Got Jaws?

Torpedo

Member
May 9, 2012
583
USA Fl
Early 1980 something. I was paid by the wrecker company that had numerous police tow contracts to attend a wrecker operation class conducted by local legend tow operator Gene Beedle. Old Gene was older than dirt at that time and by now I'm relatively certain he's RIP. Anyways, here we were in a junk yard with a wrecked car as our victim. Gene was going to show us not how to tow but how people were rescued from entrapment in "his day". This was the earliest of the eighties, the Hurst tool was something still very new and often a patient could expire while someone was still pulling the rope to start the stubborn two stroke engine on the power unit. Also long before wheel lift technology and even roll backs were new on the towing horizon.


So, Gene has this wrecked scow behind the latest innovation in towing, a hydraulic wrecker by Century. He's going to show us different methods of extrication using the wrecker. First up, pulling the steering column up off of a trapped patient. He removes the windshield using a tire iron around its circumference, and leaves the iron laying on the vehicle's hood. Now conducting his pull the vehicle nestles up to the back of the well staked wrecker and the cable begins to work, creaking and groaning as it pulls the old iron (remember old cars?) up off "the patient. SnAP goes something or another and that cable whips up then down and hits that tire iron well enough to send it on a one way boomerang ride right through the back window of that brand new Century wrecker's back winDOH! Epic fale #1.


Next up was how an operator would use the winch's extreme amount of power to pull a driver's bench seat back in the case of entrapment to/under the dash in a crushed vehicle. "Mean Gene the towing machine" runs the cable through a snatch block, under the vehicle, up the rear bumper, over the deck lid and in through the removed rear window (same tire iron, recovered it from the wrecker's seat) opening and attaches it to the under seat's ironwork. He adds some cribbage along the pinch points to avoid the sheet metal V'ing which would entrap the cable and begins his pull. The car once again nestles up to the wrecker's rear, finding home and the cable begins to groan, pop, and spin as it goes to work. Ka fooking BOOM goes that old bench seat off of the floor and damn near through the roof. Anyone injured in that seat would surely have expired as the seat buckled the roof of that junker from the inside up.


Recovery and rescue have come a long way since the days Gene Beedle did it. Back when funeral homes doubled as ambulances, right Skip? Thankfully the bugaboos in the Hurst tools have been worked out with hotter ignition, better oil mixing and fuel delivery and maybe even electric start and thankfully wreckers are rarely if ever needed for extrication.


Old Gene presented as truth that he had saved many lives with these methods but for the life of me I don't see how, it weren't pretty.


I will never forget wrecker school with Gene Beedle. R I P old friend. :hail:
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Zapp Brannigan

Lifetime VIP Donor
May 23, 2010
3,580
.
Could you maybe, edit it into a few smaller paragraphs?? I got a headache just staring at all that text mushed together! :crazy:
 

Torpedo

Member
May 9, 2012
583
USA Fl
Zapp Brannigan said:
Could you maybe, edit it into a few smaller paragraphs?? I got a headache just staring at all that text mushed together! :crazy:

At first I was like, what a dick thing to say,.. and was going to respond with a snarky "mission accomplished, ....then I got a headache looking at it too.


Thanks man, done. :duh:
 

Zapp Brannigan

Lifetime VIP Donor
May 23, 2010
3,580
.
Torpedo said:
At first I was like, what a dick thing to say,.. and was going to respond with a snarky "mission accomplished, ....then I got a headache looking at it too.

Thanks man, done. :duh:

No offense intended, thanks, much easier to see now!!! :thumbsup: :thumbsup:
 
Dec 4, 2011
1,126
US NC
Great story. I love hearing about how things were done in the "good 'ole days", before we had all the modern equipment that we rely on. It makes you really understand the value of having such things.
 

Phillyrube

Member
May 21, 2010
1,272
Flatistan
firefighter7017 said:
Great story. I love hearing about how things were done in the "good 'ole days", before we had all the modern equipment that we rely on. It makes you really understand the value of having such things.

Anyone ever use Portapowers to pull a steering wheel? Come-along?
 

tvsjr

Member
Oct 7, 2012
611
TX
Phillyrube said:
Anyone ever use Portapowers to pull a steering wheel? Come-along?

And a winch... and a chain plus a tow hook (things were getting desperate).


Door pop with a high-lift jack? Pedal removal/relocation with a piece of left-over seatbelt webbing?


Even with modern tools, instructors should be doing injects of tool failures to make sure students train on alternate methods. Hydraulics are wonderful, but you should always have a plan B.
 

Torpedo

Member
May 9, 2012
583
USA Fl
All great ideas^^ If I'm not mistaken at this time in history the Hurst tool was only jaws. The rams, scissors and other tools weren't out yet. There is no substitute for good old human invention and innovation especially when under duress and a life is at stake.


I recently hoisted a C-6 trans into the rescue with a come along, its cables ran under a plywood board with the C-6 on it and stretched between the two radius rod bushing mounts. Went up like a hammock, once I had it started I used a jack to put the tail shaft onto the cross member which was floating (so I could slide it back and forth as needed). That trans. couldn't have fallen if I tried. Many have been injured or worse balancing transmissions on a jack under a vehicle up on ramps in the driveway as mine was. Innovation saves lives. Even lives that can't afford a transmission shop.
 

Turd Ferguson

Member
Jul 3, 2011
2,250
Sumner, Wa
Torpedo said:
..
once I had it started I...put the tail shaft onto the...member which was floating (so I could slide it back and forth as needed)...

Giggity.
 

MESDA6

Member
Jun 2, 2010
920
Central IL and PHX
Phillyrube said:
Anyone ever use Portapowers to pull a steering wheel? Come-along?

Yup - these were required equipment on an ambulance when I started. There were only 3 or 4 dedicated rescue squads in our county at that time with Hurst tools and specialty rescue equipment. You couldn't always wait for them to arrive.


We even carried a straight jacket, but that's a whole other story..... :D
 

Turd Ferguson

Member
Jul 3, 2011
2,250
Sumner, Wa
MESDA6 said:
...We even carried a straight jacket, but that's a whole other story..... :D
You had to do something with it when you escaped from the institution, might as well stash it on the bus where it wouldn't raise too much suspicion.
 

Torpedo

Member
May 9, 2012
583
USA Fl
I just had a chain of thoughts that brought up something Gene showed us I thought useful. He said he always carried a roll of contact paper to put on a tempered glass, side/rear window before breaking it out. This way the patient wouldn't get (as much) glass onto/into them or their wounds and the glass was easier removed when more or less still together. Sounds legit. Anybody heard of this?
 

Bigassfireman

Member
May 23, 2010
823
U. S. of A. Ohio
I've heard of this before. I'm fairly certain that there is,or was, a commercially made version of this marketed to fire/EMS.
 

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