What do you guys do to burn time while on shift? Being on oil stand by, I can't sleep per AMR policy, so I have to stay away the entire 12-16 hours. I just downloaded SimCity for my iPhone and searching for some time consuming games for my netbook (has to be direct download).
So yeah....haven't been on in a while. Been working like a crazy person (all that outdoor stuff I love!). Haven't had a lot of free time...weekends are spent sleeping (last weekend slept 13 hours saturday night to sunday morning it was grand!) Finally got on the internet today to buy a climbing harness....been trying to justify getting a new one for a while and even though I can wear the ones here I decided I wanted my own.
Feel like I am in the boons out here. Had to evac a student last week and it was quite an ordeal. It's so rural out here that calling 911 is a whole new ball game....it's all private ambulances and it takes a minimum of 40-45 minutes before help arives....that and the nearest hospitail is an hour and 45 minutes (the nearest legit hospitial is 3 hours away). The majority of the staff working here have WEMT and we deal with our own medical emergencies for the most part....couldn't figure out why at first lol now I know. For me it's good insentive to work on being NOT accident prone...which I have failed at all ready but at least I am trying to work on it.
On the other hand dealing with our own medical emergencies means I have gotten quite a bit of WFR practice (which is cool since I have to recert this fall...yay).
In any case....it's going well. Hope everyone else is having a good summer. What has everyone been up too (besides working of course)?
Just got home. Kinda got my wish for a fun SAR holiday weekend.
Paged out at 1445 for a subject missing in the woods for 2 days. Was organizing the response from our SAR Cache when Dispatched called and said that we have a second call: 3 people went into the water in a location where we have had past swiftwater recoverys. One older male was out of the water but having difficulty breathing. The other 2 males were in the middle of the river clinging to a rock. Hmmm... which call is a priority and we should devote limited SAR resources to?
Stepped up a Swiftwater Rescue response. Get half way there and get cancelled because they got out of the water on theit own (somehow) and Ambulance and FIRE would handle the medical stuff. We continued on to the missing person call. WOW! If you are gonna do HEAVY drugs for 20 years (including the morning you go missing) DO NOT wander into the woods! Helo (which was called in for the search and for the swiftwater call) located the man sitting in the middle of a 25 foot wide creek/river after a good deal of searching. Took us an hour to cut trail to him (spent a lot of time wading in the water). 2 days in the woods. Nearly naked (only one piece of clothing covering his bits - not even shoes). Cold. Wet. Hungrey. Lacerations and scrapes everywhere. Sunburned. Back pain (azz pain really). He was not gonna be amblatory and even if we pushed him it would take 3-4 or more hours to push him out. Not medically the best idea. Carry out? Not in that terrain without 50 strong backs, a lot of ropes, and a good 6 hours. Oh... helo... can we say "short haul"?
Long evening... Mountain is kinda "SAR Happy"... still wanted that swiftwater call... ^_^