Well Ladies and Gentlemen.. its getting to be that time of year again where the weather is warm, and people done lose their minds with spring fever.. People are burning brush piles and debris from the fall and winter without regurds to wether conditions.. Which causes grass fires and wild land fires... Fire fighters get too involved in what they are doing, or they think im fine.. i dont need to take a break... Which causes them to get overheated and develope heat stroke and or heat exhaustion... thats where team work comes into play... Everyone watching out for our fellow firefighters.. Heat Emergencies are a cause of Cardiac Arrest on fire scenes along with being out of shape.. Drink lots of water also while your fighting the fire grass fire, brush fires, and wild land fires.. Staying propperly hydrated will help prevent Heat stroke or Heat exhaustion.. And most importantly, take breaks and cool off to help prevent a heat emergencies... For those who are FF/EMTS on the front line fighting the fire, lets keep an eye on our fellow fire fighters and try to catch our fellow fire fighters befor they get heat stroke or heat exhaution and a trip to the hospital...

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Bumped - because this is important people!
I thought - and maybe I am wrong - that you are only supposed to use icepacks in the armpits and groin if the person is conscious...and you aren't supposed to do that if unconscious....Right?
An idea that was pretty cool from a recent grass/hay barn fire...Place a full case of water into one of the full porta-tanks to keep the water cool. Then whenever a unit comes in to fill with water or personnel go to the engine for a break the cold water is readily available.

Gopher
We haul our structure gear with us to every wildfire for two reasons. If we end up with a structure involved and for the fires that continue into the night. It can get quite cold overnight. Depending on what my position on the truck is there are sometimes that I do wear my structure pants with the wildland coat because in our area we have mesquite and cactus that readily go through the lightweight wildland pants. I should mention that we ride on our brush trucks and most of the time do not have to walk very far. But we do hydrate plenty. I try to push as much water to the rest of the crew as I can.

Gopher
That sounds a good idea to me! The 'experts' tell us that it is better to drink water that's at air temperature, as the body is supposed to be able to absorb it better. Maybe, but I don't find warm water at all refreshing! I drink a lot of water at incidents, especially long running wildfires, but the chilled softdrink later is the only one that comes near to refreshing...
Tony P.. one problem with drinking water that is cold, is that the water could be too cold, and throw the heart into an irregular rythem for those who are starting to show signs of heat emergencies.... which is not a good thing.. my medic chief informed me of that it is better to drink cool water,, not cold water... i think i would have to disagree with drinking cold water when your in rehab if u are over heated.. better to drink air temp or cool water just to get cooled off first befor drinking cold water..

Also in ohio, an ems must be on every fire scene.. its for the fire fighters own protection..

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