Aftermath

I drove by the house this morning on the way in to work.

I’d driven by the house before, my wife and I had walked the dogs past it before, and I’d admired the landscaping before. I think I wanted a different memory than that of the house burning and those kids in the street. Scene tape is up all around and the investigation is still underway, but things are calm now. I don’t talk about that morning to people. My wife and I don’t talk about it to each other. Other people don’t understand. I took my wife to see her podiatrist yesterday. He knew we were from Gearhart and eventually he had to ask, “so that plane crash was right where you live, huh?”

“Yeah, I was there. I don’t want to talk about it.” That was it. I don’t want to be rude to people, but I don’t want to share details either.

I’ll write about it though. I think it’s because I’m doing it on my own terms, no one is asking the questions. I’m able to share the details that I want to share and no one is pressing for anything else. That’s comforting to me.

*****

There has been some criticism towards our local dispatch center following the plane crash and I want to stand up for them. Our south county dispatch center fields 911 calls for 3 police departments and 4 fire departments. At the time of the accident, only one dispatcher was on shift, as usual for that time of morning.

Several local people have had concerns about unanswered 911 calls after the crash, or calls that took too long to answer. The single dispatcher fielded 32 911 calls in 4 and a half minutes. The initial fire dispatch occurred 18 seconds after the second 911 call was received (the second call provided a rough location, the first apparently did not).

Per protocol, the dispatcher toned the fire department and dispatched the alarm before fielding the additional incoming 911 calls. During this 4 and a half minute time frame, the dispatcher also managed to contact her dispatch supervisor at home to request assistance in the dispatch center.

I think our dispatcher should be applauded and commended for handling such a difficult event so professionally and efficiently.

*****

Trauma counselors from the county and Red Cross have been in the area the last few days to counsel the firemen, family, and community members. I was invited (as all responders were) to the initial counseling session Monday afternoon and all following sessions. I’ve attended trauma counseling sessions before and they’ve helped, but I think doing what I’m doing right now, writing about how I feel, does so much more for me.

Seeing my brother firefighters that morning, the sadness and solemness in their eyes, I’m so grateful to know that they are getting the counseling they need. I left the scene before the body recovery began—I had a busy morning ahead of me on shift, they needed me in at work. I know the guys that carried those three kids out, most of them have families, young kids of their own. I can see in their faces and hear in their voices how this is hurting them right now. I’m grateful to know that we’re taking care of our own right now.

*****

After I got on shift that morning, I transported one of the survivors from the hospital to the airport to meet an air ambulance crew. She was going to the Oregon Burn Center for specialized care.

The tragic irony didn’t escape me, though. The helicopters couldn’t land at the hospital because the weather conditions were too poor. Now, this little girl whose life had been changed forever, was now going to fly to Portland in the same conditions that may have contributed to her tragedy.

I was so saddened and bothered by that notion, and I could only wonder how she felt. Or if she was even in a state to understand what had happened and what was happening to her right then.

But I felt a sense of fulfillment from being able to help her, even in the small way of transporting her from one place to another. I felt like I had done something good that morning.

*****

I wrote before how I wished I had been wearing my turnouts that morning and not my white button down. I’m not sure that’s really true. I don’t envy the firemen that were there.

I don’t envy any of us. I am exceptionally proud of every one of them though. Every fireman there (with the exception of a handful of paid chief officers) were volunteers. And every fireman that helped to carry the last three children out volunteered to do it—volunteers of the volunteers. No one deserves my respect more right now.

The house after the fire had been knocked down.

*****

As I drove by this morning, neighbors had set their trash cans and recycling out. Others were out walking their dogs, coffee cups in hand. Traffic on Marion had increased, as you would expect. The house is such a tragically awesome site and a large memorial has developed: flowers, candles, and balloons all along the long stone wall.

I guess it’s a sense of curiosity that brings people to the house, to leave their memorials, the same sense of curiosity that drives people to ask “what was it like?” Sometimes I feel guilty about how my emotions surround the accident. I was in the shower when the explosion occurred, I wasn’t even sure what had happened. I was only on scene for 45 minutes, didn’t taken part in suppression or recovery operations. I only assisted briefly in patient care, helping to get them packaged and transported.

Sometimes it feels like I didn’t do enough, like I didn’t have an opportunity to do enough.

Decimation and Shock

A plane crashed into a beachfront home 4 blocks from my house this morning.

I was in the shower, getting ready for work when I felt something shake the house. Initially, I thought that Boomer had knocked something over upstairs—we have thin floors and walls and little things often sound very big. But Meghan began knocking on the bathroom door when I turned the shower off and I knew something wasn’t right.

“Was there an earthquake?” she asks.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Well, I heard a loud bang, the house shook, and then I heard a lot of sirens.”

“Probably just a bad car wreck, then, “ I reply. We’re only a couple blocks from the highway, and right behind the Gearhart fire station. “Let me get dressed and I’ll turn the radio on.”

Half dressed in my uniform, hair still wet, and plodding out of the bathroom in my crocs, I turn my portable radio on.

“… 3148 responding to Gearhart.”

“48 from Command, come straight in to the scene. We’re gonna need your elevated stream.”

I’m a little disappointed at hearing this, I’m missing another fire because of work. “Just a big fire,” I tell my wife. “Probably some type of construction accident.” We’ve had those before, explosions, BLEVEs, and the rare natural gas leak gone boom. I tell her it’s no big deal, to go back to bed.

But I dress a little quicker now, I’m thinking I’ll swing by the fire station on the way into work and see how things are going. I’m half listening to the radio as I button up my uniform shirt. I start to hear third alarm units going on the air, engine and ladder companies coming in from the other side of the county.

Then I hear it—

“…Medcomm, Medic 4. Fire reports three burn patients. Requesting a second ambulance.”

Shit. I’m at high speed now, grabbing my boots, cell phone, work vest, and ball hat. I kiss my wife quickly and tell her I’m going to head up to the scene and lend a hand until the second unit arrives.

I drive two blocks west and park on Marion, out of the way of incoming fire and police vehicles. Three blocks down, I see flames shooting above the trees, grey-brown smoke rolling upwards, and what remains of a house, laying on its foundation.

I grab my stethoscope and head off at a dead sprint up the road. All of town is out here to see what’s going on: couples in pajamas, or early risers out walking their dogs. Police haven’t even set up a perimeter yet. I jog up to the command officer as firefighters are pulling lines around me. The ladder from 3148 is up and they’re getting ready to flow water on the flaming pile of debris.

“Joey, where do you need me?” He points another half block up where the Medic unit is parked. I see three people lying on the ground, covered up to the necks with blankets, with bystanders all around them. I see one of our company EMTs. “Who’s in charge?”

It’s one of our new paramedics that he points to, and she looks a little overwhelmed. “Michelle, what can I do to help you?” Right away she starts giving instructions. She plans on taking the first two patients—children—and the next arriving Medic unit can take the mother. She needs my help to get them packaged and loaded, but first she wants me to find out if the Air Ambulance was activated from Portland.

I phone dispatch, letting them know I’m on scene, and then check on the air unit. The dispatcher, a little ruffled sounding, copies that I’m on scene, but tells me she doesn’t know if the chopper's in the air. I let Michelle know and we begin to load our first patient, a young boy. His hair is singed, his legs are blistered, and his feet are cut. He tells me he had to jump from the roof.

He looked like the pictures from the text book: covered with soot, with blackened hair, and lips that were just starting to puff. But he was amazingly calm. He followed our directions, said please when he asked us for something and followed that with thank you. He was concerned about his family and my heart was going out to him. I sat with him while the cot was readied. I introduced myself, talked to him a little bit, tried to offer a comforting, older brother kind of smile. And when we loaded him into the unit and I told him that Michelle would take care of him, he almost cried. “You’re not coming with me?”

“No, I can’t. There’s others I need to help. But Michelle will take good care of you, I promise.”

Behind me, and all around me, more fire units are arriving on scene. An additional ladder company from further south, additional engines from north county. Additional chief units are also arriving and they start coordinating defensive operations. The primary house is destroyed, collapsed to its foundation, with heavy fire rolling from the debris pile. The fire has partially engulfed the neighboring homes, and the chiefs set to work on the exposure protection.

Above all of this though, I hear a father yelling, “there’s still three kids inside!” He’s standing over Michelle and I and the young boy. He’s crying, tearing at his hair, hysterical, and I feel for him. He was staying in another house, further down the block when the explosion occurred. He has no idea what’s going on, he’s only concerned about his family.

The scene is a mess. Neighbors had been the ones to render first aid to the three patients, getting them to lie down then covering them with cool blankets and bath towels. The neighbors stayed with each patient until they were loaded into each of the ambulances.

Our second Medic unit arrived, as well as the OppsChief. The MCI protocol was activated, in some ways because he was expecting three more patients. I helped to get Michelle loaded with the second child, then gave them the best directions to get themselves out of the scene that was quickly bogging down with fire apparatus. The second medic unit had their patient loaded and was pulling around now, too. The OppsChief wanted me to stay on scene with him, at least until a third unit arrived to provide standby coverage.

Scene tape was going up now as the Sherrifs worked to control and move the crowds back. The OppsChief and I turned our backs to them and walked towards the command post. I took the time now to really study the scene. Something big had happened here, enough to literally blow the house apart. Glass had been blown into and across the street. The roof of the garage, still completely intact, had been blown up, then landed upright. Walls had been blown out, and debris piled the center of the house. The back side of the house was obscured by smoke and steam.

I watched the firefighters work hoselines through the debris pile. The ladder pipe was raining down a gentle fog. Steam was billowing out through the burned out home next door. I listed to the radio chatter as additional companies arrived and received assignments or were told to stage. Trauma Intervention Counselors were requested to the scene for the family members. I was watching all of this, wishing I was in my fire turnouts, not by white button down, when I heard the OppsChief ask, “so the plane came in from the west?”

I interrupt. “Wait, what plane?”

The command officer looks at me, dumbfounded like I should already know this. “A plane crashed right into the house.”

Holy shit. I was shocked and in disbelief. A plane? I couldn’t figure out how this was possible. It had come in from the west, over the beach, and that didn’t make any sense. This was the only house hit in the impact, and that didn’t make any sense either.

Bystanders had reported seeing the plane come in very low, strike a tree, then crash into the house. A secondary explosion, the one the shook my house, occurred just moments after the initial impact. Upon really inspecting the scene, a plane door was leaning against a tree in the front yard.

Oh my god. Three kids are dead, and three more are critical because a plane crashed into their house.

The house was decimated like nothing I’d ever seen before. And as I looked around at the firemen on scene, really looked at them, I could see the same look of shock, horror, frustration, and sadness that I knew was on my face. Three kids dead in an instant from a plane that had crashed into their house.

*****

I still had to go into work and the OppsChief cleared me from the scene as the third medic unit arrived. I went home, hugged and kissed my wife, cuddled my dog for a few minutes, then grabbed my day bag and headed out the door. It was going to be a busy morning.

My first assignment coming on shift was to transport one of the burn patients from the trauma hospital to the air station, and transfer them to an air ambulance crew for her trip to the burn center.

Both children had been taken to the same hospital and both were in relatively the same condition. They both had extensive first and second degree burns, both had been sedated and intubated in the ER (to protect their airways and provide for their comfort). My patient, whom I’d seen at the scene, looked far worse than when I’d last seen her. Blisters had formed all over her face, and her skin was starting to swell. Patches on her arms were sloughing off and we had to be careful as we moved her. She was transferred to my gurney, then quickly transported to the air station where the helicopter crew was waiting for us.

We turned the patient over, then returned to the ER where the nurses there told us what a fantastic job that our crews did. All the typical high-fiving and back slapping that goes on after a “good call.” But I can’t get the image of the kids’ faces out of my mind. I just can’t believe how destroyed this family is now, how such a freak accident has decimated their lives. All I want to do right now is go home and hug my wife.

*****

This was written the evening following these events (8/4/08), however I could not post this until today. Numerous news stations covered the accident and a report can be found here.