Apparatus Standards

[squady]

I'm curious as to what other people think is a good standard for equipment on a Rescue Squad. I want to get an understanding of what people carry and their reasoning for it.
Does anyone know of a standard for Rescue's???

Also what's your opinion on a Rescue Engine vs a Squad? Do you think a ER can function as a RS or are they even close to being the same thing....

I'm curious to hear your thoughts.

[10-75 K]

Coming from a squad company i might be a lil biased but i believe that a rescue and a engine should be seperate. All these new "rescue-engines" that are popping up everywhere can in no way carry the same amount of rescue gear that a true rescue squad can. If you think about it the engine has to carry a certain amount of supply line and attack lines and engine company stuff, couplings, hard tubes, strainers etc. A rescue squad has specialized equipment that it has to carry also like rope rescue, air shores, cribbing, air bags, and the like. A combined unit cannot carry the amount to do both effectively and safely. Plus you got the weight factor of the apparatus and staffing issues that i won't even get into. IMO keep em' seperate.

[ohfrmn89]

i have to say keep em seperate but on the other hand coming from a dept. that doesn't have the staff to roll and engine,life squad and a rescue squad, i believe rescue engines are just as good. our rescue engine has cutters and spreaders,already connected to a power unit ready to go. we also have a "portable"power unit for using additional tools if needed or for use on another vehicle or if vehicle is .....say over an embankment. we also carry an additional large spreaders, 2 rams, chains, winch on front of truck, cribbing,6 different sizes of airbags it also carries1100 ft 5" hose, 400 ft of 2.5 " hose off rear of truck, 3,200 ft 1.75" crosslays, 300 ft of 2" crosslay, so in otherwards about the only thing we can't do with this truck is refill scba bottles although we do carry 8 extra bottles also. so needless 2 say if you have a large dept with plenty of staffing and manpower you can run seperate trucks, but if you have small departments or volunteer dept and manpower (lack of) is a problem then you can put everything on 1 truck if you do it right.

[ohfrmn89]

squady we keep all this stuff on our rescue engine ,1 reason i guess is we have a major interstate running through our area so you always have the possibility for bad wrecks so we don't have the time to wait for mutual aid to get there with their rescue truck.

[ashfire]

In the area where I am a member of a company that runs a heavy rescue squad, you are not just handling extrication but also the services of a truck company, haz mat and special rescues.
We are working with the county fire service to obtain a larger unit based on FDNY design because of the weight and amount of equipment that the squads in the county have to carry depending on the area the unit operates in.
Our squads equipment standards are based on county and state requirements.
A few stations in our county operate rescue engines, some of them operate heavy squads also and the others operate near interstate highways where the squad would take close to 4 to 5 minutes to arrive after the rescue engine has arrived.
Has for equipment standards contact Maryland State Firemen's Asso or Prince George's County Fire & EMS to get info on this if you want to compare standards. There are for Light, Medium, Heavy and Rescue Engine.

[Forrest]

To me the debate over seperate engines and rescues vs. engine-rescues is pretty similiar to the debate over seperate engines and trucks vs. quints. All of these apparatus can be kickass workhorses or a nightmare to work with depending on the specs, quality of construction, personnel and how you are actually using them. The whole issue comes down to what does your community/station/department actually need.

One of the places the Quint issue goes off track is that many believe the purpose of the quint is specifically to perform both engine and truck duties on scene. Additionally since it's a combination unit you have the "lack of equipment" arguement as compared to separate units. As I understand the concept, it is to be able to perform one or the other upon arrival, not specifically both. Plus, unless you really botched the specs/SOPS, you should be able to perform the most common truck functions and be just fine.

The Engine-Rescue issue is similiar in that too many seam to think that an Engine-Rescue needs to perform all engine functions and be equipped for every conceivable rescue situation. I think the point (or purpose) of the Engine-Rescue is to be equipped to handle (or to get started on while waiting for the Heavy Rescue) the rescue situations that you will commonly see and some others that you have a high potential for.

Not every rescue call needs a Heavy Rescue and every community doesn't need their own Heavy Rescue.


As for the Rescue standards question, you can find PA's info at www.ehsf.org/VRSRMANUAL2000.pdf. PA has a 3 provider level certification that has been in place for a couple of years now. It is currently not a mandatory certification. It is also geared primarily towards vehicle rescue. The intention being to develop separate standards for each of the various rescue areas (i.e. water, confined space, rope, etc) since everybody doesn't have the need for every type of rescue.