there as volunteers and others are there to get paid. Either way, the level of care is one of the best in Westchester.
Another VAC I belonged to barely covered anything for a while. Then some new members came and they were the dependable ones in the area. A change of officers made some of the die-hards almost vanish, and Mutual Aid became more frequent. Another change of officers, back up to covering calls again. Yet another change, and probably one of the worst periods in this VAC's history. A recent change appears to be helping, but I really don't think it will sustain, simply because it seems like more of a "proving a point" thing then anything. Once these people get tired of what they're doing, it will be back to three tones and out.
My current EMS affiliation used to be FD based. People literally raced to get the ambulances out for calls and would stay at the firehouse waiting for them. Some leadership problems, personality conflicts and a lack of trying to resolve things by our leadership sent us down the toilet. I still believe that if certain Chiefs put forth some effort, we could of improved things, but I firmly believe there was always a personal agenda involved and now EMS is on it's own. Ironically, EMS is doing much better. In the beginning it was mostly FD people who were waiting for something to change in order to motivate them, so we were getting out all the time. The open membership started, and the new influx of people have been picking up the ball and running with it. The biggest problem, however, is that the call volume keeps growing, especially during the day when most people are working, and it truly taxes the agency. Especially when almost one call a day is Mutual Aid to someone else - you get tired of bailing others out.
If every VAC could crew every rig they have, then this wouldn't be an issue. It kills me to see VACs with 3 or 4 rigs that allow calls to go Mutual Aid 3,4,5 times a day. Why not sell a rig and hire an EMT/Driver?! ALS knows exactly who I am talking about, and so does anyone with a scanner.
My time in paid EMS revealed all kinds of agencies to me. Some VACs always covered their calls, others were almost non-existent. Sadly, this goes back about 10 years and in some places, IS THE SAME NOW!!!! I remember waiting over an hour once for an ambulance for a nose bleed when working in Heritage Hills. When we finally had an ambulance responding, the gentleman stopped bleeding and said, "Forget it, I'll f---ing drive myself to the ER."
I have heard and been there to dispatch calls that have gone as far as six, seven, eight and even NINE agencies until we covered them. But as long as the rigs are washed, people have new t-shirts to wear and they win parade trophies, they'll never see a problem. I've seen some VACs have 20-30 people at a parade, but two hours later they need Mutual Aid for a nursing home FDGB call. Nah, keep on wishing on rainbows and eating the magical cupcakes....everything is fine....
But I will say this. If ever a family member needs EMS, and that EMS doesn't respond and/or there is a major delay they couldn't avoid (bad weather, etc.) then I guarantee my name will be in a load of letters to the agency, municipality and media. This much I promise!
I know a lot of you commenting on this thread, especially ALS & JJB - and I know how tired of this s*** you are, and being the professionals you are, I know it's getting to a point where you just can't bite your lip anymore.
Stay strong brothers!