Medevac Helicopters Crash in Flagstaff, Arizona

Having worked as a paramedic, this crash really makes me sad. There has been alot of talk (maybe not enough) regarding medevac helicopters being needed for civilian purposes. This is similar to the question of using lights and sirens on every call or using priority dispatching. Or using a courtesy blue light on a volunteer EMT/firefighter's personal vehicle. Or police cars being involved in high speed chases. Is it worth taking the risk? Is if fair that innocent paramedics/pilots/nurses be killed when there is a possibility that a medevac helicopter isnt scientifically proven to save lives?

Here is an article that discusses the dangers of using medevac while also mentioning that there is nothing proving that time is saved:
Medical Copters Have High Crash Rate; Some also say travel time isn't significantly less than ambulances


Click here for complete NY Times Article of the Medevac Crash

Teen accused of posing as a DEA agent

FERNDALE -- A Lebanese teen in the United States on a visa unsuccessfully tried to convince police he was a federal drug agent and flashed fake ID when he was stopped for having illegal police lights and a siren on his pickup truck, police say.

"When officers stopped him he told them he was working on a case for the Drug Enforcement Agency," said Ferndale Police Lt. William Wilson.

The suspect offered police bogus federal credentials that identified him as a DEA agent and looked almost legitimate, Wilson added.

Rabih El Habhab, 18, of Dearborn was charged Thursday in Ferndale 43rd District Court with impersonating a peace officer, a one-year misdemeanor; and a count of unlawfully equipping his vehicle with blue flashing police lights, a 93-day misdemeanor.

El Habhab is a Lebanese national in the United States on a visa. He was released Thursday on personal bond, but was forced to surrender his passport to the court.

Ferndale police on patrol about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday saw El Habhab's Dodge Dakota pickup truck heading south on Hilton Road near East Cambourne.

"The suspect ran a red light," Wilson said. "As he ran the light our officer noticed the suspect used a siren and blue flashing lights like we have on our unmarked detectives' cars."

The illegal lights were in the pickup truck's headlights and taillights, police said.

Once he stopped his vehicle, El Habhab identified himself to police with false credentials identifying him as a DEA agent, Wilson said. Police said they then looked at the suspect's driver's license, which shows he is 18 years old.

"That's when the jig was up," Wilson said. "Our officer asked the suspect how he could be a DEA agent when the agency requires that you have to be 21 or older to be an agent. The suspect didn't have an answer for that."

El Habhab is also charged with driving on a suspended license.

He is scheduled for a pretrial hearing in Ferndale District Court at 11 a.m. July 17.

Michael P. McConnell. "Teen accused of posing as a DEA agent" Daily Tribune [updated Friday, June 27, 2008; cited Friday, June 27, 2008]. Available from
http://www.dailytribune.com/stories/062708/loc_localn02.shtml

Lights Without Siren; Safety or Danger?

Many states allow volunteer EMTs/firefighters to respond in the personal vehicles with lights. This is typically know as a courtesy light (though legally they may be considered emergency vehicles that cars have to yield too). In New York State, volunteer firefighters respond with blue lights and volunteer EMT/EMS personnel respond with green lights. Unfortunately, they arent allowed to use sirens (though many volunteers will use airhorns). The question arises: Is this a safer method of response?

Let's look at the options:

1)Respond without any lights or sirens.
2)Respond with lights and siren and being considered an emergency vehicle (just light any other police car, fire truck or ambulance.
3)Continue to respond using a courtesy light/lights.

Responding without any lights or sirens has the potential to increase response time (very minimal change would be noted because the driver using a courtesy light needs to abide by all motor vehicle laws). I think that this is the better option if your state doesnt allow lights and sirens. Using a courtesy light can create confusion to other motorist (especially when pulling up to an intersection). Also, although very much an opinion, I would say that once the lights are activated, it creates a need for speed by the responding driver.

I think that any state that has a courtesy light law needs to think about changing the law to either allow lights and siren or nothing. Lights and sirens would decrease the response time but would do so in a safe manner. The problem can be that there will be to many people driving around with lights and sirens and it will be hard to know who is authorized. Additionally, any state that does allow lights and sirens should also require volunteers to have 360 degrees of lighting. I dont care how you acheive 360 degree coverage, it could be a roofmounted lightbar, a beacon or surface mount lights that are mounted on all sides of the vehicle. Either way, you need to be seen and heard!

NYPD's Best of the Best - ESU

Great video! I like the actual video shots. My guess is that many of these shots were filmed during drills.

Roll With It; Can YOU handle it? - EMS Campaign

My previous supervisor (from good old Medevac Ambulance, Ellwood City, PA) sent me a link to this website: rollwithit.com Its been a while since I watched the video, but you all have got to see this video! The video/website is a marketing campaign to get the younger crowd interested in EMS in PA. I'm not sure how well their campaign went, but I thought this video was awesome.

Its a shame that they haven't added more stories to the website or job opportunities. Such a website needs to be updated on a regular basis.

Having come from an EMS background, I find that retention is the biggest problem the agencies are facing. Why be an EMT/Paramedic when you can get a job as a firefighter or police officer and work towards a pension (yes, there are some EMS jobs offering pensions). Or, if you enjoy the medical field, why not become a registered nurse and make a better salary (plus there are many nursing fields to go into). So how do we fix this problem? Not sure, but I think the retention issue is a bigger issue then recruitment.

Intersection Lighting - Often the Step-Child

Have you ever noticed that most stealth-type response vehicles (no roof top lightbar) seem to be lacking intersection lighting? There seems to be to much emphasis put on the front and rear of the vehicle. Now don't get me wrong, I am a firm believer of proper lighting in the front and back of the vehicle but we need to remember side warning! From what I remember, most accidents that occur while driving with lights and sirens occur at intersections. This makes me think that side warning should be just as important, if not more important than front and rear warning.

I'm sure theres another factor that goes into the "intersection accidents." I see many emergency vehicles that dont come to a complete stop before entering an intersection at a red light (or even stop sign). Not only is this a danger to the public safety personnel but also to everyone in the vicinity of that intersection. Between safer driving and better lighting we should be able to cut back on many intersection accidents.

Joke: The Witness

A police officer arrived at the scene of an accident to find that a car had struck a telephone pole.

Searching for witnesses, he discovered a pale, nervous young man in work clothes who claimed he was an eyewitness.

"Exactly where were you at the time of the accident?" inquired the officer.

"Mister," exclaimed the telephone lineman, "I was at the top of the pole!"

Source: Aha! Jokes, http://www.AhaJokes.com/

Emergency Vehicle Light Colors

Being that we deal with USA and international colors, we would like to know what colors your state/country uses. Do the police light colors vary from town to town? Does EMS/fire have different colors than police/sheriff?



Here in New York City, NYPD and FDNY use a mix of red (primary color), white and amber. The back of their LED lightbar has two amber modules (one on either side) that actually is covered with a red lense (but still produces amber). There are two white halogen rotators that also function as takedown and alley lights. The Crown Vics have two red/white LED deck lights facing the rear.

FDNY has a mix of red/white on their forward facing lightbars with red/amber on their rear bars. Most of the other lightheads are red.

Please post a comment regarding the colors used in your area...we will add it to this post.

Vintage Police Car Show (Check out those lightbars!)

Well they may not have LED lightbars, but there sure are some nice looking bars! I'm kind of happy that we have LED technology now. Some of those vehicles seem a bit dangerous to be going through traffic lights (one beacon just doesnt cut it for me) . I guess that is one of the ways that emergency vehicles have evolved. MORE LIGHTS! Fully populated LED lightbars. Dash lights. Deck lights. Grill lights. Intersection lights. I think I'll stop, but the list goes on and on. The question becomes when does lighting become to much that it poses a hazard?

Inciter EX Review by Pimpala

Pimpala's review of the Inciter EX:

Not too long ago, I received two Inciter EX Dual head dash/deck LED lights from Herschel with Whacker Technologies. I got a red/blue and an amber/white model, both dual heads.

Right out of the box the first thing I noticed was that the lightheads looked similar to a Whelen TIR3 lighthead. The quality of the product seems to be excellent. I got the cigar plug version of the light. The cigar plug has power, pattern, and sync all built in. The cigar plug is a bit bulky but saves you from buying a switchbox, I suppose. The extrusion is well made and offers several mounting options. The lights come with a plug in system for syncing the lights by connecting the wires near the cigar plug. I tried it out and it seemed to work fine.

There is an SAE approval on these lights which should add some extra reassurance in purchasing these products. The word WHACKER is etched into each lense twice along with the SAE approval. This light is available in a 1,2,4,8 and 10 head design. The two head lights have 21 flash patterns. Herschel will be doing a video of those patterns soon. The flash patterns on the light were pretty good patterns. The red and blue were very rich and not pink or teal (see pictures).

I think these are really good lights, especially with their low price and seemingly great quality.

Final disposition: Pimp approves! Cool

You can view the actual review here.

The Junior Review by Pimpala

Pimpala unoffically become the official product review guy on elightbars.org. He did a review on the Junior lighthead and here it is:

A while back I received in some "Junior" lightheads from Herschel over at Whacker Technologies. I played with them on several occasions and I'm pretty impressed with their performance.

These lightheads are comparable in size to a Whelen TIR3, LXP LX3, 911EP Star, Bull, Nova, (insert your own of the 9,000 other 3-LED surface mount modules out there, here.) They are SAE certified. The color of the diodes is a nice and crisp red, as evident in the pictures. The wiring is fairly simple to follow. A traditional four wire setup for the lightheads includes power, ground, pattern, and sync. To sync these lightheads you must connect each lighthead's yellow wires together. To change patterns, apply the blue wire to the black wire for 1 second. The wiring was rather confusing at first but, I after reading both parts of the instructions it was understandable.

I was very impressed by the off-axis performance of these lights. I did receive the optional "L" brackets for mounting of the lighthead. These seem sturdy and simple to use (will update on that once I get them installed)

I hooked these up to a DC power supply in my office for bench testing. I left them running for 7 1/2 hours one day while synchronized. When I came back they were still going with no notable discoloration, dimness, heat buildup, or loss of sync. I was a little concerned of the unique flange and plastic tab system but, it shouldn't be a problem... (see pictures)

Final disposition: Pimp approves! Cool

Video done by Pimpala: Junior LED Lighthead

You can view the actual review here.

Florida Highway Patrol: Emergency Lighting Research & Prototype Evaluation

The Study

This study has been brought up on numerous websites but I'm still going to bring it up here to make our blog all inclusive. This is one of the most powerful studies done to date on police light bars. The difference between red and blue lightbars during daytime and nighttime usage causes one to wonder whether any state should be using all red or all blue lights/lightbars on their police cars. I think that everyone should be adopting the mix of red/blue lightbars so they will always be visible.

Funny Fire Truck Response Video

While looking for response videos, I can across this one. The remote control fire truck has the ability to spray water but I think it needs an updated lightbar!

The Whacker Technologies Blog is Up and Running!

We finally decided it was time for a blog. Our hopes are to make a more fun side to our website (and more of an unofficial area) where we will be posting police, fire, EMS or plain old public safety jokes, videos, pics and more. We will also be posting links to customers who have reviewed our products.

Honestly, this is the first time I've ever blogged so hopefully I'll be keeping your attention and make this a place where you'll want to visit (rather than us boring you). If your on our site, you obviously have some interest in LED lightbars, police lights, LED dash lights or something of that nature. I know that many of you arent in public safety, but I'm sure you'll have some fun enjoying our blog.

The one other thing we would like to us our blog for is product design. When we have a new product (whether it be a new LED lightbar, a new LED technology or just a new design), we would like to have our customers input. We feel that if we build our products around our customers, we will both benefit in the long run.

Please note that our comment section is going to be monitored but you can post a comment without having an account. You can use this comment section to let us know if you have a good joke, video or picture that you would like us to post.

Keep Safe,
Herschel and the Whacker Team