Grid Iron Emergency Medical Plans

[chawalang]

I was curious what the hive minds thoughts are on this subject. In recent conversations I have had, most venues do not take into account how to evacuate a person who has had a medical episode in a grid iron above the stage. The design of most venues, given I'm talking about older venues, can make it almost impossible for EMS to access the gridiron, get someone on a stretcher of some kind, get them down, then get them into an emergency vehicle, then to a hospital. The reality of someone getting heat stroke or having a heart attack in this area of the venue is a real possibility.

Thoughts?

 

[mrtrudeau23]

We're currently attempting to set up a site visit with our fire department to come out and visit the grid for them to see what exactly they would be dealing with in that scenario. We don't think they have ever been here for that purpose in the 40ish years of our building being in existence.

I would also be interested to hear what policies/procedures other venues have for these potential situations.

 

[jtweigandt]

I think Most mid to large size cities have technical rescue teams on the FD who train in extracting, lifting, recovering folks from all sorts of dicey situations.
So it's probably more the pervue of their team rather than your team to develop a plan based on the situation. That said, not a bad idea to interface with those folks
and see if there is indeed some sort of specialty equipment they don't have to get someone out of the grid. If there is something they need.. you could certainly participate in the
fundraising to expand their capabilities.

 

[John Palmer]

I believe that this type of rescue would be considered a "high angle rescue". It does require special training and equipment. Contact your closest fire station about a site visit.
John

 

[MNicolai]

Depends on the nature of the injury and design of the venue, but you could be looking at a high angle rescue where they'd hoist the person down on a backboard with 3-4 people topside helping with the hoist down.

This is a hard scenario to plan for. Depends who shows up to the call, if they can stabilize the person sufficiently that they can do a hoist that may take a few minutes without someone having to do render aid to keep them alive, how quickly they can bring in a technical rescue team if need be, if the person is ambulatory, if you have stair access versus ladder access, so on. Some venues have a roof hatch with a short ladder up and it may be easier to put someone on a backboard and pull them up to the roof and pick them up with a rescue helicopter than to take them down a spiral stair -- assuming the hatch isn't locked or that someone on-site has a key handy and what the response time of a helicopter may be.

There may be too many variables to have a comprehensive plan for this -- and ultimately it's a judgement call for EMS that you cannot make for them. The most important thing in this situation would be that the person who calls 911 immediately informs dispatch that a technical rescue may be necessary so those assets can be called to the site as soon as possible. You don't want to wait for EMS to show up, climb upstairs, and then make the call for those assets, several minutes after the incident started.

FWIW, this is the kind of thing that fire departments enjoy practicing for. If you ask them, they will probably happily take a tour of your venue and may be willing to use it as a training opportunity if the conditions are sufficiently different from what their own training facilities offer.

 

[Crisp image]

Depends on the nature of the injury and design of the venue, but you could be looking at a high angle rescue where they'd hoist the person down on a backboard with 3-4 people topside helping with the hoist down.

Back board? most likely not as they (well the ones we have here in Australia) are not made for lifting vertically only horizontally. Bu there are many types of stretchers that are rated for vertical lifting . As mentioned it would be a high angle rescue in this situation. Being one of the trained qualified for such things, once the team is on site the set up is quite quick and usually the wait is either stabilising the person or loading them into a stretcher. Once ready to go it can be quite quick. There are many ways to skin this cat so best to get the responsible people in to have a look.
Regards
Geoff

 

[egilson1]

Great topic. And I have opinions.

Technically you have to have a documented plan for this, as it’s considered a confined space as defined by OSHA.

 Is large enough and so configured that an employee can bodily enter and perform assigned work
 Has limited or restricted means for entry or exit (e.g., tanks, tankers, silos, storage bins, vaults and pits)
 Is not designed for continuous employee occupancy

So is calling 911 a necessity, yes. but that alone might not be enough.

 

[What Rigger?]

Great topic. And I have opinions.

Technically you have to have a documented plan for this, as it’s considered a confined space as defined by OSHA.

 Is large enough and so configured that an employee can bodily enter and perform assigned work
 Has limited or restricted means for entry or exit (e.g., tanks, tankers, silos, storage bins, vaults and pits)
 Is not designed for continuous employee occupancy

So is calling 911 a necessity, yes. but that alone might not be enough.

Let me piggy back onto what Ethan has said. Yes, the Confined Space rules apply. Yes, recovering a casualty from the grid is a very specialized rescue.
In my repeated experience, faith in the local Fired Department's rescue capabilities is greatly overestimated. "High Angle" rescue can mean a variety of things depending on how/what the local FD trains. Even the Orange County (Calif.) Urban Search & Rescue team has been thwarted a half dozen times in training exercises by my venues. A casualty needing removal from FOH catwalks took almost 5 hours, and the system that was built was directed by one of our riggers. Is your FD using industrial climbing/rescue (i.e. Rope Access), or are they trying to adapt back country techniques on the fly? Some departments will train regularly at your facility, some will not. Is management overly confident and/or lazy about "nothing's gonna happen"?

It was always pretty frustrating to watch 15 firefighters/rescue responders fail to contact the rescue dummy over 6 hours on both nights the last time I was present. Being a Rope Access guy, I couldn't even tell our FD what to do because it's a completely different set of skills and tools.

So yes, engage your local FD by all means. I don't think that's a negotiable. But train, (and get certified), in house people AND buy the gear to affect rescue in house yourselves. That doesn't mean "make up your own stuff and go sport climbing in the theater twice a year". That means looking into SPRAT or IRATA certifications and actual work at height gear for rescue. My favorite thing about Rope Access has always been the fact that if my partner or someone else on the site gets in trouble, I've got what I need to get them down and in a lot of cases it's already on me- I don't even have to go to the ground I just have to get over to them.
Bonus? You get to take boss pix like this in the training center. Leopard print kneepads and all.

Society of Professional Rope Access Technicians
Industrial Rope Access Trade Association

 

[TimMc]

Bonus? You get to take boss pix like this in the training center. Leopard print kneepads and all.
View attachment 24981

Society of Professional Rope Access Technicians
Industrial Rope Access Trade Association

You need the matching Leopard skin pill box hat... (thank you, Bob Dylan).

To the best of my knowledge, ASM Global does not have any at-height rescue plans for our PAC and rigger rescue training is done by the horizontal line inspector at the arena ASM manages here, but I've *never* seen the FD in either building do more than check fire extinguishers and blocked exits.

 

[Lasermike]

My day job is a food manufacturing plant with 10 65' outdoor silos and a refrigeration system containing over 600 pounds of ammonia.
We regularly get multiple departments , not just our local responders, using our facility as a training site. This summer, it looked like touch and go's on the roof in a tight space between a silo and the doghouse over the dumpster with the vehicles on the busy road out front. It involved both basket lifts and ladders. They may also have been using the top of the silo as a landing spot, I didn't want to get in the way.
One year, we had over 10 different responders from Woodinville to South Tacoma use our building as a training site for an ammonia spill. It was a two day exercise and everyone involved seemed to appreciate the access and experience. One department found that their fancy new wireless video system didn't work through old heavy concrete walls very well, they had to move the external antennas much closer then the spec sheet had led them to think would work.
All this is to say that I would think involving the locals beforehand is a good thing.

Michael

 

[mrtrudeau23]

Let me piggy back onto what Ethan has said. Yes, the Confined Space rules apply. Yes, recovering a casualty from the grid is a very specialized rescue.
In my repeated experience, faith in the local Fired Department's rescue capabilities is greatly overestimated. "High Angle" rescue can mean a variety of things depending on how/what the local FD trains. Even the Orange County (Calif.) Urban Search & Rescue team has been thwarted a half dozen times in training exercises by my venues. A casualty needing removal from FOH catwalks took almost 5 hours, and the system that was built was directed by one of our riggers. Is your FD using industrial climbing/rescue (i.e. Rope Access), or are they trying to adapt back country techniques on the fly? Some departments will train regularly at your facility, some will not. Is management overly confident and/or lazy about "nothing's gonna happen"?

It was always pretty frustrating to watch 15 firefighters/rescue responders fail to contact the rescue dummy over 6 hours on both nights the last time I was present. Being a Rope Access guy, I couldn't even tell our FD what to do because it's a completely different set of skills and tools.

So yes, engage your local FD by all means. I don't think that's a negotiable. But train, (and get certified), in house people AND buy the gear to affect rescue in house yourselves. That doesn't mean "make up your own stuff and go sport climbing in the theater twice a year". That means looking into SPRAT or IRATA certifications and actual work at height gear for rescue. My favorite thing about Rope Access has always been the fact that if my partner or someone else on the site gets in trouble, I've got what I need to get them down and in a lot of cases it's already on me- I don't even have to go to the ground I just have to get over to them.
Bonus? You get to take boss pix like this in the training center. Leopard print kneepads and all.
View attachment 24981

Society of Professional Rope Access Technicians
Industrial Rope Access Trade Association

Being certified to rescue someone is all well and good, but when you work for a university with a risk/safety department on campus things are very different. As part of our huge grid retrofit a couple years ago (adding necessary fall protection and bringing the entire grid up to the current OSHA standards) we got a rescue kit to use to retrieve someone if they fell while attached to an SRL. Risk came through after all this had been installed and purchased, and flat out told us they didn't want us, as the theater's staff, attempting any rescues and instead to call 911 immediately. That said, there is no way any of us would ever get certified to perform a rescue, so engaging with the FD to get them familiar with the space is really our only option.

 

[egilson1]

Being certified to rescue someone is all well and good, but when you work for a university with a risk/safety department on campus things are very different. As part of our huge grid retrofit a couple years ago (adding necessary fall protection and bringing the entire grid up to the current OSHA standards) we got a rescue kit to use to retrieve someone if they fell while attached to an SRL. Risk came through after all this had been installed and purchased, and flat out told us they didn't want us, as the theater's staff, attempting any rescues and instead to call 911 immediately. That said, there is no way any of us would ever get certified to perform a rescue, so engaging with the FD to get them familiar with the space is really our only option.

And this is in fact, a violation of OSHA law.

1910.38(e)
Training. An employer must designate and train employees to assist in a safe and orderly evacuation of other employees.

Your situation is not unique. A lot of universities do this. But it does leave them open to a lot of liability. Especially with fall rescue where the victim might not have the time to wait for an off site team, who may or may not actually be available at the time of rescue.

 

[mrtrudeau23]

And this is in fact, a violation of OSHA law.

1910.38(e)
Training. An employer must designate and train employees to assist in a safe and orderly evacuation of other employees.

Your situation is not unique. A lot of universities do this. But it does leave them open to a lot of liability. Especially with fall rescue where the victim might not have the time to wait for an off site team, who may or may not actually be available at the time of rescue.

I'm not saying that I agree with that directive at all. I agree that getting someone out of a harness after a fall ASAP is imperative (just as the university's fall training session told us). Just pointing out that university politics could be interesting with regards to this sort of thing.

 

[TimMc]

I'm not saying that I agree with that directive at all. I agree that getting someone out of a harness after a fall ASAP is imperative (just as the university's fall training session told us). Just pointing out that university politics could be interesting with regards to this sort of thing.

This is why we have unions.

 

[Crisp image]

Oh don't get me started about university rules. We have a fire alarm go off quite often (because they don't isolate everything they need to) and then the university security turn up before the fire brigade and order us to evacuate. If I can find the detector before they arrive and deem it to be safe I will not evacuate the building. We have had many stand offs with security who say you need to evac and we reply we are the building wardens we will make that decision. If we cant find the detector then we will evac.
Now if someone is suspended a fall arrest harness then and if I have the equipment to start the rescue procedure I will do that because we all know we need to get them to a safe place ASAP and if the fire brigade are delayed or take some time to get there (I think in our case it is 12 min) a person suspended in the harness is not going to be well.

 

[What Rigger?]

Being certified to rescue someone is all well and good, but when you work for a university with a risk/safety department on campus things are very different. As part of our huge grid retrofit a couple years ago (adding necessary fall protection and bringing the entire grid up to the current OSHA standards) we got a rescue kit to use to retrieve someone if they fell while attached to an SRL. Risk came through after all this had been installed and purchased, and flat out told us they didn't want us, as the theater's staff, attempting any rescues and instead to call 911 immediately. That said, there is no way any of us would ever get certified to perform a rescue, so engaging with the FD to get them familiar with the space is really our only option.

That is a bummer of an attitude for your Safety folks to have. That seems like they are ignoring/unaware of the risks of someone being suspended for more than a few minutes. Do they at least allow your harnesses to have relief steps?

 

[egilson1]

I'm not saying that I agree with that directive at all. I agree that getting someone out of a harness after a fall ASAP is imperative (just as the university's fall training session told us). Just pointing out that university politics could be interesting with regards to this sort of thing.

Agreed.

I just went through this with a university and once we showed that specific line to the health and safety person the tune started to change. Slowly.

 

[TimMc]

Agreed.

I just went through this with a university and once we showed that specific line to the health and safety person the tune started to change. Slowly.

Dead workers, OSHA fines, and lawsuits from surviving family tend to speed up the process. Tis a pity it has to go that far before brasshats are able to learn.

 

[danTt]

Dead workers, OSHA fines, and lawsuits from surviving family tend to speed up the process. Tis a pity it has to go that far before brasshats are able to learn.

It's both sides though--right? Tell a Scenic design adjunct doubling as a TD trippling as a sound instructor that they're also responsible for Rope access life saving techniques is quite a bit. I think there certainly needs to be a plan, but I'm not sure the immediate/proper answer should be an in-house one, for the same reasons we don't suggest letting in-house people fly performers. I agree that The "What happens if something goes wrong" question to harnesses certainly needs to be much more commonly asked (and answered) in this industry though--harnesses are a step in the process, but the plan can't stop there.

 

[egilson1]

Not directed an anyone specific, BUT....

It's simple. IF an employer puts someone at risk, they must mitigate that risk. A person in a harness suspended in the air is a significant risk. Do you require people who might cut themselves with a saw to bleed out while they wait for first responders? I would assume not. The legal responsibility is the same.