Clarksville Fire Rescue does extrication training
Tony Centonze
tonycentonze@theleafchronicle.com
About a dozen members of Clarksville Fire Rescue did training exercises at Queen City Metals, Inc. Wednesday. Teams took turns dismantling vehicles with heavy-duty cutters and spreaders, extrication tools that can prove invaluable at a crash scene.
"We're training some of our men out there today," Fire Marshal Ray Williams said. "This is how we get people out, in case of an accident with injuries. Our guys have to get vehicle extrication training to be qualified in their positions here at the fire department."
According to Williams, injury accidents that require extrication are a regular occurrence.
"It happens a lot more than what people think," Williams said. "Can it happen every day? The answer is yes. Does It happen every day? No, but I would say on average, maybe two or three times a week an extrication has to be done."
Williams says his department responds to a lot of calls that have no injuries, but are called in as injury accidents.
"We end up responding," Williams said. "That's just part of the business. There is always a chance extrication might be necessary, especially in the case of more serious accidents. That's why we train as much as possible. I would say, between us and the volunteers, we have three or four training exercises like this every year."
Williams says it's a sad reality that the best training is real-life, on-the-job experience, and each accident scene is somewhat unique.
"It's always nice to have an experienced person on site when you run into a situation like this," Williams said. "We always try to have two people in the rescue truck now. It used to be a one-person job, but this has become a big part of our business, the medical side, and the vehicle extrication."