Be Sure to Save Your Own Life During Water Rescue Work
departments
The Volunteers Corner
One of the real tragedies of the fire service is the loss of a fire fighter during a water rescue effort. What makes this loss of life even more tragic is that frequently adequate safety precautions are not instituted when fire fighters leave land for the water.
Many fire departments operate “rescue” boats that essentially are rowboats—sometimes with an outboard motor but still rowboats. Every fire fighter who gets into such a boat should wear a life jacket. That is a must for rescue work—even on a calm day that makes the local park pleasure puddle look like glass. It’s too late to prepare for the unexpected after it happens and nobody can tell you what may happen during a water rescue.
Remember, a life jacket is a form of insurance against your becoming part of the death statistics.
Dress for the job: When we respond to a fire alarm, we don’t think twice about donning full turnout gear. When we respond to a water rescue call, we ought to think twice about the absurdity of wearing full turnout gear in a small boat—a boat that can capsize and plunge us into the water with enough heavy turnout clothing on to drown us before we can shuck it.
In warm weather, only the work uniform—a light shirt, trousers and shoes—is sufficient to wear with a life jacket. In a water rescue, we don’t need the protection against heat and falling objects that a turnout coat and a helmet provide. As for bunker pants, they are too bulky for boat work.
In cold weather, wear a warm work jacket instead of a turnout coat under a life jacket.
Fire boots should never be worn in a small boat. If shoes are worn, the lacings should be loose so you can kick off the shoes easily if you are thrown into the water. It is rare indeed that a fire company responds to a water rescue without knowing it from the dispatch. Therefore, it is no problem to toss your boots on the apparatus and continue wearing your shoes during the response. Loafers, sometimes referred to as moccasins, have no lacings and are ideal both in a small boat and around the firehouse because you can take them off so easily.
If you do get caught in a water rescue with only fire boots, take them off and get into the boat in your stocking feet. If the weather is too cold for stocking feet and you don’t have a pair of shoes, at least turn the boot tops down so you can more easily kick them off if you’re plunged into the water.
If you respond to water incidents with a rescue truck, you might carry some pure wool mittens for boat work in cold weather. As soon as you put them on, get them thoroughly wet and your hands will never be cold.
Use of lines to boat: In turbulent water, a line (rope) should be tied to the stern of the boat before it leaves the shore whenever the distance to the rescue spot is not excessive. If the boat capsizes and the crew cling to it, men on shore can pull the crew back to safety. There are times when the boat does not capsize but the crew is unable to control it in fast-running, turbulent water, and the stern line again can become a lifesaver.
If a stream is narrow, a bow line to the opposite bank can improve control of the boat. Whether the line is tossed to the opposite bank from the boat as it gets out into the stream or is tossed from the bank to the boat depends on the situation.
Sometimes a line (rope) can be floated to the opposite bank of a stream—or to a victim stranded on a rock, tiny island or capsized boat. Carry some bats of foamed polystyrene both in the boat and on the rescue truck. Tie one end of a line to a hunk of polystyrene and by taking advantage of the current—or in some cases the wind—you can float a line to where you want the end to go.
Boat Safety: The oars should be attached to the boat with lanyards—made of 1/4-inch line—so that the oars can’t be lost overboard. Once oars are lost, a boat is in real difficulty.
Lines also can be attached to a boat to provide convenient hand grips in the event of a capsize. It is much easier to hang on to a looped line tied at both ends to a boat than it is to find a grip on an overturned boat surface.
There should be some extra lengths of line in the boat to use in hauling persons in distress to the boat. Sometimes all you have to do is to toss a line to a person being swept along by a strong current and you can pull him to the boat while he clings to the line. The old-fashioned life ring at the end of the rope lets the person being rescued get a good grip by putting his arm through the hole in the life ring.
Boaters sometimes get into trouble on the overflow side of a dam, and this is a particularly dangerous area for rescuers. If the turbulence at this spot capsized the boat and the powerful downward current of the water falling from the dam took the boat occupants beneath the surface, there is every reason to fear that the same thing will happen to rescuers in a boat—and it has.
Rescuers must take all the precautions we have previously mentioned and should remain clear of the area near the dam. Generally the victims do not survive and their bodies are found some distance downstream. It is only when a victim is on the surface that the rescuers should approach the danger area and then only while taking every precaution for their own safety. Another catastrophe will be of no help to the original victim.
