EMS Field Communications

Fire and EMS radio frequencies tended to become overloaded with traffic. Motorola offered additional radios, batteries, and special equipment (Eisner, 1992). The Los Angeles County Fire Department does not communicate with private ambulances on a day to day basis in the field. In this case they had to use an ambulance radio to communicate with other ambulances. Hand signals were used on scene. The amount of time that it took to type in a message and confusion at the scene; made it impossible to use fire engine computer terminals. Also, E-mail traffic backed up creating information overload. Once law enforcement protection was provided, communication with the law enforcement officer was a big problem. EMS and firefighters use different radio frequencies from LAPD. The LA County Fire Medical Director requested that base hospital contact be suspended late Wednesday night (Pratt, 1992). This was approved for all units working in the affected riot area by the EMS Medical Director on April 30 at 9:30 AM. This meant that a paramedic did not have to contact their base station for certain medical care instructions or to find a patient transport destination. Base hospital contact requirements were reinstated at 8:00 PM on Saturday (Chaffin, 1992). Interestingly, when asked if they had been directed to use communication failure protocols, only 34% of the EMTs reported that they had received such orders, 65% said that they hadn't. All Los Angeles City Fire personnel were notified by teletype, radio, or in person (Cowen, 1993). Pacific telephone gave LA City Fire Department 20 portable cellular Phones already programmed for immediate use (Eisner, 1992). Cellular telephones worked, but it took many dealings -- sometimes as many as 20 or 30 -- to achieve a connection. Regular telephones lines were swamped. It was very difficult to call out from the EOC and satellite command posts. Information is at a premium during a disaster. EMTs rated the amount of information that they had received about various critical concerns and issues. Table 19 reports this data. In almost all cases EMTS, in their opinion did not have enough information about various aspects of the disturbance. In terms of their immediate responsibilities, 79% would have liked more information about safe transport routes. They were about evenly divided on the amount of information available about hospital status. Other responders provided most of the information, followed by EMS radios, commercial radio, and television. Obtaining information about the status of the entire event was also a problem for LAPD and the City's EOC (Webster, 1992, p. 70). A substantial number (60%) of survey respondents indicated that they did not have enough information on the status of relatives and friends. Families were under considerable stress as they watched their relatives fight fires or make rescues in the middle of the civil disturbance. It was probably quite important for them to know if their relative was safe (Asken, 1992).

Medical Care for the Injured

Continue to Medical Equipment Resupply

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