By Jordan Baker
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It had been a quiet Sunday night for emergency services in the Hunter Valley. The ambulance control centre was fielding calls about routine transports, overheating cars, and an incident involving an “overzealous medical student,” said one paramedic in a bored tone, “trying to convince a patient there is something wrong with her”.
At 11.35pm, that changed. NSW Ambulance began receiving reports that a large bus, crowded with people, had rolled. Crews were directed to Wine Country Drive at Greta, not knowing what to expect but bracing for trauma. The formerly relaxed tones of the ambulance radio operator’s voice hardened.
Highway patrol officers were first on the scene, followed quickly by paramedics and Fire and Rescue. Credit: Nine
The first to arrive were highway patrol officers, who had been at a service station nearby. Moments later, two more police cars followed.
NSW Ambulance Inspector Joel de’Zuna, a second-generation paramedic with 18 years experience, raced to join them. Struggling with his own monitor, he asked the dispatcher to read the first report. “We’ve got multiple passengers, up to 40,” she told him. “There are people trapped under the bus.”
He asked whether there were several triple-0 calls, or just one. Perhaps a single report might have been exaggerated, or misunderstood. “We’ve received multiple calls,” the operator said grimly.
At 11.40pm, the first ambulance arrived. Paramedics relayed reports of passengers trapped under a large bus, which was lying on its side. A few minutes later, their worst fears were confirmed. At least four victims had been crushed and were already dead.
By midnight, there were six helicopters, 11 ambulances and three ambulance rescue units on their way. De’Zuna had taken control of the crash scene and had designated an area for ambulances, which were told to keep their engines running so they wasted no time taking patients away. “Be careful, all units inbound,” the Rural Fire Service dispatch warned. “You’ve got extremely heavy fog around the area.”
Minutes later, the first patient – a man with a closed head injury – was on the way to John Hunter Hospital.
NSW Ambulance Inspector Joel de’Zuna was one of the first on the scene.Credit: Twitter: NSWAmbulance
De’Zuna declared a major incident as the death toll climbed. “At this stage, we have identified seven – I repeat, seven – code fours [fatalities],” he told the dispatcher. “We have one red [critical] patient, whose injuries are severe and unfortunately, we are expecting that is also going to code four.” There were more critically and severely injured passengers. “I’m still trying to locate how many patients I have.”
By then, NSW Fire and Rescue officers had arrived, and were using airbags to raise the bus. “You can slide them in underneath a vehicle or somewhere people may be trapped, and you can gently inflate them,” Fire and Rescue Inspector Christopher Forster told this masthead. “They used that equipment to lift at least one person who was trapped under the bus.”
At 12.15am, two more passengers had been declared dead. “I do not have exact numbers for you,” De’Zuna told the dispatcher, “but we’re working our best here.”
By 12.20am, helicopters were approaching. Amid heavy fog, the expressway was suggested as a landing zone.
De’Zuna told the incoming helicopters about the most serious casualty, a woman with a complex chest injury whose arm had been amputated at the shoulder. “She’s now intubated, she’ll be the most critical patient to be assessed,” he told the ambulance dispatcher. Her blood pressure was in freefall.
Forster, who’d begun his shift at 8am that morning, arrived at about 12.20am to see the site swarming with police, ambulance, rescue and members of the Rural Fire Service. His officers were helping with first aid, setting up fire protection and dealing with dangerous chemicals from the diesel-powered bus. “We had a significant volume of crews, including a HAZMAT tank,” he said.
By 12.40am, six patients had been taken by road to John Hunter and Maitland Hospitals, and the ambulances came straight back to collect more. Another highway patrol car was bringing blood to the crash scene, and the first helicopter was preparing to land at nearby Green Ridge Estate, rather than the highway, where specialist doctors were picked up by police.
At 1am, the rescue was at its zenith. A mobile command centre had been set up. Paramedics were triaging the less injured patients, and another seven were taken to hospital. “All patients are adults,” De’Zuna told a relieved ambulance dispatcher.
Paramedics radioed the condition of patients. There was a 29-year-old woman with lacerations to her eye who was becoming drowsy and complaining of shoulder pain. There was a young man with suspected fractures to his shoulder blade and collar bone, an open wound to his shoulder, and cuts.
There was a 58-year-old woman, who had not been restrained, reporting pain in her right arm and shoulder. Paramedics suspected her ribs were fractured. Her husband, 63, had a soft tissue injury to his neck.
Forster said the agencies “worked well together to ensure we were protecting our people, and were providing the best care and support to casualties. It was a very intense experience.” In his 30-year career he had never seen so many casualties, but had attended other tragedies. “This is not new to me,” he said, “but it doesn’t make it any easier.”
There were still 34 patients at the scene; one critical, 10 serious. They were escorted to two helicopters by senior medical officers. The rest of the helicopters were told they were no longer required, as the urgency of the response began to fade and the injured passengers were driven to nearby hospitals.
After 2am, the rescue wound down. At the height of the crisis, emergency services workers had done what they were trained to do. Now it was over, they had time to think about what they’d seen.
When police told Forster the incident had moved from response to investigation phase, he pulled some of his crews out, so “they weren’t being exposed to scenes that could cause them a lifetime of ongoing injury”. He reassured them they’d made a difference, and that they’d done their jobs well. He directed them to support services, so they had someone to talk to when the events of the night hit home.
“You have a level of adrenaline that really spikes when you’re dealing with this,” said Forster. “You know your job, you know your task, you know how to do things safely and look after your people, but once that response has moved to another phase, from response to investigation, and you have a moment to sit there and think … the reality starts to kick in.”
On Tuesday, NSW Police Acting Assistant Commissioner David Waddell said some of his officers had been visibly distraught. Emergency services worked well together, but “it was a very chaotic scene.”
Health Minister Ryan Park said their service was remarkable. “You know, this is all done in the middle of the night, in pitch black and in a pretty tough environment in terms of being able to clear your head and then react,” he said.
With Sarah McPhee, Angus Thomson
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