BEHIND THE GREEN BRIDGE
Reaching down to light a cigarette while crossing
a two-lane bridge is tempting fate, especially doing 60 MPH. If you are not
wearing seat-belts, have no airbags and end up half on and half off the bridge,
you are just plain lucky if you make it out alive.
Ukiah,
California
The outside air temperature gage on our Bell 222 helicopter read an even 40º C (104º F) with just a breath of wind from the southwest, Brent and Sean, the flight nurses on today, and I lifted into the sparkling afternoon. "Lifeguard helicopter CALSTAR 4 departing Ukiah to the southeast." I rattled off on the radio, while in the background, Howard Forest, the 911 dispatcher in Mendocino county, provided us with latitude, longitude, distance, bearing, radio frequencies, contacts and a brief description of the accident and our patients.
We were watching the horrors unfold in New Orleans, and along the Gulf, wanting to do something but unable to when the call came. There is an immediate adrenalin injection as the "beep, beep, beep, beep" explodes from our pagers. With a few decades of experience between our crew, we channel the hormone surge and systematically and quite calmly prepare ourselves and the aircraft for the flight. It is our mana. Minutes later, we are circling over the "green bridge" talking with the fire chief charged with setting up our landing zone. An older Volvo had swerved into the side of the bridge and was half on and half off the bridge. There were reports of up to three people hurt with one serious enough to require a helicopter.
It is often easy to spot a car wreck--just look for the long lines of cars coming from different directions and where they stop is your accident. Highway 101 just south of Hopland is where we found our traffic jam. The Chief initially wanted us to land about a quarter mile north of the accident in a turnout just off the road. The turnout--dry dust--would mean that they had to move a fire engine through the traffic to wet the area down so that we could land. Our rotors blowing dust and dirt can be hazardous to those on the ground and create "brown-outs" for us in the helicopter. Fatal accidents can be the result of a brown-out in a helicopter landing. Even wetting the Landing Zone does not eliminate these problems. There is often not enough water or time to do a really effective job of stopping the dust. Sometimes there are no engines at all. Landing a distance from the accident means we have to get our nurses to the patient and the patient and nurses back to the helicopter. This wastes precious minutes. From my vantage point over the accident, combined with a career of flying helicopters, I suggested to the chief that we land on the bridge. The roadway was clear and the traffic was already stopped from the wreck and emergency vehicles. With an OK from the CHP, the chief approved our landing.
Checking for wires adjacent to the landing zone, and then continually checking for obstacles as we settled down over the bridge became our primary concern. As we came through the hazard area, with a final check to insure that we did not blow debris from the wreckage at people or back up into the rotor system, I placed the "deuce" down between the guard rails of the bridge and the crew exited toward the patient.
Ten minutes after our landing, the patient assessed, treatment started, we lifted above the stalled traffic, over the bridge and tress, around the wires for the trauma center in Santa Rosa. Nineteen minutes later we arrived at the Hospital. Less than two hours later, paper work done, aircraft restocked, fueled and oxygen serviced, we were back watching CNN and the coverage from the aftermath of Katrina, still wondering if there was something we could do.
The outside air temperature gage on our Bell 222 helicopter read an even 40º C (104º F) with just a breath of wind from the southwest, Brent and Sean, the flight nurses on today, and I lifted into the sparkling afternoon. "Lifeguard helicopter CALSTAR 4 departing Ukiah to the southeast." I rattled off on the radio, while in the background, Howard Forest, the 911 dispatcher in Mendocino county, provided us with latitude, longitude, distance, bearing, radio frequencies, contacts and a brief description of the accident and our patients.
We were watching the horrors unfold in New Orleans, and along the Gulf, wanting to do something but unable to when the call came. There is an immediate adrenalin injection as the "beep, beep, beep, beep" explodes from our pagers. With a few decades of experience between our crew, we channel the hormone surge and systematically and quite calmly prepare ourselves and the aircraft for the flight. It is our mana. Minutes later, we are circling over the "green bridge" talking with the fire chief charged with setting up our landing zone. An older Volvo had swerved into the side of the bridge and was half on and half off the bridge. There were reports of up to three people hurt with one serious enough to require a helicopter.
It is often easy to spot a car wreck--just look for the long lines of cars coming from different directions and where they stop is your accident. Highway 101 just south of Hopland is where we found our traffic jam. The Chief initially wanted us to land about a quarter mile north of the accident in a turnout just off the road. The turnout--dry dust--would mean that they had to move a fire engine through the traffic to wet the area down so that we could land. Our rotors blowing dust and dirt can be hazardous to those on the ground and create "brown-outs" for us in the helicopter. Fatal accidents can be the result of a brown-out in a helicopter landing. Even wetting the Landing Zone does not eliminate these problems. There is often not enough water or time to do a really effective job of stopping the dust. Sometimes there are no engines at all. Landing a distance from the accident means we have to get our nurses to the patient and the patient and nurses back to the helicopter. This wastes precious minutes. From my vantage point over the accident, combined with a career of flying helicopters, I suggested to the chief that we land on the bridge. The roadway was clear and the traffic was already stopped from the wreck and emergency vehicles. With an OK from the CHP, the chief approved our landing.
Checking for wires adjacent to the landing zone, and then continually checking for obstacles as we settled down over the bridge became our primary concern. As we came through the hazard area, with a final check to insure that we did not blow debris from the wreckage at people or back up into the rotor system, I placed the "deuce" down between the guard rails of the bridge and the crew exited toward the patient.
Ten minutes after our landing, the patient assessed, treatment started, we lifted above the stalled traffic, over the bridge and tress, around the wires for the trauma center in Santa Rosa. Nineteen minutes later we arrived at the Hospital. Less than two hours later, paper work done, aircraft restocked, fueled and oxygen serviced, we were back watching CNN and the coverage from the aftermath of Katrina, still wondering if there was something we could do.
Posted: Thu - September 1, 2005 at 02:38 PM
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Published On: Dec 09, 2006 10:23 PM
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Published On: Dec 09, 2006 10:23 PM