Denver Health: How NOT to Drive...

[Eydawn]

I'll bet the student reconsiders an EMS career...

Come on. Can this get worse? I mean... good lord! Let's go roll the ambulances over and even further screw Denver's coverage...

Wendy

CO EMT-B

[firedoc5]

Unfortunately it does happen. And since ambulances tend to be top heavy they'll roll more easily. From what I've read they are still determining what caused it, and who might have been at fault. I know it can be a real crimp in an EMS system.

A couple of years after I got on the FD full time, the private service I use to work for went up in flames, losing six ambulances in the process. That left them with two. Even though everything was going up in smoke they still had a call to a coal mine. The unit that responded hit a deer and was taken out. That left them with one. The owners thought, what could happen next? But it was remarkable when other services loaned them two or three of their own rigs withing 48 hrs. So they wound up with eight more ambulances.

[Amhet1]

And the morals of the story are:

1) RLS is only makes the passengers of the unit feel safe.... nobody else cares.

2) If you use an Opticom (signal changing) system, trust it only as far as you can throw it.

3) When you dont have enough units, bad things WILL happen.

4) Just one more reason for using drive-cams, black boxes and other safety systems... when used appropriately.

They provide a level of security for the department, assists drivers to improve their driving skills, and the insurance companies love em. The problem is when the black boxes are used inappropriately as a disciplinary tool instead of a teaching tool.