ST. CROIX — Firefighters and volunteers from St. Croix Rescue Squad are taking advantage of a two-week training opportunity in partnership with the Maine Air National Guard on vehicular extrication, rope rescue techniques and instruction of an emergency medical responder course to prepare participants for national certification.
The extensive EMR course gives firefighters and other first responders the knowledge and skills needed to provide immediate, life-saving interventions until additional emergency medical services arrives.
A group of nine volunteers including members of Virgin Islands Fire and Emergency Medical Services and St. Croix Rescue, as well as an Emergency 911 dispatcher are participating in the EMR course. The course includes classroom instruction in the VIFEMS administrative office in Estate Orange Grove as well as hands-on training, such as emergency oxygen administration using CPR dummies.
The free EMR training the Maine Air National Guard is providing gives an opportunity for firefighters to complete the course as the first step toward passing the National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians exam.
“They bridge the gap to getting on the ambulance and getting that definitive care by emergency medical technicians and paramedics,” Chief Robert Bryan, VIFEMS EMS chief, said about emergency medical responders.
Bryan said the EMR course is the first level of medical training for firefighters, noting the goal is to have VIFEMS staffed with emergency medical responders as well as emergency medical technicians, advanced EMTs and paramedics.
“We’re basically creating a mix of all levels of responders,” he said, noting that each training course prepares participants to advance to the next level.
Fire Director-nominee Antonio Stevens said the biggest challenge facing VIFEMS is a lack of available EMT and paramedic courses in the territory. While an EMR course lasts two weeks, he said an EMT course is three months and paramedic training takes nine months to a year. He said recruits at VIFEMS must pass an EMT course and become nationally certified.
“You will not move on to fire training unless you are successful in the EMT course,” Stevens said. “If you fail the EMT course, you’ll be dropped from the course. And you may reapply some time in the future, but you will not move on to the Fire Academy.”
VIFEMS will place its focus moving forward on EMT training, Stevens said. He said he would like the guardsmen from Maine to offer an EMT course the next time they visit so VIFEMS can get more firefighters trained as emergency medical technicians. He also noted ongoing recruitment of paramedics.
“We have a desperate need right now for paramedics,” he said.
The territory’s partnership with the Maine Air National Guard is possible due to the National Guard’s Innovative Readiness Training program, which provides real-world training opportunities for service members and units to prepare them for their wartime missions while supporting the needs of the nation’s underserved communities.
Michael Lewis, VIFEMS territorial training coordinator, said Fire and Emergency Medical Services has started a great relationship with the MANG unit.
“I think it’s gonna be mutually beneficial to both,” he said. “They get to come down here in the Virgin Islands and do some training, and we get a resource where in the event of an emergency we have a response team familiar with the Virgin Islands and our operations.”
The collaboration between VIFEMS, St. Croix Rescue and the Maine Air National Guard naturally developed out of a desire for a Crucian fire chief from the 101st Air Refueling Wing to give back to his home island.
“He’s homegrown and wanted to give back to his community that he grew up in,” Bryan said about the MANG unit’s installation fire chief, Master Sgt. Kevin Marin, a St. Croix native.
Marin, who conducted the EMR course with two other guardsmen, said the collaboration with VIFEMS provided the members of the Maine Air National Guard an opportunity to train with the island’s firefighters.
“We’re both benefiting from learning from each other,” he said.
In addition to providing the EMR course, the training between the territory’s first responders and the visiting guardsmen provides an opportunity for them to share techniques in vehicle extrication and rope rescue while building a partnership. The collaboration sets up the territory to receive emergency assistance in the aftermath of a hurricane or other natural disaster from the 101st Air Refueling Wing, which includes a Civil Engineering Squadron with skilled firefighters trained in urban search and rescue.
“They’ve reached out to us and let us know that they, in times of emergencies could be here within hours, and they would like to do this combined training with us,” Bryan, whose brother is Gov. Albert Bryan Jr., said.
The vehicular extrication training held in the bush near the South Shore prepares first responders to remove car crash victims. The high-angle, low-angle and simple rope exercises are used to rescue people from cliffsides or hillsides, as well as aid firefighters in transporting tools.
“A lot of the guys already know how to do this,” Senior Master Sgt. Joseph Baker, deputy fire chief of the 101st Air Refueling Wing, said. “We’re just basically giving them a refresher course.”
VIFEMS and St. Croix Rescue officials embraced the training opportunity.
“We have the tools, but we don’t have enough hands-on training,” VIFEMS St. Croix Deputy Chief Paul Christian said from the extrication training site, adding that the guardsmen showed the firefighters efficient techniques.
Jason Henry, St. Croix Rescue field operations commander, said the training is important because participants strengthen their skills in addition to learning new ones so they can respond with more competence when they arrive to a scene that requires a rescue effort.
“It’s showing them different techniques and different tools that can be done to get the job done right,” he said after participating in a vehicular extrication training exercise.
