A question from a webcast viewer is;
Mr. Moore: There are two sides to every issue, and my concern is whether or not to let the air out of tires of vehicles for stablization. I have always taught to lift the vehicle slightly, place cribbing of some kind under the four corners of the vehicle, and then let the vehicle down to rest on the cribs. I understand that you think it is better to place cribs under the four corners, and let the air out of the tires so that the vehicle will lower itself onto the cribs. Dosen't this make moving the vehicles a little more difficult at the conclusion of the incident?
My Reply Is;
I understand what you are saying. The bottom line is that you may have to “prove” later that whatever you did to stabilize the vehicle resulted in a truly stable vehicle.
If you lift a little like a lot of departments do and the way you teach, then that’s fine if the end result is the structure of the vehicle is resting on the cribbing suspension and is completely relaxed. I see a lot of crews lift a little, shove the stepchock in snug and then deflate the tires anyway. No problem with that as long as 'stable' is the end result.
If you do what I recommend and at some step in the stabilization process, blow the tires by deflation, you have done a ‘best practice’ and are done with initial vehicle stabilization. No matter what car components are removed and regardless of how many victims you take out of that vehicle, no matter how much lighter it might get during the extrication, you have connected it from “structure to cribbing” once and for all.
I agree that a car with air in the tires would be easier to tow away from a crash scene. What I see however is that across the US, the huge majority of tow/recovery operators run rollbacks. With this vehicle, all they do is winch the crash-damaged car onto their flatbed and haul it away.
Ron Moore
[email protected]
Mr. Moore: There are two sides to every issue, and my concern is whether or not to let the air out of tires of vehicles for stablization. I have always taught to lift the vehicle slightly, place cribbing of some kind under the four corners of the vehicle, and then let the vehicle down to rest on the cribs. I understand that you think it is better to place cribs under the four corners, and let the air out of the tires so that the vehicle will lower itself onto the cribs. Dosen't this make moving the vehicles a little more difficult at the conclusion of the incident?
My Reply Is;
I understand what you are saying. The bottom line is that you may have to “prove” later that whatever you did to stabilize the vehicle resulted in a truly stable vehicle.
If you lift a little like a lot of departments do and the way you teach, then that’s fine if the end result is the structure of the vehicle is resting on the cribbing suspension and is completely relaxed. I see a lot of crews lift a little, shove the stepchock in snug and then deflate the tires anyway. No problem with that as long as 'stable' is the end result.
If you do what I recommend and at some step in the stabilization process, blow the tires by deflation, you have done a ‘best practice’ and are done with initial vehicle stabilization. No matter what car components are removed and regardless of how many victims you take out of that vehicle, no matter how much lighter it might get during the extrication, you have connected it from “structure to cribbing” once and for all.
I agree that a car with air in the tires would be easier to tow away from a crash scene. What I see however is that across the US, the huge majority of tow/recovery operators run rollbacks. With this vehicle, all they do is winch the crash-damaged car onto their flatbed and haul it away.
Ron Moore
[email protected]
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