Firefighters respond to care facility power outage

The Contra Costa County (Calif.) Fire Protection District, an all-risk agency that serves the majority of Contra Costa County in the San Francisco East Bay area, were dispatched to a health healthcare facility during a regional power outage, according to an article on the Fire Engineering website.

The entire facility was without power and the patients in the ventilator wing were dependent on electric ventilator machines. Staff members were using bag valve masks to manually replace the failed ventilators.

Once it was determined that the facility had enough oxygen to last until morning and the ventilator-dependent patients were being manually bagged, the next task was to offer a better, more dependable option for ventilating the 20 patients for the next several hours, the article said.

While the ventilator issues were being addressed, the rescue team and the facility's maintenance supervisor dealt with the facility's backup generator, which was not working. 

Read the article.