By Tom Vines

On Oct. 17, southwestern Kentucky firefighters responded to a bizarre incident that eventually required a complex high-angle rope rescue.

Initial Response
The response was activated in the early morning hours with a 911 cell phone call to the Hopkins Country (Ky.) Central Dispatch. At 0112 HRS, the call was relayed to the Dawson Springs (Ky.) Police Dispatch. The caller reported that someone had fallen from an abandoned coal chute adjacent to railroad tracks on the south side of Dawson Springs.

The first unit, dispatched at 0119 HRS, was from the Dawson Springs Police Department. At 0122 HRS, the Dawson Springs Fire Department dispatched Squad 3, Engine 8 and Ranger 1 (a Polaris 6 x 6 ATV). At approximately the same time, Medical Center Ambulance Care 2 (a private ALS unit) also responded. Shortly thereafter, Engine 7 and the Dawson Springs Emergency Squad also responded.

A few minutes later, the first units arrived at the railroad tracks at the end of South Parker Street in Dawson Springs; this area was set up as the staging area. The accident site was inaccessible by road, so the responders had to load their gear on ATVs and ride the Paducah and Louisville Railroad (a regional carrier) tracks for about a half-mile to access the scene. Dawson Springs contacted the railroad dispatcher to request they hold all trains through the area for the duration of the rescue.

At 0137 HRS, Dawson Springs requested mutual aid from the Princeton Fire Department, which is about 12 miles from Dawson Springs. The Princeton Fire Department dispatched Heavy-Rescue Truck 1, a command vehicle; Ladder 2, an aerial truck; and a Polaris Ranger 6-wheel transported on a trailer towed by the department’s F-350 pickup. Princeton’s Truck 1 and Ranger arrived at the staging area at 0200 HRS.

The Incident Scene
When personnel arrived at the accident site, the area was extremely dark. Initially, all they could see was the concrete and steel structure, an abandoned facility about 80 feet high that was once used for storing coal and loading it into rail cars via two large chutes positioned partway up the structure. The Police Department had arrived on scene first and now had a male subject on the ground, handcuffed and under arrest for intoxication and disorderly conduct. There was a second male subject on the top of the structure, somewhat agitated and yelling for the responders to hurry up.

After a bit of information gathering, responders were able to piece together what had happened. Earlier that night, three men, ages 30 to 44, had climbed to the top of the structure, bringing along a cooler and a Coleman lantern. Once on the top, they had built a campfire.

At some point during the night, one of the men on the roof had suddenly disappeared from sight. In the dark, the man’s two companions thought he had fallen off the edge the building. Panicked, one companion quickly climbed down to the ground to look for him. When he could not find the man, he used his cell phone to call 911.
What had actually occurred was that the individual had fallen through an opening in the roof. After falling vertically about 25 feet, he hit one of the coal chutes and slid down its 60-degree slope for another 25 feet. The chute was designed to dump coal above the tracks through an opening about 4' x 3'. Fortunately for the individual, the opening to the outside was blocked by debris, which stopped him. Otherwise, he likely would have gone through the opening and fallen the additional 30 feet to the ground.

The Rescue
Once the firefighters realized that the man was inside the structure, they began devising a plan to evaluate his injuries and identify the best strategy for extrication. The debris blocking the outside opening that had possibly saved the patient’s life also complicated the extrication effort, preventing responders from bringing the patient down by ladder from the exit hole. The rescuers determined that they would have to approach the patient the same way he had fallen—up to the roof of the structure via a 5' x 5' shaft with metal rungs, down through the opening on the roof, and down the chute.

Before entering any space in the structure, the rescuers used a gas meter to check for airborne hazards. Readings were in the normal range, so they climbed to the top using the metal rungs set in concrete to the top, taking with them 200' lengths of low stretch kermantle rope to initially use as handline and safety lines.
Once they made patient contact, the responders found him conscious, alert and oriented, and complaining of rib pain. His only obvious injuries were multiple abrasions of hands, elbows and knees.

On the roof of the structure, responders lowered a rope to the bottom of the access shaft and hauled up the needed gear. They lowered a LSP Half Back, rigged with a spreader bar to immobilize the patient in the confined space. The rigging team initially considered hauling with a pre-rigged 4:1 MA system, but there were no anchor points for a high directional. Also, the patient was able to help maneuver himself in the space, so they decided to attach a travelling pulley to the Half Back, resulting in a theoretical 2:1 MA haul. For an anchor, they padded a structural beam with fire hose, and then rigged a wrap 3, pull 2 with 1" tubular webbing on the beam.

Once they had the patient to the top, the rescuers prepared to lower him from the roof to the ground, because there was no exit from the interior position to the outside. They attached another wrap 3, pull 2 with a brake bar rack to another steel beam, padded with hose as before, and used this to lower the patient.

Once on the ground, the patient refused to be immobilized with a backboard and C-collar. He did agree to be transported, so he sat on the Ranger and was driven to the staging area, where he was placed in the ambulance and then transported to Regional Medical Center in Madisonville, Ky., about 29 miles away.
All units cleared the scene at 0447 HRS.

Sources: Dawson Springs Fire Capt. Stacey Grable; Princeton Fire Chief Brent Francis; and Lieutenant John Griffin, City of Worcester (Mass.) Fire Department provided information for this report. Some additional details were taken from an account of the incident in The Times-Leader.

Lessons Learned/Lessons Reinforced
Capt. Grable says that the department had been in the process of applying for a grant to purchase equipment. They had not initially planned on purchasing high-angle rope rescue equipment, but they have since changed the grant application to include high-angle gear. Chief Grable says it’s important to know what personnel and equipment resources are available in your area, and to call for mutual aid for those resources as soon as possible; otherwise, there may delay in the operation.

Lt. John Griffin, City of Worcester Fire Department, had been in the Princeton area conducting a rescue course at a local industry, and agreed to assist in the technical aspects of the operation. He noted that he was very impressed with the working relationship of the two local departments and how well they melded their units into one operation. He said that there was a basic, practical approach to the operation, with everyone trying to keep things as simple as possible, and this helped the operation run smoothly.

Rescue Editor Tom Vines is the co-author of “High Angle Rescue Techniques” and “Confined Space and Structural Rope Rescue.” He operates a rope-rescue consulting group in Red Lodge, Mont.

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