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******************************* From : "Cassidy Meyers" <killashandrarey@hotmail.com> Subject : Every Parent's Nightmare... Date : Fri, 27 Dec 2002 21:09:34 +0400 Captain Stanley had one eye on the kids Lopez had directed to him, the other, on Roy. "That's it. Come on out of the bus. Don't worry about fire. It's raining good out here..There's no way things are gonna burn." his voice said gently to them as he took them one by one by the arms and lifted them from the wreckage. When the last walking little girl was taken by a CHP, Cap turned to his HT. ##L.A. This is Engine 51. Respond a full landslide detail to our scene. The freeway's in danger of a mud avalanche.## ##10-4, 51.## and Cap sighed as he heard dispatch call out the run also to Station 10 and 114. He turned his attention to the long board Chet had laid out by his head injury's side and helped Lopez and Kelly secure and free the boy from his place underneath the seats. Gage was already hyper paramedic mode. Only the slightest stress in his tone gave away the fear he felt still having Roy's son, among those not yet found. "Easy, Chet. Keep those sandbags on either side of his head. He's breathing fine. Hold it a sec, Just let me get this peds airway in." Johnny looked up. "Cap!" "Yeah.." Stanley said, peeking through the ripped side of the upside down school bus over the rushing river of muddy water running down the curbside of the road. He didn't look at the sewer grate which had cost the little girl, her life. "This next one's gonna need O2. Have a man hyperventilate him until I can get to him!" Johnny gasped, ducking around metal shards and debris. "You got it pal.." Cap said. He looked up at Roy as two policemen in yellow rain gear took the tiny boy's longboard and got him out of the bus. "Roy.. Take him." he said, shaking the pouring rain off his helmet so he could see where Marco Lopez and Chet Kelly were working better. "Huh?" Roy said, still dazed by his private nightmare. In his head, his own voice was screaming. ::Chris? Where are you??! Ohmyg*d Chris! Be ok. Be ok! Johnny. You find him. Find him fast..:: he thought, but out loud . "Right.." he said. "Have him set over here, I'll take a look at him." DeSoto got out a peds BP cuff and set it around Chet's victim's arm. He got a palpated brachial pulse of sixty. ::Too slow.. D*mn. Brain stem head injury..:: The tiny comatose boy's unequal and fixed and abnormal eyes and his soaring BP confirmed the finding. "Keep tabs on his carotid, Ben." he told the CHP officer who knelt with the resuscitator Cap handed him. "Ventilate him 30 a minute on 100 % O2, ok? Time it to work with his inspirations." "Got it.." the highway patrol officer said, setting the tank's smaller fitted mask over the boy's nose and mouth. He began using the thumb trigger. Roy got on the phone to Rampart. "Rampart, this is squad 51. How do you read?" His heart just about pounded out of his chest when it was Dixie who answered. "Go ahead, 51. I read you loud and clear." ##Rampart. We have a multiple casualty situation. Car versus school bus. Triage is underway. So far, I've six victims. Five minor, one comatose. Victim one, a boy of six or seven. Under supported ventilation on 100 % O2. BP 142/110, pulse 60. Respirations, are in Cheynes Stokes pattern. He is immobilized with sandbags and a long board with an oral airway. There's no apparent trauma beyond a noticable depressed occipital softness at the base of his skull.## |
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Dixie wrote down Roy's vitals set and motioned for Dr. Early to come into the radio room. "Joe, it's 51. Sounds like a real bad one. And something else too, I've never heard Roy so uptight before." "Oh?" Dr. Early toggled the intercom receiver. "51, on victim one, start an IV D5W TKO only. Maintain an airway, elevate his head, and transport as soon as possible." Then he licked his lips and asked, "Roy, just how serious is your situation?" Joe's question took Roy aback when he realized that Dr. Early wasn't only referring to the boy they had stabilized. The doctor was going outside of protocol. ::Because he knows something's up..:: Roy reasoned mentally. Roy replied. "You'll know the moment I do, doc. Wish I could tell you more. All I know is that we don't know a lot of details right now and there's at least one fatality." Roy cringed when Mike Stoker ran up from the car that had caused the accident and the downed power poles. His coat wasn't even unbuttoned as it would have been had he found someone alive and revivable. "DeSoto.." Mike called out. "The victim in the car's a Code F. Looks like because of electrical shock. He's been down too long. Pupils are fixed and dialated and there's already lividity showing in his lower extremities." "Got it, Stoker.." Roy said. Then he turned back to the phone. "Rampart, raise that number to two Code F. Victim one's loading with Squad 10. I estimate their ETA to you around ten minutes. Please stand by for further victims.." ##Standing by.## Joe said. --------------------------------- Roy saw the Mayfair recede into the distance through the noisy rain down the highway and away from the scene of mud and multilated metal. He tried not to imagine the little girl who had drown down the drainage grate. Inside the bus, the going was slow. Johnny felt bloody neck after bloody neck and found no signs of life. He gestured to Kelly. "Get those seats outta there. Forget these six, they're gone." Gage bent down to worm his way along the soaked floor to the next section of broken seats. More bodies and pieces of bodies. Nightmarish.. Then... "Uncle J-Johnny?" Gage's heart skipped a beat. "Chris?! Where are ya? Now don't move around. Just keep talkin to me.. Chet! I found him.. Give me your HT! " Kelly underhand tossed it to Gage like a pro. Gage caught the heavy walkie talkie and thumbed it. "Squad 51 to Engine 51. Got another survivor.. Hey Roy... Listenup..Ok, Chris.. Say something. Daddy's right outside." Gage said, handing the HT to the muddy blond headed boy cradled against his shoulder. |
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"I'm here. I'm ok. Don't worry Daddy. Just get the other kids out. I'm fine. Really.." Outside, DeSoto let out a half sob of relief. "Chris??" Roy said, he ran for the bus. Cap stopped him. "Hey hey hey.. Now listen. It's crowded enough with Kelly, Lopez and Gage in there. You're needed out here for triage. Hang tight, Roy. Things sound good to me.. and now even better in there for them..." Roy stopped fighting Cap's hold and sagged against the bus's shell. Through a foggy window, he could see many many body sheets. "ohmyg*d." "I know.. I know.." Cap said, grasping Roy by the face. "It's bad. That's why I didn't want you in there. Now just stick with your HT and no doubt Johnny will be letting you know how he is, ok? Hang tight and just wait here.." Stanley strode away to intercept 114 coming in, to direct them to deal with the mudslide risky hill that had already claimed part of the school bus. Lopez shouted. "Hey somebody.. I need help. I found the school bus driver!" Roy glanced around and saw Chet's caked shoes deep in the seats and two sets of flashlights but no one else handy. "I gotta do it.." Roy muttered and ducked into the bus. Immediately two from Engine 10 took his place outside the tear in the side of the bus to wait for orders for extrication equipment from those working inside. Roy's breath caught deep in his throat when the smell of blood and things much worse reached his nose from the tiny bodies Chet and Johnny had covered. He began to fervently wish he had obeyed Cap's advice to stay outside. He forced his lips to work. "Marco, whatdiya got?" "He's alive. Eviscerated partially. Looks like a piece of the dash stabbed him and tore out afterwards. Lower right quadrant. Also, this mud's caving in on him. He's having a lot of trouble breathing." Lopez ducked as another gush of mud and branches from the hill slid through the shattered bus windshield and onto the driver's lap. He used his hands to scrape away the stuff from the man's nose and mouth and he bent close down to make sure air still moved effectively there. Roy never got to see the wound Lopez spoke of. It was buried in mud instantly. He shouted over his shoulder and set his HT near his ear on an overturned seat back. "You guys, on the double. Shovels and a scoop stokes. This hill's gonna go!" Roy listened closely to Johnny's heavy gasps and grunts as he and Chet maneuvered nearer to Chris through the tangle of shorn off seats even as his own hands assessed the driver. "We've got to get him out fast..Now. Long board or no long board. Marco..watch his airway!" "I know.. This mud's crushing him.." "Just keep him breathing.. even if he quits.." Roy said, leaning over to try and dig the muck away from the driver's lower half with only his gloved hands. The mud flowed in faster than he could push it away. Marco groaned in frustration and renewed his jaw lift on the unconscious man with one hand and felt his chest with the other. "So far so good. He's still here." Roy continued to free the driver. |
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Chet Kelly put on his best smile. It didn't fool Chris. Something was filling all of his thoughts beyond getting out to Roy. "Uncle Johnny. I tried.. I tried so hard.. Ahh!" he grimaced, when Gage's questing hands found where his leg was pinned in a knot of seat. "Yeah, Uncle Johnny, right there. My knee I think. But listen to me.. ugh.. I tried so hard, I really tried keeping her awake with stories, but Carrie got quiet on me." "Who's Carrie?" Johnny said, "Easy, lie back down.." "S-She's right over..t.." Chris tried to point but couldn't quite remember where his seatmate was trapped. He started to sob as a frightening memory resurfaced. "I- I couldn't reach her when she stopped breathing, Mr. Kelly.." "Where is she?!" Chet asked urgently. Chris's tear filled eyes were blurred and his panic barely veiled as an odd maturity for a boy his age took over. "Right there.. She stopped making noises just before you got here. She's right under your arm, Mr. Kelly, underneath that cushion.." Kelly heaved a heavy seat cover away from where Chris's shaky hand was pointing. A tiny girl in pink lay twisted underneath it, but her face was blue. Gage startled. "Kelly?" Chet crawled out of Johnny's eyesight to get close to the girl's body. "Got her.." Johnny heard and soon there after, sounds of rescue breathing began. Gage sighed in double sympathy when those sounds were separated with pauses for cardiopulmonary compressions. "Keep working her, Chet.. I'll be right there." Johnny said. "Here.. See if she's reactive..." Johnny said and he rolled his penlight through the narrow space between them. Chet snatched up the light and a few seconds later said. "Good going Chris.. She's got responsive eyes. We might be able to bring ..........her back.." "Heh.. " the DeSoto boy smiled. "Dad taught me a few things about first aid. Like to try and keep a head bumped kid conscious... But why didn't it w-work for..Car- didn't work for..." John noticed Chris's head beginning to sag. "Chris. Where else do you hurt besides that knee.. Chris?.." But Chris went out and went very pale. Gage kept a grip on his partner's son's arm artery. ::Fast heart rate. Now what's causing this blackout?:: Johnny yanked a stubborn seat frame out of the way and found a deep cut in Chris's thigh. He pulled off his pants belt and made a tourniquet out of it, glancing at his watch for the time he began its constricting lack of blood flow. Then he made sure Chris was stable enough to be left alone. He spoke into his walkie talkie. "Cap. We gotta move. We've got a little girl in witnessed cardiac arrest and a leg bleeder." Johnny amended his transmission. "..who's stable.. " he added for Roy's benefit. Then he slid over near Chet to help him try to revive the girl. "You take her head. I got it here.." he said, taking over Kelly's one arm CPR for him. Chet looked up in between delivering breaths. "How is he?" "Fine. Just stressed. His leg's pinned and he's got a deep laceration on the thigh. Venous hemorrhaging only, thank g*d. Whatya find on Carrie?" Gage grunted as he worked. "Her pupils constricted right off, both of them. Equally." "Good, a little epi will..." "Here..." came a new voice from over their heads. Roy DeSoto was crawling over the seats with a one CC epinephrine syringe in between his teeth. "Roy! What are ya doing in here? Cap told you t-" "Shut up junior, and let me at one of her arms." Roy said, grinning. "If this doesn't work, Cap's got the defib on eighty watts outside." Gage kept up his CPR wordlessly. Chet didn't stop either with his ventilations. Two seconds after Roy gave Carrie the injection, the girl pinked up and started coughing. Gage flipped her over onto her side, as she spat fluid and blood out of her mouth, murmuring encouragements. Kelly stayed nearby and gratefully snatched the portable O2 another fireman handed him and began holding its mask over the restless girl's face while Gage calmed her down. |
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| Click the Resuscitator to go to Page Three :) |
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