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Search-and-rescue volunteers, dispatchers and county EMS outline response to silo explosion and recent MCIs
Summary
Volunteers and county emergency officials described two recent major incidents — a technical rescue at Camden Hill State Park and a silo explosion at Robins Lumber — and urged a countywide accountability system after dispatch and crews were heavily taxed during mass-casualty events.
Noah Rouso, a member of Kosa Mountain Search and Rescue, told the Knox County commission and budget committee on May 28 that volunteers helped carry an injured hiker from Camden Hill State Park in a technical, four-hour extraction that required ropes and a litter. "We eventually arrived there ... it was roughly four hours after the call came in that we got her safely loaded in the ambulance to the bottom of the hill," Rouso said.
Jessica, director of the regional communications center (RCC) for Knox County, described two recent mass-casualty incidents that together stretched dispatch capacity. She said a May 2 crash in St. George required multiple ambulances and that, during a three-hour response, "those two dispatchers in that room fielded 452 transmissions between the radios and the phones." She told the committee that telematics/autorecording and simultaneous incoming calls complicated the ability to reach callers and required rapid coordination with emergency rooms and mutual-aid responders.
Rouso and other volunteer and municipal firefighters later described the Robins Lumber response, where a silo exploded and created a "wall of fire" that damaged apparatus and buildings and burned responders. Rouso said crews at the scene had to change extraction routes, use ropes in multiple spots to lower a litter, and that some first responders were burned but walking after the explosion.
Bob Kums, the county's fire and EMS coordinator, who responded to the incident, said establishing a clear on-scene command and an accountability system was a priority for the county going forward. "We're really going to ramp up our accountability system," Kums said, explaining the county will implement a standardized tagging and personnel-location program so every responding department uses the same process and tags.
Committee members thanked presenters and said lessons from the incidents should inform next year's budget requests for equipment, training and staffing. The county did not adopt any immediate policy changes during the meeting, but officials signaled they will develop a countywide accountability program and revisit resource allocations in the next budget cycle.
