the world's largest ambulance.

we had an injury accident today.

this morning, I was on duty to transport a bunch of people from town out to williams field airstrip in Ivan the Terra Bus. on board were a couple of grantees and several firefighters. the grantees were on their way out to the airstrip to load some atmospheric-measurement devices in a twin otter aircraft, and the firefighters were on duty at the firehouse out there. we arrived at 'willy town' and I let the mechanized stairwell down, and the passengers got off. some of them went to the side of the bus to get their baggage out of the luggage compartments there. the doors to the compartments are made out of heavy steel, and need to be lifted upward and secured by propping them on a metal prop, sort of like your car hood. well, one of the grantees was lifting the door up, and thought he'd propped it -- but he hadn't, and the edge of it came crashing down on his head, splitting open his scalp and causing profuse bleeding. (mind you, these doors are freakishly heavy -- I've witnessed several people dropping them closed instead of lowering them, and it was sickening to think of that weight falling on someone's head.)

I was still inside the bus while this happened, and was none the wiser until I went down to see if anyone needed to go back to mcmurdo on the next run and saw a bunch of firefighters gathered around the man. he had blood running down his face and into his collar. however, he seemed lucid and alert, and was able to answer all their questions. the airfield ambulance pulled up a minute later, and first aid was applied. medical and fire dispatch were notified. the firefighters helped him back onto the Terra Bus (why not? it was warm, and there were places to sit), and I drove everyone back to mcmurdo hospital. a firefighter went in and got a spray bottle of disinfectant and a paper towel, and wiped the blood off the hatch door. and I was due for another run, so Ivan and I went back to work.

the thing that most impressed me (besides the victim's ability to stay calm and cooperative while bleeding out of a nasty head wound) was the utter professionalism, warmth and humor of the firefighters that attended the scene. they made the injuree, a young man from south korea, as comfortable as possible and kept up a casual banter all the way back to town -- a 35-minute drive. they joked about how I was now the driver of the world's largest ambulance, and how easy it is to find firefighters to put out fires or help heart-attack victims but difficult to find anyone to fill out incident reports.

I later saw the grantee in the dining hall. he thanked me for the speedy ride to the hospital and assured me that he felt fine. they had stapled his wound shut. I, for one, would have been in bed popping analgesics.

Ivan: 1
pax: 0