LACoGurneyjockey
Forum Asst. Chief
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Dispatched for unknown MVA in a town 30 miles away, best location is a "X dirt road south of Y highway near Z land mark", giving us several miles of possible location for an off road MVA. Fire is not responding (for whatever reason) and there is no airship available. We meet up with highway patrol who also has no idea where this is or how to get there. Start driving down unmarked dirt road for about 30 minutes before reaching a point where our truck could go no further. Huge rocks in the road that would have blown a tire if we could even get clearance over them.
So we decide to turn around and try another unmarked dirt road, but before we can get there a group of quads come up behind us and flag us down. They were with the rider who went down and tell us he's back where we were, several miles past the impassable portion of road. So turn back around, and drive back down the same bit of awful dirt road to where we can go no further.
My partner and I hop out and start talking with the group of ATVs, getting some info on the patients condition and his location.
So at this point we have no airship, no other responding agencies, and no way of getting our ambulance any further...
So let's ride some quads.
Grab the first in bag, commandeer the quad and take off following one of the riders who knows the pt location. Find a 50 something male down in the dirt road complaining of hip and leg pain after crashing his dirtbike at low speed. At this point a retired FF and self-described 'full-time badass' (his words) shows up with a 4x4 SUV, and plywood for loading the quads onto the trailer.
So, make a backboard out of plywood, strap the patient down and drop the seats in the back of the SUV. Load the patient and take off down the road at the blistering speed of 5mph. Get to the impassable section of road again and the SUV can't go any further. Hike up a backboard from the truck, transfer the patient over, and hike him down to the truck before transporting a pelvic/femur fx down over an hour of bumpy dirt road. 5 hours from call time to clear, and he said he went down a couple hours before being able to call.
I think I like rural EMS...thank god I got out of LA County
So we decide to turn around and try another unmarked dirt road, but before we can get there a group of quads come up behind us and flag us down. They were with the rider who went down and tell us he's back where we were, several miles past the impassable portion of road. So turn back around, and drive back down the same bit of awful dirt road to where we can go no further.
My partner and I hop out and start talking with the group of ATVs, getting some info on the patients condition and his location.
So at this point we have no airship, no other responding agencies, and no way of getting our ambulance any further...
So let's ride some quads.
Grab the first in bag, commandeer the quad and take off following one of the riders who knows the pt location. Find a 50 something male down in the dirt road complaining of hip and leg pain after crashing his dirtbike at low speed. At this point a retired FF and self-described 'full-time badass' (his words) shows up with a 4x4 SUV, and plywood for loading the quads onto the trailer.
So, make a backboard out of plywood, strap the patient down and drop the seats in the back of the SUV. Load the patient and take off down the road at the blistering speed of 5mph. Get to the impassable section of road again and the SUV can't go any further. Hike up a backboard from the truck, transfer the patient over, and hike him down to the truck before transporting a pelvic/femur fx down over an hour of bumpy dirt road. 5 hours from call time to clear, and he said he went down a couple hours before being able to call.
I think I like rural EMS...thank god I got out of LA County
