This was written by one of our own. Mookie may be able to elaborate who wrote it.

Last shift, I observed an issue that occurs too many times every day in the emergency services and I wanted to comment on it.

We arrived on a major, t-bone style collision with approx. 20 inches of intrusion on the passenger side of a minivan. The driver was still in the vehicle and one paramedic had already “tunnel ratted” into the vehicle and established patient contact. Due to the fact that this was a possible pin-in with serious injuries and we had not been informed by dispatch that this was a major collision (again), our crew was a little excited. Of the six person team, the Captain established command, the Specialist (me) began securing the scene and vehicles and the four tailboards assisted EMS with patient care and prepared for possible extrication duties.

As Specialist, I make sure that the scene is properly blocked from oncoming traffic via apparatus placement and traffic cone use, cover all fluid spills to prevent slipping hazards and injuries and, most importantly, I make sure that all vehicles involved are in park and shut off. On this scene, since four firefighters and one paramedic were already crammed into the second vehicle, I went to the first and made sure that it was in park and the ignition was off. To signal that this has been done, I removed the keys from the ignition, placed them on the driver’s side windshield wiper and yelled out to everyone on scene, “Vehicle Secured.”

Just being the safety conscious Specialist that I am, I then walked over to the second vehicle and looked inside. I found that, not only was the car still running, it was in “Drive” and the only thing holding the vehicle in place was the patient’s foot on the brake. At that time, two emergency personnel were at the driver’s door working, three emergency workers and one patient were inside, and two sheriff’s deputies and two civilians were directly in front of the vehicle! I put the vehicle in park, shut off the ignition, removed the keys and placed them on the driver’s side windshield wiper and yelled, again, “Vehicle Secured.”

This is not a bash against my crew. In fact, we discussed it on the way back from the call and they all realized that, as we are all taught, everyone on scene is a safety officer and we all need to act as such. In this situation, this did not occur. As you can surmise, the minute they would have moved the patient to a backboard, thus moving her foot, the vehicle would have begun moving and possibly injured or killed multiple people. This would have been bad.

The other reason I am writing this is that this situation occurs on a daily basis in all emergency service agencies. Fire, police, EMS, volunteer and paid personnel all make this silly but dangerous mistake. We have to all remember that, before we can help the public, we must make sure to secure the scene to protect ourselves. We cannot be part of the solution if we become part of the problem.

Be Safe!