Id like to take a minute to talk to you about something you really dont hear much about. As firefighters, we have to perform our best in extremely hazardous and dangerous conditions. If you play the game long enough, sooner or later youre going to suffer some type of injury. Its just the nature of the beast. Ive definitely had my share in the 15 years Ive been a firefighter. From minor burns, to sprained knees, to torn tendons, Ive experienced it all. For the most part, Ive just kept plowing through the pain and injury doing what we do. That all changed on May 24 of this year. For the most part, it was just a routine Saturday at the firehouse. Started the shift off with radio check at the start of the shift at 7am, followed by rig inventory, checking personal gear and airpacks, then running all power equipment - vent saw, chainsaw, K-12, Hurst tool power plant, positive pressure fan (we call them smoke ejectors here in the south), flipping the switch for the PTO generator to be sure all high intensity scene lights are operational and checking to be sure theres power to each built in outlet on the rig. After that it was my daily routine of climbing up in the bucket for my usual 360 degree morning view of the city from 100 in the air. The aerial performed flawlessly as usual, so I sat it down about a foot above the ground to do my usual cable, pulley, and rung inspection. All good. Gave the rig a good washing and drying, then backed her back in the hole to await our first call of the shift. It had been a typical shift for my rig, Truck 41. A few alarm activations where we were turned around in route before arriving on scene, a pot on the stove, a concerned citizens calling dispatch to report smoke coming from a house, the homeowner freaking out when the DC SUV, 2 Pumpers, and my rig show up, lights flashing and Q2 sirens wailing, all because hes BBQing in his backyard while enjoying a few cold ones. Later that afternoon about 4:45, we got dispatched for a structure fire. DC 4, Engine 40, Engine 20, Truck 41 (DC4 and E40 are stationed at my house, along with my rig). I was upstairs, so I decided to hit the pole as I had done so many times before in my 15 year career. It was all routine, up until my feet hit the round foam pad at the base of the pole on the Engine bay floor. When my feet hit the floor, the pad spun, taking my feet out from under me. I instinctively held on to the pole with my right arm while extending my left arm behind me to help brace my fall and to keep my head from slamming against the floor. When my weight transferred to my fully extended left arm, I felt something in it let go. I laid on the floor, laughing at myself for a few brief seconds and thanking God that no one saw me, so I wouldnt have to worry about being the punchline of every joke and jab for the rest of the shift (and the next several to follow for that matter). My shoulder hurting me something terrible, I jumped up, climbed on my rig, and once my crew was ready and seatbelted, I pulled out of the bay and headed to our dispatched address. DC4 had been in territory prior to the call coming in, so they were on scene in less than a minute and determined it was a false alarm and turned us around. After returning to the house, I grabbed some ice from the ice machine, a towel, and went to my room to lay down and ice my shoulder. After 30 min, the pain hadnt eased any so I took some ibuprofen, and after an hour, iced it again. By radio check at 7pm, it wasnt getting better so I had no choice to tell the chief and the rest of my brothers at my house about my incident. He and my Captain filled out the proper paperwork, and DC4 took me to the ER where my wife met me. I was x-rayed and diagnosed with a dislocated shoulder and sent home from the ER to follow up with an orthopedic dr. After a few weeks, more x-rays, and an MRI, I found out that I had torn my labram in my left shoulder in half during my fall. After waiting on workers comp to approve anything, I had surgery on July 24 to install 3 anchors into my shoulder to put it all back together as well as him scraping the bone and tissue with what looked like a Dremmel tool to me, to try and get the rest of the tissue that pulled away from the bone to bond back together. I just started physical therapy this past week, and just the simple things they have me doing with nothing but gravity pulling the weight of my arm down has me almost at my breaking point. Im going to do my best to update my progress over the next several months with post and pics. If anyone has any experiences with injury and recovery theyd like to share, wed love to hear about it! - Chris
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 15:35:15 +0000
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