clothes as quickly as possible. todd is winded, but his airway is clear. major albers assists with one of the other firefighters who also fell into the freezing water. miraculously, there are no serious injuries that day. it was a group effort. if they wasn t able to hold on to him on that bridge, we would have been downstream looking for the fireman. georgetown first responders transform luck from this bad day into improvements for future swift water rescues. the hope is that they ll be able to rely less on luck and more on preparedness. we ve learned a lot from the 95 event to where we re not wearing our turnout gear, and we re wearing life vests and we have a swift water team that is on standby for us. they ll be ready if babbling leavenworth creek ever decides to rage again.
while the force of the stream is crushing his chest against the bridge, the melt water s temperature is just above freezing, sapping whatever energy todd has left. responding to a call from another firefighter, sheriff major rick albers arrives on scene. the officer has just recently completed swift water rescue training. from my experience in training in swift water rescue, he wasn t going to be able to be pulled out just by his arms. they would had to have almost get him in half to get him up from that position. myself and a sheriff s deputy determined the only way we were going to get him out of the water was to pull him back upstream, away from the bridge, to get him out, because it was not working, trying to pull him straight up. on bunker pants, they have suspenders that go up, and i was able to feel down his
the runoff on this particular day. but while sandbagging, three firefighters slip in. one who manages to hold on to a short brick wall is pulled to safety. a second, wearing a baseball hat, is also rescued by his colleagues. can you kick? but a third, todd neskiss is not so lucky. he s stuck on the bridge and no one is able to pull him up out of the powerful current. his legs catch under the bridge kind of like this, and his upper body is against this bridge and the water coming against his back is wanting to pull him under the bridge. he was starting to slip under the bridge and his head was going underwater. we re trying to pull him straight up, and it really wasn t working. the physics of that. his boots were full of water and his turnout pants were full of water and that was helping to hold him down. so it was very heavy, trying to pull him out.
hypothermia and water in his lungs. the team removes his cold, wet clothes as quickly as possible. todd is winded, but his airway is clear. major albers assists with one of the other firefighters who also fell into the freezing water. miraculously, there are no serious injuries that day. it was a group effort. if they wasn t able to hold on to him on that bridge, we would have been downstream looking for the fireman. georgetown first responders transform luck from this bad day into improvements for future swift water rescues. the hope is that they ll be able to rely less on luck and more on preparedness. we ve learned a lot from the 95 event, to we re not wearing our turnout gear and we re wearing life vests and we have a swift water team that is on standby for us. they ll be ready if babbling
thunderstorm, who increased the runoff on this particular day. but while sandbagging, three firefighters slip in. one who manages to hold on to a short brick wall is pulled to safety. a second, wearing a baseball hat, is also rescued by his colleagues. can you kick? but a third, todd neskiss is not so lucky. he s stuck on the bridge and no one is able to pull him up out of the powerful current. his legs catch under the bridge kind of like this, and his upper body is against this bridge and the water coming against his back is wanting to pull him under the bridge. he was starting to slip under the bridge and his head was going underwater. we re trying to pull him straight up, and it really wasn t working. the physics of that. his boots were full of water and his turnout pants were full of water and that was helping to hold him down.