Wednesday March, 29 2023

Nature: Vehicle Rescue Training – School Bus Extrication Tactics, Techniques & Awareness

Location: Station #2 – Long Neck Facility

Address:  25375 Banks Road, Millsboro, DE  19966

On Wednesday, March 29^th, the Indian River Volunteer Fire Company hosted its monthly training curriculum with Vehicle Rescue Training – School Bus Extrication Tactics, Techniques, & Awareness instructional activities.  These activities were coordinated via the Delaware State Fire School with renowned vehicle rescue training instructors – Bob Ricker, Andy Hamilton and J. Locklear.

The instructional portion of these exercises included incident expectations and critical assignments that must be coordinated to successfully mitigate such an incident which included but not limited to requirements for resource availability such as apparatus, manpower, equipment and logistics. 

As with many cases, a school bus incident may include a quantity of vehicle occupants that will require a significant outlay of resources and needs significant coordination with specific allocation of assignments with clear, concise communications.  However, any bus extrication process may require a variety of tools such as cribbing, hydraulics, airbags, air chisels, hand tools, chain or cable come-alongs, metal cutting devices, chains, ladders, rescue struts and saws to identify a few.

The instructors identified that a concise incident synopsis or size-up should be provided to responding resources as well as other concerns such as:

• Area Hazards

  • Road speeds, curves in road, utility poles, weather

  • Traffic conditions

  • Needed roadway closure points

• Number of Victims

  • Is the school bus full of children? How many injuries? Is your mass casualty incident (MCI) plan in order? How do you protect the children once off the school bus?

  • Is triage needed?

• Fuel Source

  • Diesel, gasoline, propane, hybrid?

• Emergency response resources that will be needed

• Emergency response assignments and needed materials

  • Apparatus placement

  • Stabilization

    • Cribbing, step chocks, struts, etc.

  • Vehicle Access Points

    • Windows, doors, roof hatches, through the body.

  • Consider time and tools that may be needed.

    • Are Ladders Needed?

    • What is the bus position? Elevated, rolled over, etc.?

    • Will you need folding ladders or roof ladders?

Additional topics highlighted during the preliminary discussion points included:  vehicle construction topics, vehicle roll-over concerns, vehicle stabilization concerns, windshield displacement concerns, bus access/egress topics, steering column displacement, bus sidewall access,  bus side window displacement concerns, roof access, as well as many other highlighted items.

The actual hands-on evolutions were extremely practical and useful to the course participants because it included an actual overview with emergency medical response personnel and firefighters prior to any hands-on activity commencement.

Illustrated herewith are photographs of the evening’s events.