Special Operations
In addition to regular operations, Toronto EMS staffs a Special Operations Unit, tasked with the provision of EMS services in unusual circumstances. The elements of this unit include:
- Tactical Unit - Cross-trained paramedics providing medical support to the Toronto Police Emergency Task Force.
- Marine Unit - Cross-trained paramedics staffing the patrol vessels of the Toronto Police Marine Unit, in order to provide support for Toronto Police personnel, EMS services on the waters of Lake Ontario, and EMS service to the Toronto Islands.
- HUSAR - Specially-trained Toronto EMS paramedics operate together with elements of the Toronto Fire Services and Toronto Police Service to provide a joint-service Heavy Urban Search and Rescue team.
- CBRNE (Chemical, Biological, Radioactive, Nuclear & Explosive) - Specially-trained Toronto EMS paramedics operate together with elements of the Toronto Police Service and Toronto Fire Services to provide a joint-service Terrorism / Hazardous Materials Response team.
- Public Safety Unit - Cross-trained paramedics providing medical support to the Toronto Police Riot Squad.
- Emergency Response Unit - Single paramedics in rapid response vehicles, tasked solely with response to high priority emergency calls.
- Bicycle Unit - Paramedics equipped with mountain bikes, capable of providing either BLS or ALS services in off road areas, or at special events.
- Emergency Support Unit - Paramedics trained to operate the service's busses and equipment trucks. These respond to all potential Mass Casualty Incidents (fires, multi-patient car accidents etc...), support for large crowd situations such as festivals and parades as well as responding to all calls involving aircraft at Toronto Pearson International Airport
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Famous quotes containing the words special and/or operations:
“When we walk the streets at night in safety, it does not strike us that this might be otherwise. This habit of feeling safe has become second nature, and we do not reflect on just how this is due solely to the working of special institutions. Commonplace thinking often has the impression that force holds the state together, but in fact its only bond is the fundamental sense of order which everybody possesses.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)
“You can’t have operations without screams. Pain and the knife—they’re inseparable.”
—Jean Scott Rogers. Robert Day. Mr. Blount (Frank Pettingell)