Date of Incident:
08/21/2014
People Involved in Providing Assistance to Incident:
- Slade Rauch – Fire Chief
- Ken Richards – Lieutenant
- Sam Snyder – Lieutenant/EMT
- John Tigue – Fire Fighter
- Brett Bodwalk – Fire Fighter
- Jason Embee – Fire Fighter
- Brian Hooper – Fire Fighter
- Kevin Richards – Fire Fighter/EMT
- Nathan Yerges – Fire Fighter
- Michael Kost – Fire Fighter/EMT
- Shawn Ryman – Fire Fighter
- Kevin Buss – Deputy Chief
- Patrick Genetti – Deputy Chief
- Duane Hildebrand – Fire Chief/EMT
- Lauren Hoffman – Fire Fighter/EMT
Description of Incident:
Sugarloaf Fire and EMS had a tractor trailer roll over down a 100-150 foot cliff off of Interstate 80 in Luzerne County. Sugarloaf OIC called for Berwick R122 after getting the report of this crash being witnessed. Both rescues and crews worked together with ropes and the tow operator to stabilized this truck witch was about 20-30 feet from a 6-8 foot deep creek. By the time Berwick R122 arrived on scene Sugarloaf already had two of their crew over the edge with two ropes in service. Berwick R122 got out the stokes and the Rope Rescue System that Amkus came out with a few years ago and placed it in service with the stokes. Four more Crew members went over the edge on rope lines and the one rope line was the stokes on the Rope Rescue System. After a long 2-3 extrications with being on ropes and cutting down a lot of trees that fell on the cab of the truck the driver was placed in a harness and pulled out of the truck. The 6 crew members that where on ropes at the crash sit then placed this Driver in the Stokes and secured in it. At this time the command was given to the top of the cliff for the Rope Rescue System to start pulling up. The Patient in the stokes and 4 crew members hooked into the stokes for the ascend up. At this time the patient and the 4 crew members where on the Rope Rescue System witch had about 1200 LBS of weight on the system. This worked with no problems. The patient was hauled up to the top where EMS and Medivac Crew awaited. This patient was flown to a Trauma 1 Hospital for evaluation and later the next day the patient was released.