The surgeon looked over to see Danni unscathed by the experience as she readily released her seatbelt and grabbed for her assigned satchels to carry.
Garrett opened the door and the team quickly disembarked the craft. They knew that it would have to be a hot unload, and remembered to keep their heads low, bodies hunched over and out of the way of the blades spinning over them.
They were met by the foreman of the logging crew who told them what had transpired when the tree fell incorrectly. This simple miscalculation had caused a chain reaction of unbelievable events to happen. That’s when they found out that the trapped man was not a member of the logging crew, but instead a Road Department Worker who was just driving by in his dump truck filled with road salt.
The trio walked to the edge of the road and looked down at the truck, as it lay on its side halfway down the hillside, the huge tree resting on top of it.
"Where’s the driver?" Garrett immediately asked, her eyes darting across the wreckage.
Danni took in a breath when she saw the wreckage shifting ever so slightly as a few loose stones took off rolling down the hillside.
"He’s trapped under the side of the dump. Got his foot pinned underneath the edge of it." He wiped his brow with the coat sleeve on his forearm. "We tried, but we can’t get him free. His foot is between a ledge of rock and the body of the truck. I think he’s going to either lose that foot or his life."
"Is EMS or the fire department here yet?" The surgeon looked around for any sign of their arrival.
"Well, Doc, we usually take care of our own evacs up here. We just call for the helicopter to get them out. Takes the locals way too long to get up here to our part of the hill. Besides, they usually get stuck on our mud roads."
The surgeon’s eyes narrowed. This was a whole new ballgame from the one that they thought that they were going to. "You got a backboard?"
"Yeah, it’s already down there."
"Danni, we’ll take the drug bag, the surgical tools, and large dressings."
"Okay, Doc." The nurse quickly ditched the rest of the bags. "Already to go."
They walked along the edge of the road until they were parallel to the rear of the dump truck. Looking down they could see the loose stones shifting under the weight of the wreckage. Garrett evaluated the degree of tilt and the slope of the hill. She needed to figure out just how long they would have to do the necessary procedure if it was warranted. She didn’t like what she was coming up with.
Staring down at the truck, she held her hand out to Danni. "Give me the bags. There’s no sense in both of us risking our lives."
The nurse grabbed back the bags. "Listen Garrett, we agreed that we were a team. Where you go, I’m going. You’ll be able to work fast with another set of hands to help you."
Garrett clenched her teeth together as she traded glances with Danni. "Okay! Just stay right beside me and do what I say."
The blonde nodded her head. "Right by you."
The two women took off down the embankment being careful not to loosen any more soil then necessary. Once they were below the level of the wreckage, they crossed over to where the man lay, trapped from his ankle down.
"Hey, sir. We’re going to get you out of this mess. How are you doing?" The surgeon was yelling out to the man as soon as she saw his body.
"For the love of God, get this damn truck off of me," his voice was filled with anger. "I should never have came up over that damn hill."
"Well, so much for the A and B." Danni was making reference to the man’s ability to maintain his airway and that he was breathing. The nurse hastily knelt down next to the man and looked into his eyes and around his upper body for any signs of injury. "Just try to stay still. Do you hurt anywhere?"
"Nah, just that damn ankle." His breathing was labored as he tried to control the excruciating pain. "I’m a goner Doc…You’re not going to get that dump off of me. Go on, get out of here before it shifts."
Garrett surveyed the damage to the man’s ankle. The foreman had been right. That rock ledge wasn’t going to allow them any leeway in releasing the extremity. "Sir, I may have to amputate that foot to save your life. From what I can see of it here, it’s pretty well crushed from the weight of the truck."
"They told me that they had a surgeon flying in. I kind of knew that it was hopeless then. Just get me out of here." His eyes widened and he let out a scream as more stones traveled down the hillside, the evidence that the truck was again shifting.
"Sir, are you allergic to anything, any medications?" The nurse was opening the drug compartment of the bag she was carrying, in anticipation of the surgeon’s orders.
He grimaced in agony. "No…Nothing."
"Danni, start an I.V. and give him 5 milligrams of morphine."
The nurse quickly set about her duties, finding a large vein in his forearm for the I.V. site. Her years of trauma experience were evident by her skills. She had already prepared and flushed the tubing prior to their landing. Now all she needed to do was to insert the I.V. catheter, secure it in place and make the final connection to the fluid-filled bag. Next she reached for the pre-filled syringe of the ‘pain-killing’ drug. "Five of morphine in. You should feel that starting to work very soon, sir."
By this time the surgeon had exposed the trapped limb from all clothing. She didn’t like the idea of amputating the foot but it was going to be his only chance to live. Garrett prepared her mind for what she was about to do.
"Oh, boy! That’s some good stuff, Doc." He winked at Danni. "Thanks little lady." His face was becoming less tortured looking with pain as the drug began taking effect.
The surgeon observed the patient as she pulled on her surgical gloves and took up her scalpel. The logging crew had placed the man in a cervical collar to protect his spine and slid the long backboard underneath him as far as they could with one belt around his waist holding it in place.
Several small stones again started rolling down from the edge of the wreckage. Then more trickled down from the other side of the patient. What had begun as only a few, now turned into a cascade of shifting stones and dirt as Garrett looked up to see the movement of the dump body coming over top of them. She threw the scalpel off behind her and dove over top of the patient pulling her team member into the shelter of her body. There, the three lay huddled, one on top of the other, as the weight of the wreckage caused the truck to turn over on them, trapping them in the now empty dump bed. The tree came shifting over top of the wreckage, causing it to continue to roll down the hill until it stopped abruptly at the bottom with a loud metallic crash.
Garrett and Danni slowly raised their heads, looking cautiously as to where the next barrage was going to come from. Seeing none, they allowed themselves a brief glance at each other, the warming smile of each telling the other that the other team member was safe. They had survived a fate much worse than any helicopter ride, and they knew it.
As they pulled themselves up off of each other and their patient, several members of the logging crew had come down the hillside to assist them. Within minutes, the group of rescuers had made their way to the road with the patient strapped onto the backboard ready for transport. Even though his leg was still intact, the crushing injury might still result in his losing the lower portion of the extremity. Garrett knew that with injuries like that, the faster they get to a Trauma Center, the greater chance they had for saving it.