Wildfire Today

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Wildfire Today

Tag: injury

Another firefighter burned by chain saw “fuel geyser”

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , 6 Comments on Another firefighter burned by chain saw “fuel geyser”

Last month a firefighter suffered serious burns when gasoline forcefully vented while he was removing the fuel cap on a Stihl MS461 chainsaw.

The incident occurred October 10, 2016 (we first reported it here) on the Pingree Hill prescribed fire near Rustic, Colorado. For years the land management agencies have been warning firefighters about the dangers of gasoline being forcefully released from chain saws. Some of these incidents have occurred with saws that have the new quarter-turn gas caps. After a chain saw has been running for a while pressure can build up in the gas tank causing vapor lock, which can prevent the saw from running. Thinking it may be out of fuel, the operator opens the quarter-turn gas cap and the pressure in the tank forces out fuel and vapor. If there is an ignition source nearby, it can quickly ignite and cause very serious injuries.

Below is an excerpt from a report issued about the October 10 incident. We pick up the narrative as the saw team is finishing a break:

…After roughly fifteen minutes, the sawyer sizes up the second snag and identifies a rock adjacent to the tree that he can stand on to make his cuts. He enters the burned area, steps onto the rock, and pulls on the starter cord. The saw starts but quickly sputters and dies, he opens the choke and tries again with the same result. After two or three more tries he thinks the saw may be out of gas. The saw is equipped with the newer “1/4 turn” quick release fuel and oil caps making it easy to simply flip the saw on its side and open the cap while remaining in a standing position. On older model saws with the threaded caps, this process involved using a scrench to loosen and unscrew the cap, making it difficult to open the tank without setting the saw down.

As he opens the cap the fuel sprays out in two distinct bursts spraying liquid and vaporized fuel on his stomach area and right arm. He quickly realizes this is a very dangerous situation… “I had an oh s*** moment!” The swamper looks, and notices fuel “boiling and bubbling” out of the fuel tank and sees open flame beneath the sawyer’s feet. He yells to the sawyer, but it’s too late. Fuel ignites from the ground, running up toward the saw and the sawyer. Immediately the sawyer’s nomex shirt ignites around his right arm and stomach area. He swings the saw to the left, drops it in the rocks, then sprints downhill through the black to the unburned area beneath the handline and drops to the ground. The swamper reacts and jumps on top of the sawyer and helps extinguish him by throwing dirt on the flames and rolling around to smother the fire.

Once the fire is extinguished the sawyer grabs a radio and calls the Supt. and initially gets no response. He calls the Crew Boss Trainee who responds immediately. The sawyer calmly states “I am burned pretty bad, code red, need an air transport, need to go to the hospital now.”

[…]

The patient is in good spirits and is recovering well but did say:

“The one thing I hope comes out of this is that people will give it one last second thought…before you pop the cap”.

The firefighter received 2nd and 3rd degree burns on his right arm and abdominal area.

The report says the extraction of the firefighter went smoothly, thanks largely to the incident within an incident training the crew conducts on a regular basis. About an hour elapsed between the injury and the helicopter taking off to fly him to the burn center.

Two firefighter injuries, a snakebite and gasoline fire

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , 1 Comment on Two firefighter injuries, a snakebite and gasoline fire

Reports about two notable injuries to wildland firefighters have been released in recent days.

A “72-hour” report provides very little information about another in a series of accidents that may involve a “gasoline geyser”. The document does not include the date of the injury, the location of the accident, or the name of the fire or incident, but it was issued by the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forest and Pawnee National Grassland headquartered in Fort Collins, Colorado. It is titled “Pingree Hill Chainsaw Incident” and says a firefighter that was working on a prescribed fire sustained gasoline fire burns to the abdomen, arm, and wrist related to a chainsaw while working on a prescribed fire. He was flown to the Northern Colorado Burn Center where he is recovering.

Since at least September 30, 2016 Inciweb has had information about a 2,027-acre “Pingree Hill Prescribed Fire” near Rustic, Colorado that apparently is being conducted on an intermittent basis.

Many injuries have been reported in the last couple of years related to gasoline being forcefully released from chain saws. Some of these incidents have occurred with saws that have the new quarter-turn gas caps.

Here is a video released a year ago on the subject:

The second injury is titled “Rattlesnake Bite” in the Rapid Lesson Sharing report that was released by the Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center. It happened on the Kent Fire in Montana July 24, 2016. The firefighter never saw or heard the snake that bit him, the report says.

Below are excerpts from the report:

A team of more than five EMTs were assigned to patient care, with one EMT identified as lead caregiver.

[…]

Disagreement Involving Interventions and Patient Care

Once the ambulance arrived on scene, there was a disagreement between the ambulance personnel and onsite EMTs involving interventions and patient care being provided. Because of the dispute and increased level of pain experienced by the patient, Division Whiskey decided to transport the patient via the DNRC [Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation] helicopter.

The lead caregiver and one other DNRC EMT joined the patient in transit to Baker. The DNRC Task Force Leader followed via ground transport in order to bring the EMTs back once patient care had been transferred.

Upon arrival at the Baker Municipal Airport, the patient was transported to the Fallon Medical Complex emergency room. Medical personnel assessed the bite and cleaned wound.

Because it was determined that side-effects could have adverse effects on this patient, it was decided to hold off on administering antivenin, a biological product used in the treatment of venomous bites and stings. After tissue samples were taken and sent to the lab, it was determined that the bite was nonvenomous.

The patient was monitored and released that evening.

Two fire crew vehicles hit by truck, 5 firefighters injured

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags ,

Five members of the Mid-Plains Interagency Hand Crew received minor injuries.

Mid-Plains Interagency Hand Crew
File photo of the Mid-Plains Interagency Hand Crew at the Beaver Creek Fire in Colorado. It was posted July 4, 2016 on the Mid-Plains Crew’s Facebook Page. The composition of the crew on July 15, the day of the vehicle accident, may have been different.

Two vehicles transporting members of the Mid-Plains Interagency Hand Crew were involved in a serious vehicle accident Thursday afternoon.

Five of the firefighters were transported to the Medical Center of the Rockies in Loveland, Colorado where they were treated and released with minor injuries.

At the time of the accident they were on Interstate 25 near Fort Collins en route to the Hayden Pass Fire south of Salida, Colorado. Traffic ahead of them came to an abrupt halt and the two vehicles were able to stop but the one in the rear had to swerve to the left to avoid the first crew vehicle.

A semi truck behind them tried to stop but careened into both firefighter vehicles, pushing the second truck into a cable median. A fuel tank on the semi truck ruptured, spilling about 50 gallons of fuel on the highway.

One of the crewmembers is a paramedic who was carrying Advanced Life Support equipment. That individual took charge of the medical response immediately at the accident scene.

The word we received is that both firefighter vehicles were totaled.

The Mid-Plains Interagency Type 2 Initial Attack Hand Crew can be assembled from a roster of fire-qualified personnel from Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, and South Dakota. They can be from the National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, local fire departments, state agencies, or other organizations.

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Mike.

Oklahoma firefighter run over by brush truck

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , 1 Comment on Oklahoma firefighter run over by brush truck

The Oklahoma State Firefighters Association announced that on February 26 a Ponca City firefighter suffered traumatic leg injuries after accidentally getting run over by a brush truck.

Lt. Lyle Crandall with the Ponca City Fire Department was seriously injured Friday afternoon [February 26] while responding to a reported grass fire. Lt. Crandall and one other firefighter were on a special detail when the call came in. They had to respond back to the fire station to pick up a brush pumper. During this transfer, Lt. Crandall was accidentally run over by the front tires of the fire engine. Lt. Crandall received immediate treatment from the other Ponca City firefighters and was taken by ambulance to the hospital where they were met by a medical helicopter. Lt. Crandall was flown immediately to OU Medical Center in OKC. He sustained traumatic injury to his left foot and leg as well as his right leg.

Please keep Lt. Crandall, his family, and the Ponca City Fire Department in your thoughts and prayers.

Sincerely,

Dereck Cassady
Ponca City FD
OSFA 3rd VP

Raanon Adams, President

Female inmate injured while fighting fire near Malibu

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , , , , 3 Comments on Female inmate injured while fighting fire near Malibu

The inmate’s condition was upgraded from critical to serious.

A female inmate was seriously injured Thursday morning while fighting a wildfire near Malibu in southern California. Reportedly she was struck by a rolling rock and was hoisted into a helicopter and transported to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, where her condition was later upgraded from critical to serious.

Injured inmate hoist helicopter
An inmate firefighter was airlifted after being injured in Malibu on Feb. 25, 2016. (Credit: KTLA)

The 22-year-old inmate was a member of Fire Camp 13, an all-female facility.

The fire was reported around 3 a.m. in steep terrain about two miles north of the Pacific Coast Highway.

A total of 63 inmates divided into five work crews were battling the fire, according to Bill Sessa, a spokesperson for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR).

From the LA Times:

Of the roughly 4,000 inmates housed in 44 conservation camps across the state, only a couple hundred are women.

The female inmate who was injured Thursday had come from the LA County jail system, and had been with the Malibu conservation camp since August, Sessa said.

The CDCR likes to say that only non-violent prisoners are allowed to work on inmate fire crews, but as was discovered last year, the agency’s definition of “violent” is different from the public’s perception.

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Tom.

Report released for entrapment of firefighters on the Valley Fire

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , , , , , , 2 Comments on Report released for entrapment of firefighters on the Valley Fire
Valley fire entrapment site
Entrapment site of firefighters on the Valley Fire. Photo from the CAL FIRE report. (click to enlarge)

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) has released a report for an entrapment with injuries that occurred on the Valley Fire September 12, 2015. The fire burned 76,000 acres 62 miles north of San Francisco.

Four firefighters from a helitack crew that had arrived at the fire via helicopter were on the ground fighting the fire with hand tools when they were surrounded by the fire during initial attack operations and suffered serious burn injuries. Below is an excerpt from the report.

****

“…FC1 directed FF3, FF4 and FF5 to get into the goat pen, which was clear to bare mineral soil. While in the goat pen they observed the fire behavior changing. There was an increase in the wind speed, and an increased number of spot fires in the pine needle duff and leaf litter surrounding them. FF3 saw fire sheeting and swirling across the dirt driveway on the northwest side of the goat pen; several pines torched on the west side of the steel garage.

From the location of RES2, FF2 observed increased fire behavior advancing toward Helitack A’s location. FF2 communicated the increased fire behavior using the radio; FC1 acknowledged FF2’s observation.

At approximately 1402 hours, the brush covered slope to their east completely torched into a wall of flame. The wall of flame sent a significant wave of radiant heat through the goat pen and onto the firefighters. They could feel their faces burning from the radiant heat and all four firefighters ran to the fence, climbed over, and ran towards the steel garage. At the steel garage Helitack A started to deploy their fire shelters.

“May-Day” was transmitted from FC1 and was heard over the radio. From the location of a third residence (RES3), FC2 could hear FC1 say over the radio, “Four have deployed their shelters, near a barn on the right flank.” FF4 had difficulty opening the fire shelter case from the Chainsaw Pack; the clear plastic covering of the fire shelter was soft and melted. FF4 had to remove the gloves to tear the plastic away from the aluminum shell of the fire shelter. FF3 couldn’t get the fire shelter out of the case because the clear plastic cover was melted to the white plastic protective sleeve. FF3 looked up and saw FF4 at the north side (D) of the steel garage. FF3 dropped the fire shelter on the ground and ran to FF4’s location. FF3 and FF4 shared FF4’s fire shelter and stayed together in a crouched position. FC1 and FF5 deployed their fire shelters on the east side (A) of the steel garage. The heat in front of the steel garage was too intense so they moved to the north side (D) of the steel garage with FF3 and FF4 where the atmosphere seemed to be cooler.

Helitack A huddled together shielding the heat away from their already burned faces and hands; each of them could see the visible burns to one another’s faces and hands. FC1 continued to use the radio requesting bucket drops from C1 on their deployment location to cool the atmosphere. FF5 attempted to drink the water from the hydration pack but the water from the mouth piece was too hot to drink. While crouched in their fire shelters next to the steel garage, Helitack A suddenly heard explosions coming from inside the now burning structure. As a group, Helitack A moved a safe distance from the structure. Helitack A eventually crouched along the dirt driveway, separating the dirt garden and the goat pen.

From the driveways of RES3 and a fourth residence (RES4), FC2 directed C1 to make bucket drops into Helitack A’s location at the top of the ridge. C1 orbiting above and was unable to get near their location at the top of the ridge due to the thick column of smoke convecting straight up into the atmosphere…”

****

“Injuries:

  • FC1 suffered second and third degree burns to the head, face, ears, neck, back, arms, hands, legs and feet and has had several surgeries. FC1 remains in critical condition and is under the continued care of UCD Burn Center.
  • FF4 suffered first and second degree burns to the face, head, ears, arms and hands and is under the continued care of UCD Medical Center.
  • FF5 suffered first and second degree burns to the face, head, ears, arms, foot and hands and is under the continued care of UCD Medical Center.
  • FF3 suffered first and second degree burns to the face, head, ears, arms and hands and is under the continued care of UCD Medical Center.”

The report lists 13 “Safety issues for review and lessons learned”. Here are the first five:

  • “Crews must utilize L.C.E.S [lookouts, communications, escape routes, safety zones] when engaged in firefighting operations.
  • ALL Ten Standard Fire Orders MUST be obeyed at ALL TIMES.
  • Personnel MUST wear ALL CAL FIRE APPROVED PPE when engaged in firefighting operation.
  • Modifying Personal Protective Equipment can alter the protective properties.
  • Practice and prepare for shelter deployment in adverse and extreme conditions.”

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to John.