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A Technical Rescue Team's First Rescue.


The Syosset Fire Department is located on the north shore of Long Island, New York. Each day the department protects over 150,000 people in 40,000 homes and numerous industrial parks. The Sysosset Fire Department is one of Long Island's largest fire protection districts.
In l992, due to increases in construction, industrial and commercial presence within the district, the department began assessing its ability to respond to technical rescue emergencies. After thorough research, the department determined that both the town of Syosset and the county in which it is located were in need of trained and equipped technical rescue specialists. In an attempt to satisfy this need, the Syosset Fire Department Technical Rescue Team was born. The team was to consist of approximately ten members trained and equipped to deal with such emergencies as high angle, confined space, trench and structural collapse incidents.
In April of l994, under the direction of the Urban H.A.R.T. Corporation, the team began its training. The initial training consisted of forty hour classes in both high angle and confined space rescue. Later members of the team would go on to take advanced high angle and confined space classes as well as trench and structural collapse rescue classes (also with the Urban H.A.R.T. Corporation).
By October of l995 the team was trained, equipped and ready to be placed into service. Just three months later, the team would make its first rescue. On January 3l, l996 at l5:l6 hours, the Syosset Fire Department received a request for an ambulance, at the service road of the Long Island Expressway in Syosset, for an unknown type of aid. Minutes after the initial alarm the first arriving units were met by several frantic construction workers. The workers advised them that one of their co-workers had been working atop of a l00' pile driver when he was struck by a piece of equipment and fell. During the fall, the construction worker had managed to entangle one of his legs in the pile driver's horizontal supports which prevented him from falling to the ground below. The worker was left suspended upside down some 55 feet in the air and held only by his entangled leg. To try and assist their friend, two of the workers had climbed the pile driver and were attempting to prevent him from falling.
Upon arrival of Second Assistant Chief Nicholas Favata, the firefighters had already made futile attempts at rescuing the victim with ladder trucks. The first attempt by the Department's 75 foot ladder fell short of its mark. The second attempt with the Department's l00 foot tower ladder was obstructed by power lines, construction equipment and grid locked fire apparatus. Fifteen minutes had elapsed since the construction worker had fallen and his condition was deteriorating dramatically. A combination of the worker's injuries and the effects of the sub-zero temperatures had pushed him into unconsciousness. His two workers, also feeling the effects of the bitter cold were fighting to maintain their grip on their injured friend.
Determining a need for an immediate alternative to the use of the two ladders, Chief Favata called the Department's Technical Rescue Team to the scene. Within minutes the Team was at the scene and placed into action. The potential for somebody either falling or dropping a piece of equipment posied a threat of serious injury to the crowd that had formed below the pile driver. Firefighters Kevin Lee and Stephen Morris, who had been trained to a support level, began establishing safety zones on the ground below. Civilians and unnecessary emergency workers were moved to a safer location.
Meanwhile, the Team's captain, James Corleto began a 50 foot ascent to the victim in an attempt to prevent the worker from falling to the street below. Upon reaching the victim, Captain Corleto, using a piece of l' tubular webbing, secured the victim to the pile driver with both a hasty harness and a chest harness. Once the victim had been secured, Captain Corleto was able to begin a primary assessment of the victim's injuries and medical condition.
On the ground below, firefighters and construction workers had been working swiftly to make a suitable site for the repositioning of the tower ladder. The tower ladder, now in place on the ground, was moving it's bucket into position next to the injured worker.
On the tower, Captain Corleto had determined that the victim was suffering from the effects of hypothermia as well as a possible fracture of the entangled leg and several ribs. With only seconds until the bucket would be there, Corleto could now only wait.
Once the bucket was in place, Captain Corleto, with the assistance of two other firefighters maneuvered the victim into the bucket for his safe removal to the ground. On the ground, a team of Emergency Medical Technicians, with immobilization equipment and a waiting helicopter, were ready to administer care to the victim. Once safely on the ground, the victim was fully immobilized and flown to the Nassau County Medical Center where he was to spend time in the facilities Intensive Care Unit.

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