SERIES ON OUR TOUGHEST FIRST RESPONDERS
Operations supervisor brings special flair to traumatic scenes
HE “manages the unmanageable” and has brought order to traumatic scenes such as the Ravenshoe cafe explosion – but it was a newborn that had paramedic James Andrews quaking in his boots.
The Senior Operations Supervisor at the Cairns Ambulance Station said it was his first baby delivery as a young first responder in the UK that had him shaking.
“I have never been more terrified in my life than when I delivered my first baby,” the 15year veteran medic, 35, said.
Inspector Andrews comes from a strong emergency service pedigree – between them his parents had 52 years in the West Midlands Police and his brother has worn the bobby’s dark helmet for 16 years and counting.
“At the time the police wasn’t for me – I didn’t have the right mindset to do policing in the UK and I didn’t want to follow in the family footsteps, but I had some relatives in the Ambulance Service that said ‘why don’t you give it a go?’ ”
The 19-year-old newlyminted medic was soon under the wing of old pros – and his apprenticeship got real very quickly.
“The very first day I was with a wise old medic; the old dogs taught you the tricks of the trade. I was waiting for the phone to ring for the first time and he was sitting with his cup of tea hoping the phone never rings,” he said.
“We had a road accident – it was a motorcycle that hit a transit van between the trailer and hitch; the trailer flipped up and crushed him against the back doors.
“To this day it was one of the biggest multi-system traumas I’ve seen on the human body – I mean, he was really hit hard.
“It was the first realisation that ‘this is what we do’.”
Fast forward to 2019 and the now senior officer has seen his share of trauma and has long adjusted to the distances, demographics and idiosyncrasies of Far North Queensland.
In a profession where each paramedic gravitates toward a specialty, Insp Andrews has inherited the mercurial art of people and scene management from his old man.
“My father was really skilled at ‘managing the unmanageable’, to see organisation in disorganised things – I guess that transferred to me,” Insp Andrews said. “I run interference and try to bring some sort of order,” he said.
It was this role – as a deputy forward commander, that brought him to Ravenshoe’s Serves You Right Cafe in 2015.
The popular coffee shop had been ripped apart by an explosion when epileptic driver Brian Scutt lost control of his four-wheel drive and careened into two gas bottles.
“That was a really surreal job to be given,” Insp Andrews said. “There was lots of commotion, lots of talking in the station; there was lots of people moving through when normally it’s calm.”
The distant town – a twohour drive up winding roads – meant everything that was needed would have to be crammed in vehicles and driven forward.
“It was so far away that we had to go there and support the supervision to let the medics treat sick people,” Insp Andrews said. “That’s one of the best parts of being a supervisor – you can take on all that drama and reporting and let the paramedics do their job.”
The site was busy – two helicopters, paramedics from Cairns and the Tablelands, police and firefighters were flowing in and out of a compressed scene with competing priorities; the treatment of the injured, the control of a still smouldering building and the integrity of a crime scene. It was, Insp Andrews said, “dynamic”.
“Everyone was trying to give you what they think is important and you’re trying to narrow it down to numbers of wounded, which hospitals to use, how to stagger the helicopters. It was complex.”
In the best regional spirit, the locals pulled together – shopkeepers supplied bottled water and cling wrap to treat burns and the street was lined with volunteers.
“For some of the paramedics, this was their town, their community, their coffee shop,” Insp Andrews said.
“Everyone who worked in there was their best friend – I don’t think the reality of what happened hit until 18 hours later.”
The Birmingham native said those 10 hours at Ravenshoe taught him volumes and just reinforced what he already knew about his crews.
“It is really humbling to work with such driven staff; they are very dedicated, caring and community focused,” he said. “It is honestly a privilege to supervise these people.”