An interesting day...

[John E]

when I'm not taking care of the rich and famous on movie sets I play around with HAM radio. I recently joined an ARES group, that stands for; Amateur Radio Emergency Services for those who've never heard of it.

It's a local group, based in L.A. that provides HAM operators in times of natural disasters and the like. This particular group has aligned themselves in particular with 20 some odd local hospitals.

Anyway, we got a rather urgent request earlier this week to help out as the Los Angeles County/USC Medical Center closed their old location and moved into their new location. Hospital staff and ambulance crews had to transport over 400 pts. from critical to DNR's to relatively minor.

We helped with coordinating communications within the hospital and the new location, which is literally next door to the old one.

The exercise was originally scheduled to take place over 2 days, I'm happy and a little bit proud to report that the entire move was done in one day, today. From 0630 this morning until approx. 1730 tonight over 400 pts. were assessed, packaged and transported via BLS, ALS, CC, and even a couple of NICU specialised ambulances, both private as well as County owned and operated.

So far as I know there were zero problems to speak of, if anything, things actually worked better than hoped for.

It was interesting to watch the crews work from my perspective, I got to talk to 2 associates, one of whom I went to EMT school with and one of whom is an aspiring Set Medic.

There were some medical/ethical situations that had to be addressed, couple of patients near death, too ill to transport but soon no hospital or staff to care for them, what would you do? Keep an entire ward open and operating or risk moving them? We also had to deal with a couple of MRSA pts. as well as some othere severely infectious pts.

All in all, a good day.

John E.

 

[berkeman]

Sounds like a good use of HAM radio, John, and good practice.

I'm the ARES Emergency Coordinator (EC) for Newark in Northern California. We integrate our HAM radio activities with our local CERT teams and other ARES/RACES teams in our area, mainly in preparation for response after earthquakes. We've got several fault lines running through the Bay Area, and one of them is due to slip any time now...

Combining EMS/MRC/MMRS and HAM communications is really important here in Earthquake country....

KI6EGL

 

[tatersalad]

thanks for posting, very interesting. I haven't been on the air much lately, but have been thinking I should get involved with ARES and / or Skywarn after I finish my EMT-B class. There is pretty good traffic on 2m around here, now I'll have to get the Yaesu charged up!

 

[mycrofft]

CERT and ARES, ham and eggs.

Sacramento Sheriff Dept has a volunteer citizen HAM group I believe is in addition to the local ARES operation.
I've been given to understand that at least around here each hospital government and etc has to have a HAM licensed person and a radio.
The ARES folks gave talks at the 2006 and 2007 Sacramento national readiness conferences but the participants who were not already involved sorta went "Huh?".
Need someone to bridge the "radio is a way of life" group to us "I just want to know how to communicate in a disaster" types.

Congrats on the big move!!

Mycrofft,
son of the late W6NDE

 

[MRE]

Thats pretty cool John. Good to get the word out that amateur radio operators can do a lot in emergency situations.

 

[daedalus]

Lol. I was there. My company was there as well.

I hate these operations. Did the same thing over at UCLA a month ago or so.

 

[RailFan77]

Very interesting. I have been interested for a long time, in getting a ham radio operaters license and pursuing this as a hobby. My uncle did this for years and had alot of fun. Hearing this story makes me even more interested...guess I'll have to look in it now.

Jim

 

[MRE]

Jim,

Check out www.arrl.org, and if you like forums, www.qrz.com. Beware the politics and dry humor there though.

Very interesting. I have been interested for a long time, in getting a ham radio operaters license and pursuing this as a hobby. My uncle did this for years and had alot of fun. Hearing this story makes me even more interested...guess I'll have to look in it now.

Jim

 

[RailFan77]

Jim,

Check out www.arrl.org, and if you like forums, www.qrz.com. Beware the politics and dry humor there though.

I'll def check it out tonight.

And I work in an office full time for now...I've learned to filter out the crappy dry humor.

Jim

 

[Mikel512]

yo jonh E, your a set medic? I have actually worked as a set medic down in the other LA, Louisiana, for a couple of big films. It was an awesome job, just to far from home and the place is not necessarily a cool in both senses. know anybody looking for a set medic in the Austin area?B)

 

[tydek07]

Glad it went well

Hey,

That is really interesting! I heard about the HAM radio about 4-5 years ago and never truly thought about it again. I am suprised that there are still people that use them and that they are even being used in cases like this!!

Now you have me searching around the internet to find more information about these HAM radio's, haha

I am glad everything turned out good/better then planned for the hospital!

Take Care,

 

[mycrofft]

HAM radio is important.

First commo out of large scale disasters is usually HAM.
Here's more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Affiliate_Radio_System

 

[EMTinNEPA]

400 transports in one day? Sounds like my idea of hell.

 

[TransportJockey]

Yay the wonders of a MRSA pt. I have one or two a week.

And I need to do something fun w/ my HAM license.

 

[berkeman]

Yeah, keep in mind that Morse Code is no longer required for getting your HAM license. The FCC removed that requirement over the past few years, in order to encourage more folks to get their licenses and be available to help out with emergency communications.

www.arrl.org

 

[mycrofft]

How about you HAMsters help us out with links etc?

This may seem away from EMS, but a person with a radio is more effective/dangerous/powerful than one without if he/she can talk to the right people...like Air Combat Command, or local FD, LE, etc.

My medical section was given impressive folding Nextels with "walkie-talkie" capability. Most will not turn them on because they are ill at ease working a mike without dialing first and their girlfriend on the other end, and are afraid they will get a call. That fear is mutual.:glare:

 

[John E]

Yep...

Ham radio is not only still around, it's probably bigger than ever, ironically by using the net it's managed to attract a whole new group of users.

Yesterday's "Great Shakeout" earthquake drill here in Los Angeles used Ham operators exclusively for communications between agencies and hospitals as part of the scenario of the drill was that all landline and cellphones were unusable due to either power outages or line damage. Something that the cellular phone companies don't like to talk about, no pun intended.

If the power grid goes down, it takes cell phones with it, or at least cell towers without which cell phones won't work. Landline phones may keep working, at least the old fashioned non-wireless handset type but if their equipment and operations buildings collapse, so does the phone service. A ham operator only needs battery power, a radio and an antenna to keep communicating.

The exercise I wrote about above used Hams because using business band/commercial radios wasn't working and that was when they were only trying to communicate from the upper floors of a hospital down to the ambulance bays.

The ARRL uses the slogan, "when all else fails, ham radio..." and it's true, at least so far as communications during times of disaster. And besides, it's fun...;^)

John E.

 

[John E]

As for the Set Medic thing...

yep, that and event coverage is what I do to pay for my Ham radio hobby, well that and my mortgage...;^)

If you've got experience, try and find the local film liaison office in Austin, I'm sure they've got one, see if they have a local providers list for vendors/personnel. It's tough if you're not in an area with a lot of filming going on.

Try and find some local production companies and hit them up for work, impress upon how important it is to keep their crews and cast members healthy and safe cause it really is important. Not bragging but I've saved production companies WAY more than they've spent paying me by helping to keep key crew members and cast healthy and well taken care of.

When you're on the set with a crew of 100 plus people making high, some very high, hourly rates, every minute wasted is hundreds if not thousands of dollars wasted, treating a simple injury on-set can literally keep a production running. Seems simplistic I know but it's how we convince production companies how valuable it is to have a Medic on-set. Same thing for decent catering and all of the other amenities that one finds on film sets. To someone not in the industry it probably seems silly, to the crew that's regularly working 12 and 14 hour days for days on end in all kinds of weather, having someone to bandage up a minor laceration or even better, to help prevent an injury by pointing out an unsafe situation is invaluable.

John E.