BY JEM ANSHAW
There is no denying that first responders see some confronting scenes in their line of work, but at Denman Fire and Rescue Station they make sure their training prepares them for anything their imagination conjures up.
Recently The Hunter River Times experienced the authenticity of the training after we received an invite to a training exercise earlier this month.
Brigade captain Amon Burkill had said it would be a ‘mass casualty drill with earth moving equipment and cars’, but the scene he had set up to surprise the crew was complex with many factors to those involved to consider.
“We try and do a decent rescue drill every month, sometimes depending on weather we might not do it for a couple of months, but we generally try and get tools on the ground at least once a month or every six weeks,” he said.
“A lot of the time it’ll be scenarios that we’ve had or a spin-off of them, and we’re also limited by what equipment and what vehicles we’ve got laying around.”
Upon arriving to the local property where the scene was set up, the crew found an articulated grader on top of a car.
The scenario was that the grader driver had suffered a medical episode at roadworks and ran over a worker and mounted a car, trapping a passenger inside.
Members of the Fire and Rescue team got to work assessing patients, securing the scene and winching the car out to extract the trapped patient, it was a sight to behold these men and women getting to work in such a complex situation.
Amon explained that the objective was to put the medical side of their community first responder training to the test is addition to their rescue capabilities.
It also offered another opportunity to work with some of the new hydraulic equipment their truck has been equipped with.
“This one’s laid out exactly the same as Muswellbrook’s, and then in time other rescue stations in the area and across the state will migrate across to this new layout and new generation of hydraulic equipment,” Amon shared, adding that they had already used it on at least three accidents with entrapments in the month it has been on the truck.
“The biggest improvement is if we back Muswellbrook up, we know where everything is on their truck, if Muswellbrook were coming to back us up, they know where everything is so you’re not trying to learn as you go.”
