Extrication academy prepares new firefighters to respond to motor vehicle accidents

From March 23 to 24th a group of Forest Grove and Cornelius Firefighters spent the first weekend of "spring break" learning the essential skill of what we call "vehicle extrication" during our annual Extrication Academy.  For our volunteers the training doesn't stop once you finish your initial firefighter classes.  We provide opportunities throughout the year for them to increase their awareness of things like emergency medicine and more advanced rescue techniques, and last weekend they focused on the art of cutting cars.

With Oregon Highways 6, 8, and 47 bisecting our response area we naturally respond on a considerable amount of motor vehicle crashes, so it's essential that our responders are up to speed on the modern art of safely removing injured people who are trapped inside the crunched confines of their car.  Over the weekend we worked with a number of donated cars from local towing companies and wrecking yards at the City of Cornelius Public Works yard.  We crunched the cars, flipped them over, made them impact each other, and created other real life situations that our crews have experienced or expect to respond to on our rural highways or city streets.  Lead instructor, C Shift Paramedic, Ted Penge brings decades of vehicle extraction training and experience into what he calls "The Extrication Academy" where he puts some of our newest members through the paces of reviewing how vehicles are constructed, and a variety of methods that they can use to work safely to quickly remove an injured passenger or driver from their car.  Ted worked with about a dozen students from the two fire departments preparing them to not only work as individual crews, but work together to accomplish their objectives, and to get them ready for those unfortunate motor vehicle accidents that happen in our area.