Twin Hills Fire Department: Fill & Download for Free

I think it was eight. What a nightmare that was. I’ve assisted with a couple of bus wrecks and the number was in the teens.When you pull up on a crash scene and there is more than one casualty you feel overwhelmed. “Who to help first”, that is the question you ask yourself. So you do a quick bit of triage. There’s always several citizens on the scene, giving you advice. “Over here”, “This ones hurt bad”, etc.. You have to make the decisions based on your experience and training though. You can’t let the opinions of people with little to no training influence your decisions.My first question is always does anyone here have any medical training? Then a little prayer in my mind “Please God, let me save all I can, and bless me with a trauma surgeon”. The usual answer is “I’m an Eagle scout, I know some first aid”, “Great, help stop any bleeding you can find”. I check all injures as fast as I can. I assign certain citizens to jobs. “You watch traffic, you hold this bandage here, you tell anyone not doing something to leave unless they are witnesses ”. The last bad crash I worked before my retirement really stuck with me.I came over a hill and motorist were flashing their lights at me. Some had their windows down and were frantically pointing me down the road. Being an experienced state trooper their faces told me all I needed to know. It’s a bad one. I turned on my red and blues, and kicked the twin turbo eco-boost into high. As I rounded a curve there it was, the scene. In my mind's eye a traffic crash scene always looks like a Hollywood movie set to me. Cars everywhere, people running this way and that, a crashed vehicle, the roar of 18 wheelers passing, cars honking horns, a woman yelling, smoke and dust in the air. It’s surreal in my mind, I walk in slow motion through the scene, barking orders to people I don’t know, and seeing them take off and do what I ask. Do I know what I’m doing? I think, why are they listening to me? Why is everyone looking at me? Then I snap out of it, and my training takes over. I work the scene.I run through the ditch and up to the fence where the vehicle has rolled through it. It’s a pickup and is upside down. A woman is laying on the ground beside it talking to someone inside. Another motorist a little ways down the fence yells to me “Here over here” I run over to him. One look at the man lying on the ground and I know he’s gone. The motorist is down beside him, talking to him soothingly. “It’s going to be ok the police are here”, I know the guy can’t hear him. He is barely breathing. Blood is coming from his mouth, nose, and ears. I can tell it’s a bad head injury. I’ve seen this before, more times than I care to remember. I tell the motorist to continue talking to him. I get up and go over to the pickup because I know there is nothing anyone can do for him. I get down beside the pickup and see a woman hanging upside down. She’s trapped and has a broken arm, maybe more. I assure her the fire department will be here quickly to get her out. I tell the motorist to continue talking to her. The trapped woman looks at me with desperate eyes “Have you seen my husband”, she asks? “I’ve got people helping him”, I tell her. I go back over to the man. He is gone. I rub the Good Samaritans shoulder that is weeping next to the husband, and assure him that he did all that he could do. I’ve seen this, sometimes someone stops to help an accident victim and they’re connected to that person.EMS arrives “Thank God”, I say. I lead EMS over to the man, and the other paramedics to the pickup with the women. The firemen arrive with the jaws of life. I avoid the woman's location after that. 4 hours later myself and two other troopers are wrapping up the scene. On the drive home, I wonder if some day we will have a device like an AED that helps people with brain injuries. I don’t know why I have this sense of responsibility. I know for a fact there was nothing I could do. Still!It’s been almost a year and a half and every time I drive by the scene I look at the fence where he lay breathing his last. I don’t know why this one won’t go away. I guess because it was my last one. There are a few others that stay burned into my memory. I know I’ve helped lots of people in my 33 years, but that’s not the faces I see when I close my eyes.

There are going to be some graphic images implied. Read cautiously.“It's ok. Stay warm. I'm trying..”It was a cold, windy night in southeastern Colorado. I was a truck driver, delivering dairy products to grocery stores many, many years ago.On that night, the wind was carrying the snow off the nearby mountains and the roads were warmed from the sun earlier in the day. As the evening turned to night, everything had frozen over.A young woman had just left a party after an argument with her lover. She may have been unknowingly driving too fast for the icy conditions. Her car had skidded off the road and tumbled over the snowbank and laid crumbled smouldering in a patch of destroyed evergreen trees.I must have been about a minute behind her on the road. As I drove over a ridge and into the curve, I saw the snow dancing over the roadway and the glare of solid ice beneath it. I also saw a peculiar divot in the snow. I tenderly slowed and caught a glimpse of something red in the tree line ahead. I stopped well short of the odd trail leading from the road off into the snow. I have no idea how the truck stopped on a sheet of solid ice.I steered my truck towards the trees and was shocked by the wreckage. And, then I saw her. She lifted her hand. She was alive.Knowing where I was, town was several miles away. On the opposite side of the road was a gate for a large military base with an emergency contact number. I dialed my cell phone as I jumped out of the truck saying there was a bad accident, the road needed to be closed, and send help to the road by back gate now.Another truck had stopped at the top of the hill. I yelled to the driver to stop people from coming down the hill and to call for help.I grabbed a flashlight and fire extinguisher.. and then I ran. The snow was about a foot deep, and it was a couple hundred feet to get to the car. The gas tank had ruptured and there were sparks flickering in the dashboard. Steam was billowing into the cold. Her door would not open. The windows were shattered. Frame was crushed. I asked if she was ok. She was not in good shape and could barely whisper. The rear door was partially open. So I pulled with all my strength and was able to crawl into the car. She was badly broken, bleeding, shaking, and I knew I had to move her out of harms way.The other driver was yelling to me if I needed help or if there was anybody else down here. I told him that there was only one and I had to get her out of the car. Although he was a large guy, from a quarter mile away, he was outside the car in a matter of seconds.We knew emergency assistance was still at least 10 minutes away. I covered her with my jacket and sprayed the contents of the fire extinguisher into the dash, ahead through the shattered windshield. The other person took it from me and sprayed the engine and under the car.She was barely breathing, grasping for my hand, and telling me to find her phone. The other person with me was on the other side of the car trying to open the door to tear away the back of the passenger seat. She was bleeding badly. We knew we had to get her out of the car.By that time, maybe 3 minutes had passed. Another driver approached on the road from the opposite direction and stopped where I had parked. It was a husband and wife. Before they could say anything I told them to jump in my truck and get the mattress out of the sleeper. And they just looked at me. The other man looked over the roof at them and said there was a girl dying and we needed the mattress. Now. In less than a minute, the mattress and my sleeping bag were sitting a foot away.When I told her that we found her phone, she stammered in a gargling voice and told me to call Tommy. I wiped the blood from her lips with my sleeve and assured her that I would.We guided her out of the passenger door and wrapped the deep gouges in her arms and stomach. Her ribs were all broken. Her arm was broken. Her opposite leg was broken. Her face was badly contorted and she had a really nasty cut above her ear. But, she was still breathing. Still fighting.While the wife stayed up at the road frantically giving updates to, and getting instructions from the first responders, we gently guided her up the hillside to the road using the mattress as a sled.Once we were on flat ground, we were told to try and sit her up to help the breathing, fearing that with any internal injury her lungs would fill with blood. She was wrapped in my jacket, covered with a sleeping bag and I knew she wasn’t going to make it. We were just too far from civilization.The husband tried to extend a sense of urgency to whoever his wife was talking to. The other man was understandably in shock at the unfolding ordeal and was taking a minute to collect himself. I was sitting sideways on the mattress behind her, trying my best to shield the swirling breeze and holding her shaking hand.“It's ok. Stay warm. I'm trying.”She drowned in her own blood about 2 minutes before the first sign of flashing lights appeared through the trees.Maybe 10 or 12 minutes had passed between a pretty night to be out driving to that horrific moment in time.The whole fire department showed up. Several ambulances. Several police cars.I didn't ride with her to the hospital as she was hurried away. But, my jacket did. And, that is fine.Minutes later I realized I still had her phone in my pocket. I was giving a statement to the police officer about what had happened. I told the female officer that she urgently wanted me to call Tommy.Thinking Tommy would want to know the situation, the officer took the phone and searched the contacts.I didn't know who Tommy was but I could hear him scream in pain when the officer said that she was heading to the hospital, it wasn't looking good, and he should get there.Everybody present for the event gave a statement about the incident and, after our vehicles were checked for any damage, we were all free to go.I called in to my job and said I would be late with my deliveries. They understood and said they would reschedule.A few days later, I got a call from an unknown number. I answered thinking it might be an accident investigator.It was Tommy.Tommy had a twin sister named Janice.Janice died in my arms.Until that moment, I didn't even know her name.I shared the details of the accident and answered whatever questions I could. Apparently I had a piece of opened mail in one of the inside pockets of my jacket. He had noticed it earlier in the day when the family picked up her property and realized it must have belonged to whoever was with her in the snow. I told him that he was the last thing on her mind and said his name in her last breath. And, that was the truth.Tommy said that she had called him right before she left the party. He told her to stay there and that he was on his way to pick her up. She said no and was on her way home at the time of the accident. — Wow. Heartbreaking.He asked if I was ok and if I needed anything. I said I was fine and offered my sincerest condolences.I accepted the invitation to attend her funeral and met very briefly with her family to offer any support I could. They were amazingly kind-hearted people who did nothing to deserve such pain.She was 22. Beautiful girl. Tragic loss.Out of respect for the family, the names are changed, the date is missing, and the location is intentionally vague.I left a piece of my heart there.

While the most important consequences for world history revolve around whether public officials were killed and national symbols destroyed, I have a much more personal interest in 9/11 as I experienced it. I don't think my own story is very dramatic, or of any wide interest at all, and wouldn't record it here, except that, had the attack been successful, it wouldn't have been only me and my family who were casualties. There would have been thousands, and as it is, I am one of thousands who owe our lives and our property to the people who prevented Flight 93 from arriving in Washington.(The White House was often mentioned as a possible target, but I discount that theory for several reasons. The hijackers actually didn't do the homework they could have done; they mysteriously hit the wrong side of the Pentagon or they would have very likely killed Donald Rumsfeld. It's quite possible they didn't know where the Oval Office is or whether the President would be at work. Hitting the White House at all would have required much more skill for the pilot, because it's a small building by comparison, nestled in among trees and office buildings which are taller, and protected somewhat by the Washington Monument, which would have been a navigation obstacle at the very least. You don't even see it unless you approach directly from the south, which would have been a very suspicious flight path for many miles and minutes.)The way the National Mall is laid out, it would have been extremely easy to fly to either side of the Washington Monument (or over it, since it's much further from the Capitol than the White House), and straight down the unobstructed Mall to the Capitol Dome, sitting on top of a hill. As many have noted, a jet hitting the dome would not have killed many Members, who if they are "on the floor", are off in the Senate and House wings on either end of the central dome, which is a hollow rotunda. The sight of a heavily damaged dome would have both horrified and galvanized Americans, and made 9/11 an even more American-oriented attack. Although the Pentagon was hit, those people were at least part of our armed forces. Most of the victims of 9/11 were in the World Trade Center, so the attack was launched against the entire commercial world, symbolically, at least. But just as commerce survived, the US Government would have survived despite the deaths of government officials.Now let me set all that aside and turn to my family's story. Our house was five blocks south and six blocks east of the Capitol Building. My children were in a school even closer, two blocks east and four blocks south. I was at work closer still, two blocks east and one block south of the Capitol. All of this area east of the Capitol building is the residential neighborhood known as Capitol Hill. It is a neighborhood of expensive century-old rowhouses, almost none of which are free-standing.The Capitol dome is not made of marble. It is made of iron. I am not an engineer, so perhaps I've let my imagination run away with me here, but if a jetliner full of fuel had rammed into the dome going a couple hundred miles an hour, there wouldn't have been a central elevator core or office walls to stop the impact. It would have disintegrated, of course, but continued its flight through the dome and out the other side. The dome might have become much like a hand grenade; basketball sized shards of iron flying in all directions, but predominantly east of the Capitol, probably as far away as RFK Stadium, only 20 blocks away, on the Anacostia River. These iron shards would have been drenched in fuel, and in flames. How many pieces would there have been? Hundreds, if not thousands, one assumes. Each piece would have spread out and hit something, starting hundreds of individual fires in homes, cars, and trees. There is no way that anyone could have done any meaningful firefighting, or even rescue. There's also no way to know if streets would have been blocked and trees become forest fires, cutting off all hope of escape for the initial survivors.Of course the fire department would have rightly had its hands full trying to put out the flames at the Capitol building itself. And that is what is important to world history and all Americans. But that morning, as I learned that there was one flight unaccounted for and off course, many of us believed it was headed for the Capitol. I did not believe I would die, and I did not believe my children would die. But I ran to their school, thinking the odds we might see this explosion take place, and even human casualties, were unfortunately very realistic.My wife was a senior official with the District government, and had moved to the DC emergency command center. Because she and I had internet based pagers, we stayed in constant touch at a time when few officials or news reporters could. Cell lines were jammed. It meant the world to me to know that she was safe, and I was able to tell her that I had the kids and they were okay.We learned in the next few minutes that the fourth plane had gone down in Pennsylvania. We were in for weeks of watching F-16s circle overhead, and Washington Reagan National Airport was closed to all traffic. But I knew the immediate threat was over, and I wasn't going to jump in the car and flee our home. I took the kids to our house (they were 8 and 11 years old), and we turned on the TV and watched the planes slamming into the Twin Towers. I knew they would see those images no matter what I did, and I was glad they weren't even younger. (Later that day we heard the roar of helicopters and watched four big Marine choppers fly extremely low over our house. Usually when the President flies home he goes from Andrews Joint AFB to the White House in one of three helicopters, and they don't fly low over residential areas.)My personal recollections, and my personal interests, revolve more about protecting my family and our community, and I think that's natural. I know how lucky I am to have lived in a neighborhood like this one, not just because it's an enclave of fortunate people with expensive property, but because we lived so close to where things are happening that I believe are important. We had an anthrax attack less than a month later, and it was always at least sensible to consider moving far away, to a place where terrorists would never want to attack. We know now that our decision to stay and raise our children in Washington, DC, wasn't a fatal one, but it could have been otherwise, if not for the heroic actions of the passengers of flight 93.(I have never understood why local DC officials did not immediately undertake an effort to raise money to build a suitable monument to those brave people who did not sign up to die fighting terrorism. Had they not taken action, the injury to my community would have been felt far more directly than the injury to our country as a whole, and we would tragically have more in common with the workers in lower Manhattan and the employees at the Pentagon.)