Philly Battalion Chiefs
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ecps92
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Thanks Bill. The first link shows the chiefs which is what I wanted. I knew about the second link (was looking at it last night), but it does not show the chiefs, only engines, ladders and medics. Anyway, got what I wanted with your first link so thanks again.
This is interesting, from your first link:
The PFD is the largest fire department in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and also has the busiest EMS division in the United States with a single ambulance, Medic 2, responding to 8,788 calls in 2013.
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I was surprised by that statistic, too. That is a call every hour every day of the year. Not much time to eat and sleep. Since this is a 2013 statistic it may no longer be true. Philly has added more medic units to the fleet since then.
Philadelphia Medic 2 was the busiest in Philadelphia in 2016 with 7776 runs. The busiest in the country was PG County MD Unit A829 with 8916 runs. 2017 numbers will be out soon.
They have added medic units and now all 50 Medic units are advanced life support trucks staffed by one paramedic and one EMT. A friend who was a Philly paramedic now retired said the burnout rate is quite high because everyone gets a ride whether they need ALS or not. Prior to about 1990 a good many "hospital cases" were handled by the police. Talk about an over worked system.
Amazing. The city should staff more units in that area. Even 7,776 is an unsustainable workload. Wonder what the burnout rate is for Medic 2? Kensington is a tough area. Since the number of runs has been so high for many years it can't be just the recent increase in opioid cases.
I recently read an article that said the police receive 10,000 911 calls a month in the Kensington area.
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I wonder...does the city still send calls to private squads if all PFD medic units are in use? I am thinking Burholme EMS, for example. I know a few years ago there was a case of a PFD dispatcher diverting medic calls to a private company for a kickback (not Burholme.) Maybe that shutdown using private companies all together.
My source tells me they do not divert calls to outside agencies. Not all of Medic 2's runs are in Kensington. Since they added GPS to their CAD system the nearest available squad is dispatched to the next call. Medic 2 could be at Temple Hospital on North Broad Street and be sent to city hall! Often the medics leave the station at the start of a shift never to return until they have to turn the truck over to the next shift- no lunch, no bathroom break, nothing. GO GO GO
Good info. Thanks friend.
Septa3371CSX1
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They were all ALS for a short time but they've since converted a few of them back to BLS. They also recently added 5 daytime BLS rights (M51B-M55B) and also run additional units during certain weather events (extreme heat, winter storms, etc).to handle increased call volume.
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