Sorry no pictures of last night. We practiced dealing with a multiple casualties at once, prioritising who needs help first.
The three fake casualties had 3 different injuries one spinal injury, one with a severe cut and one unconscious non breathing casualty!
Not a situation I would like to be in!
Everyone got involved in dealing with one of the casualties, and I think lessons were learnt in the debrief.
Tonight is incident night at Herts Canoe Lifeguards.
Different people take it in turns to run incidents each month, once the incident is set up the unit is briefed and we deal with the incident.
Once it’s all over we debrief. I have no idea what’s going to happen tonight! I shall post later with what the exercise was! I might even attach a few pictures!
Your radio and four bum bag!
Your radio is one of the best pieces of kit we carry. Each lifeguard is issued with their own radio. There are often times when you are out of sight of your colleagues on the beach so hand signals or whistle signals don’t work! They are great tools for communicating. The only downside to them is they are not 100% waterproof! If you drop them in the drink you have to give them the kiss of life! This involves sucking all the salt water out of the speaker and the microphone, nice!
Your bum bag is another great piece of kit. It holds a small first aid kit which includes a pocket mask for using if you do resuscitation, it also hold a small notepad a pen. Jotting patient details or information about lost children can be very handy should situations become worse and you need to hand over to the emergency services.
You can hurt you back in many ways and in many places. Your back bone is something to be looked after as it caries many sensitive nerves.
If you were to hurt your back on an RNLI lifeguarded beach the likelihood is you would be placed on a spinal board.
This is a spinal board:
Being strapped to one of these boards is not the most pleasant experience (having been strapped to one in training I can vouch for this) but it is the best way of reducing all movement of the back bone.
Movement of a damaged spine can make things worse, so it’s best to stay still.
Below is a close up picture of the top section of the responder bag.
The oxygen bottle lies across the bottom of the bag, connected to a hose ready to be used.
The defib is in the top left and various oxygen administration masks are in the clear bag next to it.
All expensive, lifesaving pieces of kit.
The dates for next years RNLI Lifeguard season are out. Applications are available in December, so time to start thinking about which beach to apply for!
The new Exmouth lifeboat station will be built. Planning permission was granted last week.
More info can be found here http://exmouth-lifeboat.org.uk/
Computer generated image of the new station from http://exmouth-lifeboat.org.uk/
This is great news for Sandy Bay Lifegurds. Both the ILB and ALB will be able to get to Sandy Bay quicker!
Our winter training program is now in full swing thanks to our training officer.
Another Monday night training session tonight. This time with a bit more variety than normal. We are heading to the local swimming pool to practice rescues in a nice warm environment!
RNLI lifeguards are very lucky. We get supplied with the latest and best kit.
Below is a picture of our responder bag at Sandy Bay. This is a life saving bag.
The defib along with a Lifeguard can help sort you out, should you heart decide to have a funny turn!
The Sandy Bay defib left the bag every day this summer! Luckily only ever to be checked and it was never used in anger.
The defib is the black and orange piece of kit in the left side of the bag.
Last nights training at Herts Canoe Lifeguards was a communication exercise. We practiced radio speak whilst doing a navigation exercise, receiving instructions and scenarios over the radio.
It all got a little bit complicated at the radio control desk with various channels being used and many requests for radio checks and grid references at once!
I think the exercise was a success with many people gaining experience at using radios and using the correct procedure!
Below is a picture of the radio desk at the Blenheim Triathlon. This is where instructions to all lifeguards are issued. Things can be quite intense at the control desk but our patrol officer and his assistants do a wonderful job.
