When you turn up for any traumatic incident you take in what’s called a “global overview”. You very quickly assess the situation for a rough idea of what’s gone/going on – this includes safety, numbers of casualties, by-standers, damage, critical urgency etc etc.
After a while of being in this job you also pick up on the smaller things too, tending also, not to panic so much. This is a handy trait to develop as most people who come across a traumatic incident do tend to panic. In fact, you can loosely gauge the seriousness of an incident by the actions and panic of the by-standers around. Continue reading