Fire service gets new kit to cope with crashes
(CNS): With the amount of collisions on Cayman’s roads reaching alarming levels, the Cayman Islands Fire Service has invested in new equipment to rescue victims. Four complete sets of Holmatro road rescue hydraulic cutting and spreading tools, with associated modern road traffic collision extrication equipment, have been purchased for all four fire stations in Frank Sound, West Bay, Central and Cayman Brac.
Vehicle extrications are delicate operations in which road traffic crash victims are freed by removing a crushed vehicle from around them when conventional means of getting them out are impossible or unsafe. Experts explained that fire crews remove vehicle roofs, doors and structural posts as carefully as possible to minimise more injury.
“The investment by the government to provide new equipment for the fire service demonstrates our focus on public safety and our commitment to reducing the number of fatalities and serious injuries on our roads,” said Home Affairs Minister Tara Rivers. “This most recent acquisition is part of our overall plan this budget cycle to equip the fire service to world class standards to better protect our community,” she added.
Interim Chief Fire Officer Paul Walker stressed the need for the equipment. “Given the prevalence of road traffic collisions, increased traffic levels and the technical complexity of modern vehicles, this investment provides front-line crews with state-of-the-art tools. This new equipment ensures a quick and controlled extrication to maximise survivability rates of people involved,” he said.
Fire fighters at all stations have been trained to use the new kits to maintain scene safety and safe systems of work for officers.
“Road traffic collisions are, unfortunately, part of every fire officer’s career and we can all recount stories of the tragic loss of life and serious injuries,” said Deputy CFO Roy Charlton. “At CIFS we do everything we can to minimise the impact that road traffic collisions can have on an individual’s life. Most tragic, though, is the fact that a lot of road traffic collisions are avoidable if all road users adopted some key safety principles. We all have an important role to play in keeping everyone safe on the streets,” he added.
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Category: Local News
Did they use it on the van that hit a tree across from the Barn on Frank Sound yesterday? The drivers feet were trapped.
But what equipment will stop power poles from jumping out at people?
New concrete / coral-stone fences & walls seem to be a particular issue . For no apparent reason on a straight stretch of road , walls come into contact with front ends of mostly Japanese import vehicles, usually in early hours of a Sunday morning. Very strange phenomenon.
Who is paying for this? These things aren’t cheap! Bill accident victims?
That’s good news. However, practice makes perfect when it comes to this equipment. So just because they have had training, they need a whole lot more!
Yes, this equipment is referred to as “Jaws of life” in the U.K. so glad, however, whatever you want to call it that the Fire Service has acquired this wonderful equipment.
Very pleased to see that, unlike the Compass, CNS has ignored references in the press release to this equipment as ‘jaws of life’, which is a registered trade mark for the Hurst products.
Is that reference really that important???? Who cares!
If you owned the trade mark you’d understand – it’s a legal point and a matter of respect to the person who invented this kind of equipment nearly 50 years ago.
The late George Hurst (best known for Hurst shifters) pioneered the Jaws Of Life in the early 1960s after realising that existing rescue methods were inefficient and threatened the lives of crash victims. The name belongs to his products, not copies cashing in on his work. OK?
You’re his descendant? Otherwise, no one really cares of the name. People only care that it works.
George is dead. Doesn’t matter.