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| Page Sixteen |
| *Attention*- The following casualties are all mock exercise images. |
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They reached the boiler room. A fast check over the radio confirmed that their present assignment, seeking the pipeline's main shut off, was still a go. Sweating heavily, they added an additional length of canvas from yet another emergency hose water valve alcove to one of their trailing inch and a halves. The lack of active fire in the area made them wait until its entire length was fully played out before they charged it into top pressure. Stoker halted before the door and was transfixed before a sign displaying there. "Oh, I don't like the looks of that." he said. "What?" Chris asked, testing the door handle. "It's not even locked." he grinned. "No, that." Mike said, pointing to the sign. Chris looked. "Oh." Rorchek peeped. "That's a big dislike, coming from you, Stoker. But I find I'm agreeing with you one hundred percent on this one." Marco Lopez squinted through his mask and rubbed some more grime off of its red surface. Then he began reading. "Warning. Do not enter area when alarm is sounding. This area is protected by a Tyco Sapphire clean agent fire suppression system. Area must be ventilated prior to re-entry." Chris frowned. "Oh, man. I hate it when places I work for get technology installed that's way over my head. What the h*ll does clean agent mean?" Stoker tried not to offend. "Uh, it means it evacuates all the air and oxygen entirely in the space into which it's released but leaves behind no traces once it's done acting on a fire." Rorchek rubbed his faceplate. "You mean it becomes an f..ing outer space vacuum in there once it decides to go off?" Stoker and Lopez and Green nodded in kind, mutely, trying to break it gently. Chris's face fell slack with smouldering anger. "I really don't like that concept. Not a whole lot at all. Not even a little." he said, holding up eensy fingers of a glove. "Listen. Do we really have to go in there? I mean, I'm all for circling around the whole airport and going at it again from the opposite s--" Hallie grabbed him by the collar. "We're going in." she told him no nonsense, yanking him forward with her petite body sized strength. |
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************************************************** Subject: The Ties That Bind.. From: patti k (pattik1@hotmail.com) Sent: Wed 12/02/09 11:34 AM Marco and Stoker got Green outside. Immediately, Mike got onto his HT radio under the better reception. "HT-1B to IC2. Firefighter trapped inside an activated clean agent room. We need immediate personnel and heavy cutting and extrication tools! Also we've a Code I down." he transmitted, watching a pair of arff swiftly getting a limp Hallie out of her turnout gear and air bottle where she lay stretched onto the ground on her side. ##Rerouting a full company to your location. What's the nature of the suppressive?## Captain Stanley asked. "I don't know, Cap. The automated system's named Tyco Sapphire. And the main door has a high grade security lock on it. Tumblers, and rebar, like a vault." Stoker reported. Hank frowned, thinking fast. ::Never heard of that before.:: he thought. ##Any other way in?## he asked, looking at the only coordinates showing up inside the airport on the GPS. Vaguely, he was already imagining the shrill squeal of a P.A.S.S. device as its dead man's switch activated from being turned horizontal. He hated that sound. "Re-entry might be possible past a partially blown wall but it'll be through extreme heat and unknown fire." Stoker told him. ##Condition of both your victims?## "When we left him inside, conscious, on intact scba. The second firefighter's semi conscious but breathing normally." Mike told him. |
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##Sending in paramedics. Watch for their response. I'm homing in on your twenty!## Mike Stoker took a deep breath as he hefted his HT thoughtfully in his hand. He accepted the exchange of a new air bottle from support crew onto his back and a pair of fresh gloves. Marco Lopez was on his knees near Hallie. "Hey, Senorita. Rise and shine. You're okay." he said holding her head supported to make clear breathing room for her. An arff started Hallie on some oxygen by non-rebreather. She was panting and ringing wet. "She awake enough to talk?" Stoker asked. "Not yet." Marco answered, keeping tabs on her heart rate. Stoker crouched down by them on his toes. "What do you think it is?" "Heat. Pulse's racing. She was pretty worked up in there." Marco guessed. "Yeah." Mike said ruefully, worried. "Good reason to be." A small fire engine sped up and parked near their location. It was Ted with Roy DeSoto and Johnny Gage. "Hallie?" Ted shouted, hurrying forward with a stokes. He set the basket stretcher down next to her, setting a protective hand on her shoulder. "How is she?" he asked, snatching at her wrist for a pulse. "....tired..." Green groaned, finally appearing conscious. "Ted... it's Chris who's inside. You have to hurry." her voice trailed off. The youngest Rorchek rose to his feet and immediately interrogated Stoker and Lopez for new information about his brother while Roy began an assessment on Hallie. Gage joined him, listening, but first he asked. "Marco, Stoker? You okay? Looks like it was pretty hot in there." "We'll be fine to go back in once that team gets here." Lopez said, "We're not small enough to roast right away." he quipped, trying to make Hallie laugh. Green didn't smile, worried about the fact that she had to leave Chris behind. Hank Stanley showed up with the extrication company. He stepped out of the dayglow yellow cab and hurried up. "Okay, this is how it's gonna go, people. Two teams. One, straight through that front steel door with everything you've got. The other, find and start digging through that wall breach that's been reported. Watch for weak ceilings! Move out!" He got to Roy's side. "Get her to Holbrook Park. There's a free doctor there and I'm sure Joe's gonna want to know about his son. Directly from the horse's mouth." DeSoto had a thought to consider. He spoke with Cap, aside, after finishing up a BP. "Do you think Ted'll be okay going in after his brother?" "You know him as well as I do." Hank replied. "Somehow, I don't think anything in the world will be able to stop him." "Not even Joe?" "Now that's between family." Stanley said defensively, grinning. Hallie was trying to get up. "No stokes. I'm walking!" she said. |
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"ULQ. About a nine. I'm short... of breath. Dizzy.." Steve replied, stiffening as she probed his abdomen carefully to feel for structures. "Pressure?" Almstedt requested. "One forty two, systolic." replied the attending paramedic. "He has a mild hypertension history." she said. "Ringers?" Joanne asked of the IV tucked under Beck's shoulder. "Yeah, suspected internal injuries right off." replied the medic. "You were right." she told him. Looking down, she addressed Steve once more."Beck, listen to me. It's not the spleen. I'm concerned about part of your large intestines, stomach or bowel perhaps. But first, there's something sharp, maybe a broken rib, that's very near your--" "Not the heart.." he frowned, scared. She nodded."It sits just above the point where you say that you are hurting the most." Joanne told him. "But the spreads between your QRS intervals aren't serious yet. You're in sinus tach with only slight elevations. Might not be tamponade at all. But I'm authorizing an immediate exploratory once I get you fast flown into Stony Brook. Try not to move or breathe in very deeply." "But.." "Shhh.." she said, placing a hand on his oxygen mask. "Rest. I'm giving you MS for relief. Concentrate on slowing your breathing rate." Beck's eyes fluttered shut as he panted in pain and stress. Joanne looked up. "Intubate him RSI if he goes out. No mast trousers. If his pericardium is damaged, I don't want him to bleed out around his heart any faster. Keep tabs on his BP, watch for different readings in both arms." "Yes, ma'am." Joanne looked up as Roy arrived with Hallie in her stokes with another ambulance crew on a wheeled gurney. Almstedt stood up to intercede, but Roy shook his head. "Yellow tag." he said. Joanne nodded and then fulfilled her own promise to stay by Steve's side until Morgan Wainwright took him away with his attending paramedic. Joe Rorchek hurried from a canteen where he had snatched a quick coffee to keep with him, high in sugar, for nourishment, when he saw Green go by. Roy braced himself for the coming storm. "Chief, It's Chris. He's stuck in the clean agent room behind ticketting. It went off." Green said, sitting up with the help of Al Martelli who had just noticed her arrival. "Don't worry, he's awake on bottled air." Joe, to his credit, didn't panic like a father. "Any fire?" "Damage from an explosion that didn't injure him." Hallie shared. "Enough to collapse a wall." "Ted's there?" "Yes. He's probably already going in after him." "Okay, how are you?" "Just overheated. I did too much again, sir." Hallie admitted. "Don't you worry about that. This night has loomed far larger than all of us. Thanks about news on Chris.." he said numbly. "Roy, stay with Green only as long as you need to." |
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************************************** Subject: Gambit... From: patti k (pattik1@hotmail.com) Sent: Thurs 12/03/09 03:34 AM Hallie opened her eyes to a new person seated over her. It was a man in a winter parka, wrapped tightly against the cold, and yet, his skin held as dark a tan as she had seen in months. "*cough* Did I black out again?" Green asked, disoriented at the change from Roy to a new face. "For a while. But that's only part of the reason why I'm here." "Who are you?" she croaked. "I'm Dr. Brackett, one of Station 51's ilk you might say. They're evacuating the medical center as we speak. There's a large crack forming underneath the foundation. They're worried about cave-ins due to the weight of the adjoining parking garage." he said, adjusting the flow of her I.V. bag to wide open. "So when am I through?" she asked, all of her anxiety returning. "When I say so." Kel said. "And not a minute before. I know about the personal situation you have going on." Hallie got mad. "That's one of my coworkers in trouble back there!" Brackett just looked at her while he examined her eyes with a penlight. "Uh, huh. And all of my patients, also in trouble, are all right here, including you. Your pressure's dropped." "That's because I'm hungry. Add some sugar to my ball and chain and I promise I'll make you smile enough to do a jig!" she snapped, tugging on her I.V. line hard enough to make the pole rock. He steadied it back onto its wheels and just quirked his lips. "It's already ordered. Here's a step into the right direction. If you stay put, I'm making you officially a green tag." he shared, getting up to make a few notations to the evacuation order on Hallie's chart. Then he left for another stokes containing his next patient. None of them, Green could see, held a firefighter. And the radio that she had so coveted, was gone. Whispering, Green sighed in frustration. "No, I'm all yellow..." she sobbed, not meaning her triage priority. "...for not sneaking right back into that d*mned fire... to try and save him." |
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------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ted Rorchek raced back to where his dad was standing near the fire secured access to ticketting. "Dad, it's still taking everything we got just to make a dent in that door. Those hinges just aren't cutting through fast enough. We're running out of time!" "Ted, if I had a faster solution other than brute force, I'd offer one." "Chief." Gage said, stepping forward from where he was prepping a new air bottle for one of the arff working hard to breach the obstacles in the way of reaching Chris Rorchek. Chief Joe stopped looking at the blueprint he was studying of their problem. "I'm listening." "Well, sir. How about us trying to break into that clean room from the roof? You see, my pal Chet Kelly here and I were thinking about it and.. Well, just exactly how many rooms do you know of that're built absolutely solid stainless steel including the ceiling?" Joe blinked in surprise. "Practically none that isn't a strong vault in itself." "My point exactly. An airport's not Fort Knox. I can't imagine that the designers even started to think that way. No money's stored in that room, just some high tech machinery." Johnny reasoned. Chet added more. "With that part of the roof of the terminal already gone, sir, we could try rappeling down from the parking ramp and then crawling in that way to Chris through the infrastructure that has already been exposed." Rorchek slammed down the antennae of his radio. "Go! I want every man making that idea workable! Hank, I'll send over another aerial to provide a water shield to protect your two paramedics from the heat." Chief Rorchek told him. "They have more experience high angle than my men do." "They're yours." Cap said. Roy nodded his head as he leaned into Johnny. "Have we ever tried rope work wearing scba?" "Nope, but there's always a first time. That fireman can't wait." Gage replied, all business. "And I'm never one to shirk a new experiment." They flew into action. |
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Once they reached the top, Roy asked. "Cap? Where should we anchor from? There are no antennae or anything up here." "We'll use this right here." said Cap. "It's a layover pulley installed for a window washer's scaffolding." He said, patting the red winch looking hook nestled over the roof edging wall. "I'll stay with you up here until you get inside." Hank said, waving over a few firefighters to man Roy and Johnny's safety lines. Then he hefted up his HT. "IC2 to HTs' Lopez and Kelly. See if you can find access over the clean room from inside the terminal as a backup. Tear down the ceiling if you have to, near the entry team, to climb up." ##10-4, IC2.## they replied in double. Stoker ran up to meet Cap on the roof of the ramp with news. "Cap, looks like the way in through the collapsed wall isn't going to work. As fast as we dig out, more debris keeps filling in." "That's all right. We have Plan C in the works." Hank told Mike. "What's Plan C?" "That." Cap said, pointing. Mike looked and saw the aerial angle being worked. "Oh, nice." he grinned happily. Another team of firefighters accepted a rope gun toss from the ramp and got busy securing the other end of the rappelling anchor line to a stable structure on top of the control tower. Then, with the new line dangling in the sunlight in a great sweeping arch over the fire burned hole left by the fuel fire, things were ready. Soon, DeSoto and Gage were dangling in mid air over the mostly destroyed airport. The only signs of life were the brilliant reds and yellows of the fire crews and their vehicles rushing about their business below. "Ah, sad looking sight.." Gage hollered back at Roy and he slid along their rope as he accelerated hands over head down to their access goal. "Not for long. People are resourceful. They'll build again." DeSoto said sliding after him, just as fast. Both paramedics found themselves counting their breaths and remembering exactly how many could be taken using a self contained air bottle before it ran out. Just before they sagged down for a landing near the fire hole, they put on their faceplates and masks. "Okay, let's go." DeSoto said. He froze their descent winch right over the gap along the horizonal rope, to use as a vertical tether point. "We're secure." Then, they were inside the building. "Chet was right, the infrastructure crawl spaces between the ceiling tile suspension frames and the roof is doable." Johnny celebrated. "And there's the top of the clean room over there." he said, aiming a flashlight through the heavy smoke into the murk. "I recognize those red painted pipes. They belong to that funky Tyco system thing. I had a look at them through the doorway." "Just so that fire cooperates with us and decides to behave a little." Roy said. "I don't see why not. It's been mostly strangled out by that valve." "Have you ever heard of Mount Vesuvius and the eruption of Pompeii? It didn't blow again until there was enough pressure to push out the blockage." DeSoto mused. Gage frowned at that image. "Try and think positive. Usually, you're the one telling me that." When they were over the room, a great rumbling began. Johnny paled through his mask. "That's not a good sound." he said, whirling around to look behind them. Kelly, near Lopez, radioed a warning to Gage and DeSoto. "Ground rupture. Duck and cover!" Roy and Johnny instantly flattened onto their stomachs over a firm concrete girder. |
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Al Martelli looked up from the foam truck engineering panel he was manning as a stand in for a cool down break. "Oh, crap." Then he started shouting. "Guys! Doubling your output right now!" he hollered, quickly spinning dials and releasing valves. Out in the airfield by the great big gaping hole the ruptured fuel line had made in the tarmack, a new pool of fire emerged. Its energy and quick temperature change buckling the landscape and the crack running to the medical center and parking garage widened in one swift surge. The safety at the desk in the ramp, bailed and dove out of harm's way as the first floor of the parking garage disappeared into the ground. Nearby, Joe Rorchek radioed out instantly. "IC1 to IC2. You and your man okay up there?" Cap waved as well as transmitting. "We're fine. What was that? There's a lot of dust rising up around us." he said, rolling nimbly to his feet. He helped Stoker up as well with a firm glove. ##First floor of the ramp collapsed. Looks like the fuel pressure's building up again because it's still burning. The only way down for you is by rappelling along 51's line back over to the control tower.## "Same escape plan idea as mine." Hank agreed. "We'll get going out of here right now by that route." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Al Martelli had his hands full. "Ready for more foam?! Thumb up?!" he shouted to the silver suited arff on his team. He knew he had to provide and provide amply so personnel wouldn't fry. "We're anchored. Feed the line again!" they hollered and signalled back. As one, the trio of fighters attacked the fiery new split in the earth and fought it to knockdown black all the way to the source from which it came. Suddenly a fireman inside the building, only wearing standard turnout gear and scba was enveloped in flames. He didn't scream. He reacted, spinning about with his water hose spraying strongly in a protective flower. He umbrellaed himself underneath a circle veil of water until the foam crew could get him out of the hot spot. The head foam arff shouted. "Are you hurt?" "No, I'm fine. Wasn't on me long enough." replied the firefighter. Behind him, the hose he had used and then dropped when the opportunity presented itself, burst open in the fire, curling brown and burning when its engineer terminated its water source. "Thanks for the cover. Looks like my angle's all dried up." "Join us. We're going in to make an exit for the trapped Code I." the foam captain invited. "I'm all over that." said the company man, running to grab a silver suit. |
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------- Roy and Johnny began to shimmey on their bellies, fast, seeking a soft spot over the clean room when the shaking stopped. DeSoto replied back to the others outside. "We're okay! We're moving in!" he said, pulling out a short axe. "Here?" Gage asked, clearing away just enough soot to read the guide markings along the rafters to avoid gas lines and hot water pipes. He tapped on the hollow roof's shell. "Yeah, right there!" Roy agreed and started swinging the blade of his hand tool down with all of his strength. Johnny shouted as soon as a man sized hole was visible. "Chris! Chris! Can you hear me? Bang on something!" But they only heard the loud howl of Chris's P.A.S.S. device. Quickly, Roy lowered Johnny down onto the floor by the arms. As soon as his feet touched the gritty floor Johnny read the sensor disk on his jacket. "Air's still not breathable in here. No oxygen! Even with our new hole!" "Do you see him?" Roy shouted down. "Not yet. I'm going to let the others in to help us out!" he replied. "That agent gas is still waist high in here." Moving forward carefully, sweeping ahead of himself with a booted foot for a feel of Chris's body underneath the white vapor, Johnny made his way to the main steel door. Regular tugging didn't budge it, so he backtracked to the Sapphire unit's battery power source, and severed its wires with his axe. With a pop of sparks, the digital display showing gas activation, died out and went blank. Gage tugged the door open with relish when the locks released and in flooded Chet and Marco, already pushing back from the other side. Another firefighter team with a pair of PPEs set them up and began evacuating the dessicant from the room. Soon, the fans had sucked out all the vapor from the floor level. They found Chris by seeing just his booted feet, sticking out from under a pile of tumbled ductwork and a storage tank that had fallen down during the new rupture fire. "Is he breathing?" Chet asked, scrambling near the debris to help dig. The firefighter wasn't moving. "I don't know. He's mostly buried. Chris!" Roy shouted. On his knees, he reached up along a sweat dampened leg to feel for a femoral pulse. But the way was blocked by a wall of metal. Gage shouted into his radio. "We need a Hurst tool ASAP!" There was no immediate reply. "I'll get it." said Marco, running. "The others are probably tied up with all that burn going on outside." The fan crew spoke up suddenly. "Okay, we're completely ventilated out. Air's testing safe to breathe. Plenty of oxygen." Roy ripped off his faceplate gratefully and turned to Kelly. "Chet, see if you find a way to his face and give him some air anyway you can. Johnny and I have to try for that fuel valve one more time as a next priority!" Gasping in the thin air, Gage and Roy made their way over to the valve that had started flaming again when the clean agent disappeared. A foam team was desperately trying to cool it down. Roy and Johnny waved at them. "Okay, we're going in turn it!" he warned. They nodded. DeSoto and Gage got on their stomachs and slowly crawled to the cooler side of the valve pipe assembly, with a long pry bar. Reaching up around the tongue of fire erupting from the torn metal gasket, they threaded the tool in between the spokes of the valve wheel. Then they carefully put their shoulders into it full strength. The foam lubricated valve rotated, groaning under the heat/cool stresses it was enduring. Yelling, Roy and Johnny pulled even harder on the ends of the bar they were using as leverage. But a building rumble made them abandon the control quickly and they dropped the tool to the floor to save themselves. |
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----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Outside, Joe Rorchek broke off from the commands he was giving via HT to his working fire crews when another explosion sinuated up from the original hole in the ground. "D*mn it! She just won't stay down!" he spat to himself, worried for his missing son. He was still pacing as he watched his orders carried out when a man rushed up to him. "The garage is burning, sir. Over there!" "We know that. It just started. Just who the h*ll are you? You should have been evacuated from this air field hours ago." "Uh, sir, I'm the bus driver. I was helping out your fire guys on the ham radio.." he prompted. "I have a pass." he said, waving his FD authorization that was hanging around his neck. "But I'm not being a fire buff just because I can. Listen to me, Chief, I think there are people still up there." "Yes, we have two firefighters who're going to rappel out of danger from up there as soon as they harness up." The bus driver was insistent. "No, I mean, two other people. A man and a little girl." Joe's forehead furrowed. "Where did you last see them?" "On the top level. They were heading for the stairwell from a car last I saw. I guess they were trying to hide there or something from all the explosions." Rorchek lifted the HT to his mouth. "IC1 to IC2. Belay! Belay your evac! There's been a report of two civilians present in the ramp. Confirmed by an authorized. I want you to find them and get them out of there. But watch yourselves. The lower level is on fire. Just started. It's gonna take me a bit to get resources out to you." ##IC2 to IC1, loud and clear.## said Hank. Very soon, Stoker and Stanley found them. They were still on the roof, hard to spot because of all the tall SUVS and vans parked in the ramp. "I tried to get down. Really I tried." said the little girl as Mike Stoker picked her up protectively. "But grandpa's really scared. I know that even though he can't talk any more." Hank studied the old man's face for soot or injuries but there were none. But he saw the unmistakable signs in him of a vulnerable adult created by the effects of a mild stroke that had happened long ago, in the wrong places. "Honey? How old are you? Where's your mom and dad? Aren't they here to take care of you and your grandpa?" Cap asked her, brushing away hair from her frightened eyes. "I'm eleven. They were supposed to meet us at the car last night. But they never got here." she said, beginning to cry. "Okay." Hank said, meeting Mike's eyes significantly. "Now Mike and I are fire fighters from the airport fire station. And we're going to bring you someplace else where we can try to find your parents, okay? How does that sound?" "All right, I guess." she sniffed. "All right. Now come on over here to this wall. We're going to get some lifebelts and new ropes and then we're going to go for a little ride. Would you like that?" Cap asked her. "I don't know. But if you want grandpa to follow you. You're going to have to take his hand." she said. "Like this?" Hank asked, taking the old man's gently and meeting his eyes, giving him a follow me gesture. "Yes. He'll go. Just smile at him." she explained, shivering bravely. Once they were there, Cap had Stoker sit the man down on a bumper of a nearby car. Then he broke open a window of an airport hotel supply van with his helmet to borrow some blankets to help keep their new victims warmer in the cold. Stoker got on his radio. "HT-51 Ramp to the control tower crew." ##Go ahead, 51.## they replied, still watching from their position on the other side of the rappelling anchor. "Send over a stokes and two life belts and ropes. We're going to get two uninjured people, one by one, from our location over to you." Mike explained. ##10-4, Sending over a guided basket with gear, right now.## |
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----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hallie Green got out of the fire engine she had hitched a ride with to get back to the airport. Her head was helmetless, but nonetheless, she got out of the truck, rechecking the bandage she had wrapped over the place where she had yanked out her I.V. She timidly made her way over to Joe Rorchek's location. "Hallie." he said surprised. "How are you feeling? Did they release you? There's no news yet." he said quickly, distracted as he watched Stoker and Hank's rescue in progress. "No, I released myself. That Cali doc left me a back door as long as I finished my I.V. off completely. He made me a green tag even though I wasn't ready for it." "Left you permission to walk on your own two legs." Rorchek half smiled in admiration for the man he had never seen. "He knew the rest of us would do the necessary bedside sitting for him." "Don't worry, Chief. I left all my gear at home. I just wanted to be here." she sighed, coughing. "Sit down." Joe told her, inviting her to park on a pack of airbottles cushioned with a spare overcoat. "Glad you came. Now the both of us can worry together." he frowned. "Make that three, firefighters." said a female voice. It was Joanne Almstedt. "I heard there was a possible red tag on the way." "Yeah, my son, Chris. He's still inside." admitted Joe. Joanne looked up, noticing the rope line strung between the parking ramp and the blackened quiet control tower. "What's going on over there?" "An aerial rescue. Don't worry, just two stragglers. Nobody's hurt." Rorchek told her. "Not yet." Joanne surmised. "Looks dangerous." she said with some trepidation. "Piece of cake." said Hallie, confident, watching with her eyes shielded from the sun. Joe's IC band shuddered into life. ##We've found him!## reported Chet to the outside. "Is he alive?" Joe asked eagerly, toggling his HT. ##We haven't been able to reach a checkable pulse point. He's under a debris pile.## Kelly shared. Joe startled, almost wanting to move forward towards the building, but then he stopped himself. ##But the room's now breathable, sir.## "Thank you for that update, fireman. Keep me posted." he said unevenly. ##I'll come out to you with the gas sniffer report!## he said, wanting to prove to a father that what he was saying was the truth. Joe didn't reply back when his voice choked up. Joanne Almstedt reached for his arm in sympathy and Joe, without looking at her, placed his glove over hers in stiff gratitude. Beside him, Hallie Green suddenly froze in place. "Oh,ohoh.." she minced. "Chief, look at that!" She said pointing. On the roof of the parking ramp, smoke was showing from a car. It was on fire and a tendril of burning gas was slowly trickling down the side of the ramp to the ground below as it flowed downhill. |
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Joe immediately got on the handy talkie. "IC1 to IC2. To your two o'clock! An incendiary flow's headed in your direction!" Hank and Stoker whirled. They saw the danger and quickly moved the aerial line's pulley assembly and both their victims to a safer corner of the ramp. ##Change noted!## Hank replied. Joe ansed. "There's isn't going to be enough time to stokes ferry everybody over to the tower. Another car is going to catch and possibly explode, setting off chain reactions in other cars. Not enough time to raise any kind of a ladder.." he said, speaking mostly to himself. Then he made a snap decision and broadcast a command over the radio. "Companies 9, 12. Emergency! Pull out a lifenet and bring it to 51's location at the north side and east side ramp corner. We're bailing two firefighters and two civilians, a.s.a.p.!" Even as he spoke another car exploded on top of the garage ramp, making the little girl scream. It was very audible to the firefighters below and its effect was electric. They flew in even faster to help. Joe added more. "Ladder 15, Ladder 6, Chopper 10. Aerial attack those new ramp fires! Stay upwind!" Swiftly, the tan canvas net with the red bullseye, was ready, ringed by a dozen firefighters holding it at the ready. Cap leaned into the terrified little girl in his grasp, talking fast. "Pretend this is gym class. You're going to jump, and the men down there are going to catch you." "...no..." she said, pressing away from the wall. "You're going to have to, honey." he said, watching Mike desperately keep the on fire liquid river from reaching them with a charged ramp fire hose on wide open. "Just close your eyes. It'll feel like a trampoline, I promise. But without the bounce." "Better hurry, Cap! I can't hold this stuff off much longer!" Stoker hollered. |
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Still the little girl buried herself into Cap's smoky jacket. Cap was still trying to break the girl's grip gently when a sudden sight made both of them look up and stop the struggle. Grandpa was climbing up onto the wall nimbly, a beatific smile on his face. He raised his arms in a swan's dive pose and then looked back at his grand daughter excitedly. Then he just shrugged a very obvious oh, well,.. and turned away. "Head's up!" Mike shouted into his HT when the old man neatly tipped off the building into a perfect butt first and back faced down push off. He landed exactly on target over the red spot, but the excitement made him faint dead away and suddenly his smile for the girl's benefit, faded away. "Nothing to it..." Hank told the child, with an amazed gasp. "See? Grandpa did it, and he got to go first." Then he turned around, still holding the girl in his arms. "Mike, I'm going next just as soon as they clear the net." he said, watching those down below check for a carotid and swiftly move the old man off to a place on the ground in a careful protective spine carry. "But.." "Mike, I'm going to show her again how much fun this is." Hank told him, an artificial smile locked onto his lips. "So she can play, too." "Oh, okay, Cap. Sounds like a really nice game. I'll play those rules." he said meekly. Mike set down the hose, still turned on, nestled neatly in grandpa's blanket so that it continued to push away the burning gas flow still spreading bigger and bigger and closer and closer, behind them. Hank passed off the trembling girl to Stoker and then he handed the girl his HT. "You give a try with this first. Can you hit that red spot? Go ahead. Go toss it down. If you make it, you get five points." he said playfully, in a farce. Calming down just a little, the still scared girl dropped it. The radio hit dead center. "Bingo!" Cap said. Then he climbed onto the wall and waved once. "Now follow me.." And he fell backwards two stories, and down into the net where his momentum was stopped by many strong arms. The little girl's mouth flopped open into a shocked but delighted smile. "Can I do that?" she asked Mike. Stoker was still keeping an eye on the fire. "Sure.." he said, nervously. Hank rolled off the net and swiftly took a place at its rim as a holder. He took back his radio from a firefighter and called up. ##Your turn.## he said as they raised the catch net back to chin level with all eyes on the sky. But suddenly, there was no more time. Three cars twenty feet away suddenly exploded into a huge fireballs, sending shrapnel flying in all directions. Mike felt a sharp impact on his back. "Two going down!" he shouted, quickly leaping over the edge with the little girl still held tightly in his arms. He nestled her head under his chin as they fell. "Hang on, honey. I got you." And then he held his breath. They struck. |
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--------------------------------------------------------------------- Mike came to on his side, with pain radiating between his shoulder blades. A panting voice was right next to his ear. "Hold still. You've got a big cut right here." Hank said, holding pressure against a wound with his gloves. "But it looks like your air bottle deflected whatever it was that sliced your skin. It's shallow." Stoker struggled to catch his breath. "Sorry,... about the extra weight." "She was nothing at all. You chose right." Stanley said. "Hold still and let me get all this bleeding packed off before you try to get up." "How's the girl?" "Fine. A few nicks and bruises about the face but uh, Chet's taking care of that. You know how good he is with kids." "And Grandpa?" "A little amnesiac. But that's only because he checked out a little early on the way down. Our lady doc's taking a good look at him, now that he's back awake and looking up a storm at all of us." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The distant explosions in the main fuel fire ended and as they eased off into a new phase of quiet consumption, Roy and Johnny lifted their heads to once again tackle the AV gas valve. "Ready?" Gage asked DeSoto. "More than ready. Let's end this once and for all. That fire's had enough time to ruin the neighborhood. " Roy told him. Again the foam team smothered them with protection as they advanced with the pry bar to turn the burning wheel. The third time was a charm, when one final spurt of lurid flame around the violated gasket, sputtered out. Roy and Johnny collapsed on the iron tool, using its support to hold themselves up in tremendous relief. As if in benedication, all of their radios sprang into glorious, joyous life. ##The main fire's out. No sign of renewed blazing anywhere that we can see inside the main terminal. Good job, men. Good job!## Joe congratulated. 51's paramedics accepted the help back onto their feet from their colleagues on the foam team. They got a few pats on the back for risking their necks so close to the red hot metal. The overheated prybar clanked back onto the foam moist concrete floor as it was abandoned in favor of saving an individual life again. Chris's. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Brackett coming here?" Mike winced as Cap began to cut away his jacket. He decided to lay his face back down onto the net to rest a while with his eyes closed. "Yeah, we don't know whether or not Grandpa has a seizure history or not with that old stroke of his." Stanley answered, then his voice changed. "Whoa." "What?" Stoker asked quickly. "I hope it's not bad news. Roy and Johnny are back out here a little early." Mike cracked an eye open, but his eyes were too blurry with fatigue to focus much. "I'd go find out." he suggested. "Great idea. I'll be back to autograph your bandages." Hank said, patting his shoulder amicably. "Oh, ha ha." Mike groaned as another firefighter took Cap's place as a first aider. |
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*************************************************** Subject: Epilogue Sent: Thurs 12/03/09 23:34 PM From: patti k (pattik1@hotmail.com) Dr. Joanne Almstedt looked up as she held Grandpa onto his side while he got sick. The footsteps she had heard approaching belonged to Johnny Gage and Roy DeSoto. "Any word on that firefighter yet in the clean room?" she asked as she handed Grandpa a cloth towel to use to wipe his mouth. "We're still digging him out. It's slow going. But, we think he's alive and breathing. We get a really pink capillary refill back into the skin of his feet when we pinch them. We came out here to find out whether or not that clean agent's poisonous when inhaled." Johnny said. "I can sure find out." she said. "We tried to reach you, but you didn't answer your radio." DeSoto explained. Joanne was embarrassed enough to blush. She could still see it sitting forty feet away on the hood of Joe Rorchek's battalion car. "Oops, I got kind of busy. This gentleman and his charming princess of a sidekick decided to try a Superman act off a burning garage ramp." "Need help packaging them?" Gage asked. "Naw, we've plenty of help. Dr. Brackett's on the way to help me figure out this man's neurology and cardiologic signs before we let him back up onto his feet. He can't tell us if this nausea's MI related or simply due a post reaction to his agrophobia." she smiled. Nearby, Hank gaped. "He's got a fear of heights?" She nodded. "His granddaughter told me about it." "Sure as h*ll could have fooled me up there. He was pure Evel Knievel during his whole swan dive stunt. Didn't shake a bit." "That was an act. To save her. They're very devoted to each other." Dr. Almstedt grinned. "How's Chris Rorchek?" Hank asked Roy and Johnny. "Thumbs up, Cap. First hurdle done. He's hanging in there. Now all we have to do is find out whether or not he earns a week's time off, or a year." "That tangled up, huh?" "No thanks to the fire." Roy said. Then Joanne noticed a motion. "Ah, Dr. Brackett. Can you take over here? This case is a syncopal episode following a life net fall. I have to find out a bit of crucial information for your two paramedics." "Be glad to." Brackett said. Kel noticed Hallie hanging back in the wings, and gave her a conspiratory wink. "Looks like everybody out here's gonna be okay. That firefighter inside is going to be one of our last patients, doctor." he said to Joanne. "Really?" she asked. "Yep. The other team of doctors finally arrived from New Jersey." Brackett said. "What took them so long?" Almstedt wondered. "Snow plows. They did a lousy job of clearing the roads. They had to keep stopping at every roadside accident to help out until the fire department paramedics got there, all night long." "Must have been a lot of them." Cap said. "There were. Hundreds in fact, because of the odd early snowstorm. But this airport suffered the worst weather related incident, by far." Kel said as he studied Grandpa's EKG reading. "Joanne. He's a little bradycardic. But that's probably from the cold. I'm not seeing much in the way of abnormalities at all. Now l'll see if I can peg a good normal baseline mentation wise." "Thanks. I'll be right back." she said. "Fellas. Let's go talk to Joe about that reagent of yours. If anyone knows what that chemical actually was, it's gonna be him." she said, rising to her feet. She handed Kel Grandpa's already started I.V. bag, which he took quickly, to read the label to see what course of treatment she had already decided to do. |
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