Danger

The other day I was discussing with somebody how perhaps St. Francis in Poughkeepsie should become a Level 1 and Kingston Hospital and/or Vassar Brothers go to Level 2.

So, would Alamo's Chief of Operations be 81-1 or 81-7?

Would a VAC Captain be 82-7 and not 82-1?

I pity the poor dyslexic ones up there who think a boat is coming for their EMS calls!!!   

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Well, that is where I can imagine some confusion.

Alamo's GM I guess would be technically 81-1, but it is highly unlikely he'd ever come on as that. More likely you'd hear the Duty Supervisor as 81-9 at a large scale event or 81-89 when acting as a Medic.

BVAC's Captain (top rank) is 82-1.

A fire and EMS agency, such as East Fishkill or Pleasant Valley would have 39-8 or 56-8 as their EMS chief or rescue captain, respectively.

In Arlington or Lagrange, 32-8 and 32-7 and 47-8 are career EMS directors. Our EMS captain is 32-C7 technically, but he's a low profile kinda guy.

I agree, the badge does not make the medic

If you show up on scene act professionally and identify yourself.  If you're there as a civilian before any first responders arrive you will be well recieved and your efforts appreciated.  People are not going to stop you and ask for your certifications.  I've seen it happen dozens of times.

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I disagree. When volunteers show up in Van Halen t-shirts and ripped jeans, they can be the best EMTs in the world, but when the Medic shows up in a uniform, a badge and a monitor, they take him as the word of God...And rightfully so, for looking, being and acting professional.

When towns stop letting nursing homes call commercial agencies direct, they're going to find that Sally Taxpayer isn't going to have an ambulance anymore because it's going to be on it's 10th "minor bleeding from a stent site" call of the day. Another rumor bouncing around the firehouse gossip world is that the person who requested MLSS direct works for MLSS. IMHO it should be your choice to call who you like, especially in this instance, as typically commercial services provide a free transport for employees and besides, who wouldn't want to be taken care of by their brothers.

Interesting. I wonder how would this effect nursing homes, who often call direct for "emergencies".

And now that the "Croft Corners Broadcast Company" relocated to North carolina - there is a LOT more available air time on BOTH agencies radios!

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Hahahaha, Robby Redlights! I know you all miss him up there at City 911!

To expand on what has already been said:

14 Dutchess County Emergency Control

31 Amenia

32 Arlington

33 City of Beacon

34 Beekman

35 Chelsea

36 Dover

37 Dutchess Junction

38 East Clinton

39 East Fishkill

41 Fairview

42 Village of Fishkill Protection Engine

43 Glenham

44 Hillside

45 Hughsonville

46 Hyde Park

47 LaGrange

48 Milan

49 Millbrook

51 Millerton

52 New Hackensack

53 New Hamburg

54 Pawling

55 Pine Plains

56 Pleasant Valley

57 City of Poughkeepsie

58 Red Hook

59 Rhinebeck

61 Rhinecliff

62 Rombout

63 Roosevelt

64 Staatsburg

65 Stanford

66 Tivoli

67 UnionVale

68 Wappingers

69 Wassaic

71 West Clinton

81 - Alamo

82 - Beacon VAC

84 - NDP

There are a few others such as IBM Emergency Control (97 I believe) and Castle Point VA (95)

1-6 - Chief Officer

7-8 - EMS Officer

9-10 - Shift Command (Commercial EMS Supervisor, Career Fire Duty Lt.)

11-19 - Engine

21-29 - Engine/Tanker

31-39 is a tanker/tender

41-49 would technically be ladder, but only 45 and 46 tend to get used.

51-59 is rescues. Supposed to be light rescues are low 50s, heavy rescue 55+.

61-69 are utility/specialty vehicles (brush trucks, utilities, mechanics, squads etc...)

70s are BLS Ambulances. The County wants to try a new system where ALS ambulances are 79, 78, 77 etc counting down. Hence Pawling 54-79.

81-89 are Medic Units, either a fly car (Fire or commercial EMS) or on board a Fire Dept. ambulance. I know that East Fishkill 39-81 is a hose truck/pumper, Union Vale 67-81 is Lazy Lay, hose reel truck.

91-99 are specialty "vehicles"

Certain 90s are specific positions, including Safety Officer, Fire Prevention Officer, MTO, other duty Lts.

I agree that this has to be one of the easier systems around. Anyone can easily surmise what type of apparatus is responding and from which agency.

As well, why don't fire depts also have response priorities?  I can't speak for everyone but almost all the time I hear units dispatched on non-priority type calls, such as water conditions with good information and then you hear the responding units blaring away with lights and sirens to, what I consider (IMO), a non emergency type call.  I mean if the persons are trapped in house that is being washed away that is one thing, but a pump out of a basement or a pipe burst in a wall...come on now!

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Uh, we do. SOPs state what constitutes a Code 3 (Lights and Sirens) and what is a Code 1 (cold) repsonse. Calls like CO, pump outs, fluids in the road, minor mulch/outdoor fires with no exposures, etc. go Code 1. Logically, blue lights can only be used on Code 3 alarms.

I'm wholly unfamiliar with Medevac. So there is a 24 hour crew who sits in a station waiting to be called?

What make is that?

And thats gotta be PS...

I don't know about you guys, but when i'm not at work, i really don't want to be overtly advertised as an EMT, nor do i want to be the 45 minute duty EMT on my way down to grand central. I think ill pay the freight.

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Agreed, I know a few cops who pay for the same reason.

I almost spit out my coffee at the Deli when I saw the big headline "EMTs GONE WILD!!" Things aren't the way they used to be, you just can't get away with this kind of stuff anymore. A black eye for a field that already gets no respect.

I just meant that in all my days of internet buff-ery I hadn't seen a Transcare flycar before.

ughh!

Could somebody PLEASE just make a bus that doesn't fall apart within the first 2 weeks of service!  It doesn't seem to matter wether you buy an AEV, Medix, Horton, McCoy Miller, PL Custom, Crestline, or even Demers... they all just go to sh!t

oh and P.S. to the designers... we really f*cking HATE lifting the stair chair OVER the patient to put it away. could ya do something about that?

regards,

Aching back of a whiny medic

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Hey, our PL Customs are great, and the stair chair is stored in an exterior compartment...

I've been hearing that pretty frequently lately. Although, I never knew Transcare did fly car medics.

Say NDP transports some one to beacon and now there is a priority 1 call in fishkill and NDP is the closest unit on GPS but county doesn't know they have a PT in the bus and dispatches them since they are the closest unit.  for this to work then all the EMS for 911 would need to be a county contract and the contracted buses would need to call out of service for transports since private transports are bound to hapen since they pay for the EMS agancy to operate.

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Instead of running in to those issues, you need to have dedicated 911 buses. Look at Alamo's Town of Wappinger ambulance vs. Transcare's. The whole point of doing a county wide service, to me, is to stop with the txpt BS and get ambulances in service for sick people paying a lot of taxes. Keep the units on the county system for 911 calls and if a call comes in direct to company dispatch or for some other reason, have a way to deactivate the ambulance. Hopefully by a means of pushing a button rather than clogging up the radio even further.

My mom gave it to me when I was born.

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Sounds like it must have been a rough childhood.

I know Dutchess is doing one.

I feel bad for the people who work there. I have a feeling pretty soon this company will be heading to the "Defunct Agencies" thread.

i saw a car marked "NY State University Police."  anyone know where that car's from??  my only guess is NYU...

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I'd be more apt to say SUNY Purchase, NYU is not part of the state system as far as I know, nor would they take that trek.

The idea of the two towns sharing 3 ambulances seems pretty logical. As far as a BLS first response, perhaps the town (provided that they fund the Volunteer Fire Department) should put some pressure on the VFD to get a crew out on scene. Over here in my direction, FDs without ambulances like New Hamburg, New Hackensack and Hughsonville do a fine job of getting a BLS flycar and some often needed manpower on the scene to assist the commercial agency.

Here in Arlington, a few people here and there complain about the fire tax being a little high, but when you see something like this, you realize that it's a small price to pay for a highly trained system with 3 (or 4) BLS ambulances and a minimum of three (and sometimes as many as six) on duty medics. Maybe things like this should be the beginning of a wake up call to commercial EMS and towns alike: no more $125,000 contracts. Start paying enough to support having a pull-for-transport-proof ALS ambulance with a 15 minute backfill capability and start paying EMTs $15/hr. Either that, or start a municipal system. I think it was x635, though I'm not sure, who observed that towns would never contract out the parks or public works department but they'll throw out the health and safety of their citizens for peanuts.

The moral of the story is that this is what happens when you let Eddie Griffin act. His performances were always a trainwreck, now a car wreck also.

Beautiful. I love the ALFs. Best of luck.