Miesau firefighters respond, help save life

***image1***Wolfgang Haase thanked four firefighters from the 415th Base Support Battalion’s Fire and Emergency Services on Miesau Army Depot June 2 for helping to save his life.
Mr. Haase, a Pond Security Guard, was working at the vehicle search point on Miesau May 6, when after midnight he began to feel sick.
“I felt pain in my chest, left shoulder and arm,” said Mr. Haase. “I couldn’t breathe right.”
His supervisor called “117,” which links up to the Central Monitoring Station in Heidelberg. This monitoring system services Miesau, Darmstadt, Mannheim and Heidelberg.
The call reached the Miesau’s Fire and Emergency Services at 12:43 a.m., and a crew of four firefighters dispatched fire and rescue trucks to the scene, arriving at 12:45 a.m.
“He was sitting in the chair, and he was having problems breathing,” said Gerhard Schmidt, crew chief, 415th BSB Fire and Emergency Services. “We laid him on the ground, gave him oxygen and loosened his clothes.”
The firefighters are not doctors, but they are trained to provide emergency care until an ambulance and doctor arrive on the scene, said the 415th BSB Fire Chief, Jürgen Stegner.
“I felt very secure when the firefighters arrived,” said Mr. Haase.
At the scene, they called an ambulance from Schönenberg-Kübelberg, and a doctor from Saint Joseph Hospital in Landstuhl.
They both arrived at 12:55 a.m. The doctor and ambulance crew stabilized Mr. Haase, and he was transported to Saint Joseph Hospital at 1:22 a.m.
He spent the night in intensive care and stayed in the hospital for seven days. Mr. Haase said that the doctors have not yet determined what happened that night.
A day after he went back to work, he stopped by the fire department to thank the crew who had first comforted him when he was in pain.
“That’s something new,” said Mr. Schmidt. “That doesn’t happen a lot that someone you’ve helped comes back to thank you.”
Accompanying Mr. Haase in thanking the firefighters was his wife, Angelika Haase, also a Pond Security Guard on Miesau and who was also working the night of the incident.
“We are here to thank them because they responded very fast and were very professional,” said Mrs. Haase.
The firefighters who responded that night were Mr. Schmidt, Kurt Dengler, Hartmut Willerich and Barbara Reidenbacher.
“I’m very proud of them,” said the fire chief. “I’m proud to know that I can depend on them 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”
The emergency number, “117,” is for the KMC Army installations. The emergency number for the KMC Air Force installations is “112.” The number “112” is also for fire emergencies at off-base locations.