- 9,736
- 1,174
- 113
They do need to at least know whether the patient will be transported by air or ground in order to set up a LZ. A few of the fire departments though are more particular about it being their scene, their fire district, and their decision regarding whether a helicopter needs to land at their accident.
For example, a few months ago I was dispatched to a "High Mechanism MVA" for a car into a house. This coded out as a Delta level trauma, so the state police helicopter auto-launched. We got there at about the same time as the first BLS fire ambulance and engine. The car had literally just bumped into the siding of the trailer home. Zero damage to the car, and minor siding scrapes on the house. After seeing that Grandpa was talking, complaint free, and had just hit the gas rather than the brake, I went to cancel the helicopter. My FTO stopped me before I could and warned me that it would be better to go through the fire officer on scene and offer up that we didn't believe this patient would need to be flown and we would be ok with him releasing the helicopter. It's just a different way of doing things than I'm used to.
Had a call that made me think about this today.
Fire captain came up to me to ask if it was alright with me if he requested aviation on a standby and I had already put them on a go. Was actually on my way to tell him that. All I got was a "sweet cause we're gonna need em. Didn't want to take your candy from you though."
Polar opposite from what everyone on here was talking about.