There have been a couple of instances in the news lately of ladders being deployed in rescue situations, but not by firefighters into a burning building; these rescues have been from underground.
We briefly mentioned earlier this month about a woman in Toledo, Ohio, who was driving along the road, minding her own business, when a sinkhole opened up in front of her car. The road surface literally disappeared from view and although the woman tried to drive round the increasing hole, she ended up at the bottom of it. Sinkholes are caused by unstable ground beneath the upper surface and often occur after floods, earthquakes and other natural disasters where there is a lot of disturbance to the ground. Emergency services believe this one was caused by a water mains leak underneath the road, which undermined the integrity of material supporting the road surface. The driver, Pamela Knox, was not hurt in the incident, but was taken to hospital for shock after being rescued. The rescue team lowered an extension ladder into the hole and sent a firefighter in to help Knox out of the car and up the ladder. Pictures from the scene show the emergency services measuring the depth of the hole (10 feet) as they decided how best to rescue the trapped lady. At a depth of 10 feet, an extension ladder was the perfect rescue tool, although extension ladders can be much, much longer.

Rescue via a Service Ladder

The next rescue story is that of a two-year old boy who actually rescued himself after falling 12 feet down an open drain in a field. Jack Summerfield, from Manchester, was playing in the field with his family during a picnic. He fell into the drain because of a large gap between the manhole cover and the drain, which has since been replaced. Luckily for Jack and his family, he is quite the climber for his age and managed to pull himself out of the water and climb to the top using the service ladder (which is a series of offset hand and foot-holds set into the side of the drain, designed to be used by an adult, not a small child), no mean feat when you consider it was dark in the drain and the spacing between the hand-holds was designed for someone four or five times Jack’s size. Although he is safe and well, Jack is sad about one thing relating to the drama; he left his hat down the drain.

Ladders and Bears

And for a really cute story to finish, last year a woman used a ladder to rescue three baby bears from a wheelie bin near Ruidoso, New Mexico. She and her husband had heard the bear cubs crying through the night, as they had learned how to open the latch and get into the bin, but had not thought about getting back out. The mother bear was hanging around nearby, wanting to get to her babies, so the Ruidoso residents decided to take matters into their own hands and help get the bears out, and back into the woods. Backing towards the bin, standing in the bed of a pick up truck (for safety, so she was not too close to the mama bear), the woman opened the bin and lowered a ladder inside. Her husband then drove away and the bear cubs climbed up the ladder, out of the bin and back to mum. Don’t you just love a happy ending?

Whenever you need a new ladder, for rescue or any other use! Come and visit our main website at www.midlandladders.com and we’ll do everything we can to make sure you get the right access equipment at the best possible price.