Medics train on patient extraction procedures

KHOWST PROVINCE, Afghanistan – It’s 10 a.m. on the flight line at Forward Operating Base Salerno. All you can hear is the sound of a UH-60 Black Hawk‘s rotor blades winding down on one of three designated MEDEVAC parking pads.

Two pads down, more than 20 combat-ready 25th Infantry Division Soldiers from Task Force Spartan are receiving medical evacuation training.

Medics from F Company, 5-159th, also known as “Devil Ray DUSTOFF,” an Army Reserve MEDEVAC Company with Task Force Wolfpack, are teaching patient extraction and patient “hot” loading or unloading.

“Hot loading” a patient is common in a combat zone, where it’s too dangerous to shut down a helicopter to load patients. During a “hot load,” patients are brought on board with the blades still spinning.

“They will learn how to approach helicopters, and it teaches them how to load injured Soldiers onto the helicopter,” said U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Kenneth Griffin of Orlando, Fla., a flight medic with Task Force Wolfpack. “It helps the MEDEVAC team to evacuate the patient quicker.”

Griffin stands near the helicopter as the rotor blades spin, waving Soldiers forward as they carry a simulated patient on a litter. He’s ensuring they properly load and unload medical evacuation patients in a “hot” situation, which occurs while the blades are moving.

Just far enough away so the instructor can be heard, the remaining Soldiers learn to use extraction equipment.

“It’s to save the lives of these Soldiers,” said Sgt. 1st Class Jesse Burleigh, of Fort Richardson, Alaska.

The Devil Rays also taught them how to use hydraulic rescue tools to free people from mangled vehicles.

The spreader is a hydraulic tool designed to be inserted into a narrow gap between two vehicle panels. When the tool is operated the arms are opened, it pushes apart the metal in the panels allowing access to a person trapped inside.

Sgt. Ed Bader of Tarpon Springs, Fla., a flight medic with Task Force Wolfpack, demonstrates the power of the spreader on a concrete barrier. He places the tip of the tool between the ground and the barrier to lift it from the dirt. The power of this tool comes from the hydraulic pressure that separates the arms of the spreader.

Bader then demonstrates how to use the cutter. These are most commonly used to cut through a vehicle’s structure in an extraction operation.

The Soldiers watch while Bader uses the cutter to slice through a 3/4 inch-thick piece of steel reinforcement bar. It’s not much of a challenge for the machine.

Soldiers get to practice with these tools and realize that although they do most of the job, it’s no easy task without proper training.

“During the real thing, there’s a whole bag of stressors,” said Bader. “What makes the task hard for Soldiers is when they don’t have the experience and time to be comfortable and proficient.”