On Monday, March 20, the control station of the commander of the Bolesławiec County State Fire Service received a report from a dispatcher at the Bolesławiec ambulance service that a family living in one of the apartments in a multi-family building on Dolne Młyny Street—a mother with three children—had suffered carbon monoxide poisoning. As it turned out, the ambulance service could not dispatch a team because all ambulances were already responding elsewhere. The earliest possible arrival time was 20 minutes.
The county duty officer dispatched two crews from the Rescue and Firefighting Unit in Bolesławiec to the scene. The crews arrived at the scene just one minute later. The incident commander determined that the ground-floor apartment contained the woman who had reported the incident and minor children aged approximately 4–8. The woman complained of typical symptoms associated with carbon monoxide poisoning—weakness, headache and nausea. The incident commander ordered the immediate evacuation of the affected people from the apartment and an inspection of the other apartments in the stairwell.
A total of four more people were evacuated from three apartments, where carbon monoxide levels of 10 to 15 ppm were measured. The apartment from which the affected family was evacuated contained 360 ppm of CO. Qualified first aid was provided to the four affected people at the same time. Since no ambulance team was present at the scene, the incident commander, after consulting the voivodeship medical coordinator, decided to evacuate the affected people to hospital in a fire service vehicle. Fortunately, during these activities an ambulance team arrived and took over the affected people from the firefighters—nine minutes after the State Fire Service crews arrived, significantly earlier than initially expected.
A police patrol and a representative of the property manager also arrived at the scene. After the building was ventilated and it was confirmed that there was no longer any danger, the residents returned to their apartments.
At the end, one may ask: Can a carbon monoxide alarm—a carbon monoxide detector—save someone’s life? In this case, we have clear confirmation that it can. The woman who reported the incident to the ambulance service said that while she was taking a bath, the alarm of the “indicator” went off, signalling the presence of carbon monoxide at 400 ppm. She therefore left the bathroom in time and notified the ambulance service.
More about our firefighters’ operation at Dolne Młyny can be found on the KP PSP Bolesławiec website. How can you stay alert? Useful information below: