SA Firefighter

Time for a very big overhaul of call taking/paging/contacting other services,someone is going to get hurt or killed if they keep playing this silly game.Time delays in paging other services is taking too long,we had a MVA Sunday I did not go but when I looked on the pager site from the time SAAS paged  and from the time we where paged was a 9 min delay......There are a lot of issues with the dispatching and only one person can fix it....

hear hear!

the new coroner isn't afraid to get his teeth stuck into anything, and while I'd like to say it'd be one of the various service's managers or CEO/commissioners, the cynic in me backs it being Mr Johns hammering it home with a dirty big nail!

of late- being despatched to VA's in metro - It's usually a repetitive call for MFS attendance - because it doesn't happen initially.  Granted, a majority of the VA's we attend in metro are so minor that not even a clean-up is neededand SAMFS aren't required, but the one we do go to that fire cover is really needed will be the one that lands on the coroners desk first.

cutting down verbose S/Os who waffle their sitreps and stop messages with unnecessary detail, cutting down radio traffic. This should also allow the radio operator to respond quicker to CFS radio traffic on other talkgroups, so we benefit too.

now if only you could try and extend this to every other agency - life with GRN would be much more palatable!!

ok thanks - still SAAS comcen still playing by a different set of rules?

given the relative anonymity this forum provides (for me and you lot anyway - I'm just a lowly paramedic working in the city) - I'm thinking that it could be a fair assumption on my part to think that the average firey considers SAAS comms a bit of a joke?

please be honest - it's always interesting to know what other services think!

Quote from: mack on November 20, 2007, 06:32:20 AM

aaah but surely 'civvys' as you call them... are the way to go.

that way they dont let personal experience or knowledge get in the way of enforcing procedures...

Nothing to do with procedures.  It's about price. 
People who actually know their stuff cost more than people who don't. 
And they are a lot harder to bully into cooperation with management
targets vs. core business.

Sad thing is that it more-or-less works for a while. Just long enough
for the manglers who introduce the system to collect their bonusses
& bolt. Then the wheels fall off.  Who here can spell "Intergraph"?

spoken like a true veteran SCK - and Mack like a true manager!!

why do you think banks have sent their call-centres off-shore? 

Saw one on another forum from QLD I think similar yellow stripping on the side.

the yellow stuff is the current flavour everywhere.  mines are using lots of the yellow reflective - and latest research shows that by having the vehicle outlined in colour and reflective- it is much more visible.

as for the EMERGENCY AMBULANCE bit - the non-emergency transport ambulances will just have AMBULANCE on them - just the bit of minor differentiation!  Will come in handy when trying to explain to some time-waster with their stubbed toe that they're "wasting EMERGENCY ambulance resources - and to go see their GP"

your reliable source is still off!!

try LW3!

call me intuitive, but I'm detecting a lot of concern in relation to discrepancies between incident occurance times and how long it takes to dispatch other agencies.

many years ago, SAAS used to manage dispatch of it's crews locally.  Then it became a regional thing - and a regional comcen used to manage crews in a geographical area.  As of 4 years ago, the whole of SA's ambulance resources are all managed/dispatched from Eastwood - from calltaking right through to major incident management.

also at around the same time, SAAS management was having trouble getting road staff to work in the ComCen - so started employing civillians to undertake call-taking duties.  Slowly but surely this leached into civillians co-ordinating all ambulance resources state wide.  The guys who deal with regional ambulance co-ordination are generally on the ball and smart, but the one's who deal with metro and fringe metro ambulance co-ordination are civvy's who wouldn't know that their proverbial was on fire if they had the most expensive alarm fitted to their backsides! 

now - you can't blame them entirely (they've never worked on an ambulance......)- management are focussed on meeting targets and ensuring that their own proverbials are covered and that they won't be smacked by the coroner.

so where does this leave the practical bits of ambulance resource management?

.......not even your average paramedic or VAO seems to know any more...and the usual reply is "just do what and go where you are told!"

now I know that there are some VAO's and even a reasonably senior SAAS manager that read this forum - and guess that they probably won't have the same perspective or entirely agree with me - but at the end of the day - these monkeys in Eastwood simply sit in front of a computer, and feed the cases on one PC screen an Ambulance from the other PC screen - and tell the crews where to go on a radio.

as for specific agreements on when should fire services be involved in VA's?  I don't believe there is one - but I know that in Metro Adelaide - if we routinely called SAMFS for every single VA we attend - there would be appliances belting around the city almost as aimlessly as the ambulances which attend minor VA's more routinely than you have hot dinners.  SAAS don't carry patients from a fair majority of these, and there is generally no requirement for SAMFS to attend....and given that these monkeys in Eastwood sit in front of a screen and "co-ordinate" (sic) - it's little wonder that the same rationale is starting to emerge in country SA!

sorry this took so long......enough of a rant...I think I need to go on a holiday!!

btw - for the record - I enjoy and appreciate the work all firey's do! have some very good mates in both SAMFC and CFS!!

or..in the case of the recent Myer centre fire in Adel - the water damage far outstrips the dollar value caused by the fire! 

mmm....while a well involved big one like that would be fun - I'd prefer water damage anyday!

...and no..I'm not a pyro!

but if some one is detained we are ment to wait for psyc to get there and take over the job unless they have a medical emergency and need urgent medical aid

the Psych truck (MH cars) are Mental Health Nurses who work closely with ACIS in order to take the workload off of SAAS crews in the Metro Area.(let's face it - most psych patients don't need to lie on a bed to be taken to hospital!!)  ACIS also has a MH nurse in the comms room who will spend time talking to the psych patient on the phone rather than just routinely send an ambulance out and take the patient taken to hosp.

as for the newest addition to the mental health transfer - ATS staff are now providing the "escort" (including flying with the RFDS) because SAPOL simply don't have the staff to send an escort every time a patient has been detained.  Only down side is that this person is not a paramedic - hence cannot sedate the patient if required - a paramedic is still needed in these instances.

yes - it's all true.  As someone who will be driving one of those monstrosoties - that particular car you all saw at the show is the lasest and greatest invention since the wheel (According to the Spin-Master SAAS Managers)

they are bigger than the current fleet, obviously stand out a lot more, and have been reconfigured internally as well.

....unsure as to exactly when they are to be rolled out, but there is more than 20 of them ready to go into action just as soon as they are marked up.

The current fleet of station wagons and sedans (Fords an Holdens) are all to be replaced with Ford Territories, which are marked up in something just as bright and similar.....

...and on the uniform topic - they are being completely redesigned as well - so will be a completely new look all round!! Watch this space!