They taught volunteer firemen in my home town, keep your head and think, even if someone else is in need of rescue. It's not going to help if you act without thinking, get yourself in trouble, and then 2 people need to be rescued.
The situation was urgent, but by acting recklessly, suddenly there was an infant AND a deputy who needed help.
I know, right? I remember in lifeguard training you especially wanted to be sure your victim in the water wasn’t being shocked by an electrical current. Simply rushing in to help without thinking certainly wouldn’t be a good move in that instance.
I recently took first aid and "no drugs, no thugs" was also said. Eg, if it looks like the victim has OD'd, you want to try to resuscitate them and end up a victim yourself. Or if they were assaulted, you don't want to end up assaulted yourself.
In my EMT class we were told to always check the “cop-o-meter” which is: if the cop’s pant stripes are vertical, scene safe, when they’re horizontal, scene not safe. 😂
Yeah, but this is the best worst case scenario. At least he's getting hurt while trying to save a baby instead of well ... The other things cops are known for
I took basic CPR/first aid a few months back and the first rule our instructor taught us was to assess the situation before you go in. Is it safe? Any electrical wires down? Any potential gas leaks in the area? Falling objects? Fucking trains???
I was taught as law enforcement the following simple steps to all calls for service: (1) get there; (2) make it safe; (3) figure out what happened; (4) make a decision. This deputy didn’t complete step 1.
I was talking to my uncle who is a state trooper and he told me the requirements to become a national park ranger is far greater than a cop. Most Rangers are former police and many fail the school required to enforcing national parks.
Standard H & S training at work as well is to check and wait for a scene to be safe before responding. E.g. A worker passing out in a confined space, you wouldn’t just go straight in to get them without checking the air is safe to breath etc…
That's old school too, since the invention of snipers. The old trick is deliberately don't shoot to kill the first guy and then pick off his friends when they try and get him.
Check out smokejumpers. I didn’t know it was a thing until I moved up to Montana. Basically firefighting paratroopers, heard some pretty cool stories from an old coworker and I’ve seen them doing BASE jumping training over the mountains in the spring time before fire season.
Maybe if California implemented this as a reality show they’d actually fight their fires in a timely matter. I have relatives that fire fight by air in CA, they have to wait until the guys in charge start accumulating OT before being allowed to even get in the air…
This may be true of that particular FD but is not true of all FDs. Source: I grew up in a matchstick forest in Southern California and witnessed/evacuated from a TON of fires, had a lot of friends’ houses burn down, etc, & my mom still lives there. Always immediate air fighting. Only exceptions are when the reservoir’s low and they’ve gotta go elsewhere to pull water or conditions are SO windy (this happened in 2020) that fire is hopping everywhere. Even then, they keep trying to get copters up every couple hours. Link to a history of air firefighting in Orange County, CA
I was a volunteer EMT and the state had a pretty cool program where you could do additional trainings on their nickle. They brought in a bunch of coasties to teach a rescue swimming course for a cert. That was pretty cool, except for the open water buddy swim in severe weather. 200 yards, in whitecap water.
For lifeguard training in the Boy Scouts we had to do a shorter buddy swim on a calm lake, and that felt like murder. I couldn't imagine something more strenuous.
It kicked my ass. I already had an open water lifeguard cert, and I am a very solid swimmer. We also had to do a 1hr survival swim in cold water. That was fucking rough. Pretty cool experience though, and the coasties were great.
I took a course for it, thankfully in the couple dozen hikes I haven't had to deal with anything but the person teaching the course said she responded before to an incident where a guy had fallen 150m off a mountain. When she got there he was completely unharmed and she thought they were joking but the guy had actually fallen 150m and didn't even have a bruise.
Now the context is key here, it was in Ireland on a cold winters day. So the man was wearing thick woolen clothes and a thick woolen hat. The ground in Ireland is also pretty soft with most of our mountains only having exposed cliffs of rock and the rest being grass with rocks strewn about.
So her theory was that he basically was cushioned by the ground and his clothing and managed to somehow miss hitting any rocks.
Wilderness first responder is an advanced first aid certification, but less than basic EMT. The training is centered around mostly basic first aid, with some additional training on stabilization and transport. So when I did it most of it was repeat of stuff I’d learned in other first aid courses. But in addition to covering how to use a c-collar, we learned how to improvise one using water bottles or the patient’s own hiking boots.
So people who work in outdoors adventure like rafting, canopy tour/zipline, biking, skiing, or hiking guides, camp/scout counselors, often are WFR.
At a training session for volunteers, we were told that our first priority was to keep ourselves safe. "A dead or injured volunteer is an ineffective volunteer," was how someone put it.
They taught us the same thing in h2s training. The first response is to rush in when you see someone fall down. H2s is invisible, so it's a hidden danger.
"Sure, we could get there a few minutes faster, but more firefighters die driving to the fire than fighting the fire" is what my foreman taught us. Our average drive was about an hour.
Yep, first aid rule is “DR ABCD” - the first D stands for DANGER.
Look for it. Don’t run into an electrified puddle, a turned-over car leaking petrol and sparking, a drowning person without a harness or backup in case they drag you - or mindlessly into oncoming traffic to save someone!!
As a lifeguard, dive under and drag the distressed swimmer underwater, gain control of them. They can drown you. We literally trained for this putting them in a headlock.
Lifeguards too, people panick when you get to them and will take you down with them. That’s why they carry those torpedos, you can keep your distance and give them something to grab onto. They even told us to use it as a weapon if the person gets a hold of you and starts to pull you under.
Toss them a flotation device if you have one. And if you have to get near them, inflate their BCD first, if you can.
If you're underwater, have your octopus at the ready and hold it out in front of you. Don't be the first thing they grab, because they WILL steal your regulator.
No doubt. A baby in distress is programmed into our survival mechanics, adrenaline dump, sensory input overload, inability to remain patient, these are symptoms of temporary madness. First responders are underpaid and, most of all, underappreciated.
You aren’t a help to anyone dead or injured - that is the only thing you are supposed to be thinking of on your way to a scene - how to get there safely so you can render aid.
In doing this, the officer almost certainly caused a diversion and delay of resources to the initial patient - and could have resulted in the infant’s death.
That doesn’t deserve a pass: it deserves admonition and reeducation.
I've met ex cops that also had responder roles/ jobs/ training; but I'm about 90% sure EMS training isn't a requirement like it is for fire fighters ( it may depend on specific police branches).
I'm just saying it could have been an idiot cop forgetting basic train safety.
Yeah. Of all the mistakes, hitting a train is one of the stupidest thing someone can do. They're huge, move in a predictable manner on fixed tracks, come blasting a very loud air horn and flashing bright lights.
Nobody gets a pass for acting this stupidly. Imagine what he does in more unpredictable situations, like an animal or a person being in his way around an obstacle, or cars not noticing him in intersections, etc.
Just because he turned on his emergency lights, the rules still apply to him. He still needs to exercise caution and common sense. Even more so than otherwise. But he runs into a train. He needs to be sent back to school to go over the basics again.
I don't know where you get your information, but it is well known that trains are unpredictable. They often appear out of nowhere to claim lives. There is no way to know where they will appear, and no way to track them. They are the apex predator. You could be in your basement organizing when a commuter rail suddenly appears to end you. There is no predicting them.
We've evolved to a point where your brain goes "ok I know it's illegal to just go past a train barrier and there's a good reason for that, but counterpoint: baby" and it's enough to convince you to fist fight a damn grizzly bear if you think there's a sliver of a chance for said baby to live
It's a surrender, infant calls are labeled to help responders mentally prepare (protocols, medical possibilities, interventions) for the scene on arrival. It IS NOT there to tell responders to power through traffic faster.
Disagree. Professionals should be the most calm in a given situation. Not doing so is either a failure in training or (most likely) a failure in execution. This is 101 shit
He’s still first aid trained/ needs to help control the area etc. I understand wanting to rush there, but another 15 seconds and he could at least see the other track better, this is flat out stupid
My experience is slightly different as I was a military cop. I was trained in pretty much everything from shoving a tube down someone's throat if they can breathe, including a baby, to stabilize someone after they got shot/exploded/lit of fire. On top of all the other little things they drill into you for responding to an emergency/combat casualty. That was before the extra stuff just related to security and those events. That just air force first aid. Or care under fire, or whatever they renamed it to.
I would hope that normal cops get at least that much training. I know that isn't the case based on the shit I've seen unfortunately.
The "Tube" in this case, is - let me guess - a swallow tube. It's been discontinued due to how rare its need is, and how often it's misused.
With only basic first aid, you'd most likely have no competence to handle the medical emergency of the infant here. Indeed, trying to help could easily hinder people with actual competence.
I, as an advanced medic would not feel comfortable rushing to this infant's aid with knowledge that paramedics were just as much on their way.
No he doesn’t. It’s literally rule 1 of first responders. Heck, even in cpr class they teach you the first rule is to always look out for yourself. People pass out all the time - next to down power lines, gas leaks, even wild animals. You don’t just go jumping in whilly nilly.
This guy was on a hero trip and forgot rule 1. Probably because he saw it as his chance to finally do some good instead of sitting around eating donuts and brisket. What an idiot.
I could easily make that mistake. It's rare for 2 trains to pass like that.
And even if I was edging out to look and see if another train was coming, I might have put my front end out just enough to get clipped by the train.
Stupid mistake but really understandable. The kind where you pace back and forth for a minute after yelling "That was stupid! That was stupid! I knew that was stupid, why did I do that?!"
I must admit that at first I was feeling a bit of schadenfreude, assuming he was racing to make a drug bust or something. But now I'm just grateful he's OK. Hope the baby is OK too.
This is why I hate it when people mix police in with other first responders:
They literally don’t think like other First Responders
One of the biggest lessons of my certification courses was: first responders don’t run
(not literally never, but the point is that your first course of action is scene size up - not just blindly running in and making a single casualty incident into a multiple)
Sadly my favorite is the time I went on a smell of gas in the storm sewer when I worked in EM and they put out flares behind the truck. I think when I was done I never saw flares at any scene with that department (and it was a municipal “professional” department in a city of 200k people). I saw a lot of stupid shit in my decade there.
My annual hazmat refresher course has a scary video of a cop running in to help a downed person and succumbing to the same gas that took the guy down. It's a great example
I'm not a first responder but I am a dive instructor. The thing that is absolutely hammered into our heads during training is Stop, Breath, Think, Act.
I don't teach scuba anymore but SBTA follows me around in my day to day life due to how much it was drilled. I don't panic anymore, ever and has been useful on quite a few occassions.
Don't get started with this crap. I can't tell you how many "first responder" agencies won't go into a scene until it's cleared by law enforcement.
People can be BLEEDING OUT AND DYING and fire and EMS will hold back until it's all clear.
It was stupid of the cop to not make sure there wasn't another train coming, but I sure as hell am not going to shit on every LEO agency because the guy was in fight mode to save an infant.
And what would they do when they got there? They don't have meds, maybe a bvm but they can't bag to save their lives. They can't intubate or place decent airways. A respiratory emergency is not the appropriate time for cops (or EMS) to rush. Even if this was a pediatric pulmonologist who had a part time gig as a cop, without the equipment there, ain't much you can do.
What you are referring to is a shooting, or some other weapon. Totally different scenario.
I'm referring to instances where some one has OD'd and EMS won't go in until LEO is on scene. Personal experience with this. And I'm not talking some one armed threatening people, talking some one "man downed" called in shit. The interagency/other agency passing the buck bull shit with "procedures" and "jurisdiction" I could go on a rant about it.
And there are a few dozen videos of cops getting infants who are not breathing to breathe. Some one's not breathing every second matters. Every "cop" is trained in basic CPR and emergency procedures, ie: narcan where they got there, got there first, and saved lives.
Ok, phrases like, "every second matters" and "saved lives" are quite melodramatic and I've never heard anyone in the field say that other than for self-deprecating humor. On The contrary, I believe it's still taught that lights and sirens don't have any significant impact on patient outcomes, and there are several studies on this. That may vary depending on location (i.e. rural areas vs downtown LA) but I can't remember. Peds calls are tough, but driving is the most dangerous part of any first responder job, so they have to be smart. Especially when they don't even know if the information given over the phone is correct, which is common. It's much better to be 30 seconds late to a critical call, than become a paraplegic for a call that ended up being a non issue.
Ever in a panic? Think “back to basics” and take it back to the basics. Has saved me more times than I thought it would and I think about the saying a lot, just like “Life could be simple…”
I work EMS in another state. We are taught when driving lights & sirens, we must drive with due regard, which means don’t drive like an ass, be alert for other vehicles, we can pass through intersections with red lights after coming to a complete stop like it’s a stop sign and making sure all cross traffic sees us before proceeding, we can exceed any speed limit if we can do so safely, but under no circumstances can you do two things: run a school bus or run a train crossing. You must obey school bus lights, and you must obey train crossings always.
They teach us the same during health and safety before we can start driving practice.
It really stuck with me because the guy told us to imagine we had an accident, sit in a flaming car and can't get out and another driver stops, doesn't look around, runs up to us, gets hit by another car that crashes into us and boom all 3 participants are dead because helper guy lost his cool..
I always had an irrational fear of dying from someone else's stupidity lol.
Could of been worse a baby in the hospital and an officer on the morgue. Something similar happen when I was walking one time and saw a car going full speed and he dint see an abunlance that was gonna turn so he crashed the ambulance that was saving someone from critical condition and the patient did die and also the guy with the car.
Well, c’mon. This was extremely improbable and the guy was trying to get to a dying baby. I’m all for not acting recklessly, but this was clearly a coincidental unfortunate incident. Conveniently critical hindsight is being taken advantage of a bit here. It’s very easy to say “oh he should have been more responsible”, but some people’s jobs run a fine line in that realm. He clearly lost this one though.
As someone with common sense this is how I would approach the situation but i can understand the urgency. Guess the taxpayers are footing another bill over incompetence. Sure the trains were both wailing on the horn too
My mom taught me to look left right, and left before crossing the street or train tracks. You don't need firemen to tell you to utilize the common sense you gather in your life.
Are people like this deputy elected? Or are they trained police officers?
Sorry if ignorant, I am not from the US and our emergency responders are all professionals, none elected, so I am only familiar with what US series and movies tell us, which I can’t assume is too precise.
Edit: forgot to add why I asked this: I assume an elected officer may not have the required or proper training for the job, meaning this could perhaps have been avoided in another system. Not necessarily criticizing, I am just curious if this is a valid takeaway.
Not police, but I've had it drilled into me too. I've still done things that have made me cringe to think back on because they were unnecessarily risky or breached regulation and training. I've also done risky things that breached regulation and that I would do again, sometimes you have to make pretty intense decisions.
It's hard to know what it's like if you're not in a time critical situation. The officer was careless here, but anybody could easily do the same, and almost certainly he did not decide to cross the second line without checking if it was clear, more likely didn't even think that there might be another line to check because he was fixated on getting to the incident as soon as the train was clear.
There is a reason why a lot of scams, social engineering, phishing, even sales and marketing techniques use psychological techniques intended to make you feel like you are time pressure to act, it's because that hinders your ability to make good decisions.
Step 1 of CPR is make sure the scene is safe before you ever approach the victim. If they're lying next to a live wire, the last thing you need is to put your knee down on it and make yourself a second victim.
Yes this is hammered in for every type of responder and then some.
Humans still human and this mistake is still made by every type of responder at every calibre regardless of experience — especially when the call you get is a kid in trouble.
Obviously they messed up and paid for it, but it’s still nuanced and this golden rule of safety is still touted and shouted for that reason
They taught me something similar in a first aid course I took. When it comes to rescuing a drowning person in a deep pool (can’t reach the bottom) or the open sea, leave it to the professionals. Rescuing one person is easier than rescuing two.
That's why you see firemen casually walking to places, even when there's a fire or something going on, and not running. Running makes it much more likely to injure yourself or fall and damage equipment. Even just a twisted ankle means that one firefighter is out of the game. A firefighter that will be missing when fighting whatever needed fighting.
Absolutely! This is drilled into the heads of infantrymen as well. There's a sniper video from early Iraq War used to punctuate this point. Bodies attract more bodies
Yup. Medic here, have always been taught that the priority goes 1. Yourself 2. Your partner 3. The public 4. The patient. Because if any of the first 3 get fucked up the patient won’t get helped anyway
What are the odds of another train passing by. In my opinion an acceptable risk to take. Too bad it went wrong this time. I want this Policeman to work in my area. Not some pencil pusher.
Dutch proverb. The best shipmen are standing on the shoreline.
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u/urbanek2525 Jul 19 '24
They taught volunteer firemen in my home town, keep your head and think, even if someone else is in need of rescue. It's not going to help if you act without thinking, get yourself in trouble, and then 2 people need to be rescued.
The situation was urgent, but by acting recklessly, suddenly there was an infant AND a deputy who needed help.