My significant other was signed out to Baldy Mountain helping the fire team install a repeater. He had not returned, and had not told me he would be late, which is very unusual especially as he was nearing 12 hours on one shift. At 1800 I began to worry, not knowing what time Dispatch would be closing so I headed into the office to have them do a radio check. I saw in the sign out book that he was due back at 1700. I saw the Forest FMO and asked if anybody had heard from my significant other, as he was past due by an hour and a half according to his check out. I asked if anybody had checked his ETA. FMO said nobody had done an ETA check, but the employee had done a radio check sometime earlier that day and Dispatch had not heard from him since. FMO said he would try to call him on Dispatch radio. FMO tried three times with no contact from the employee, using three different repeaters.
The Forest FMO came out of Dispatch and advised me to call him on his cell phone, to which I replied that I had been trying and he was obviously out of cell service, thus the need for a radio check since he was an hour and a half late in his return to station time listed in the check out book. No further attempts were made to contact the missing employee. My significant other did finally return to Station, yet no mention was made from Dispatch of trying to contact him on the radio OR that his family member was looking for him.
I believe this is a Forest-Wide problem. Somebody could be laying out there for an hour and a half with nobody caring whether or not they are OK. I believe if this check in/check out policy is NOT corrected that an employee could be hurt or worse if it comes to an emergency especially during a fire incident. In order to build a Highly Reliable Organization, integrity and professionalism needs to be modeled starting from the top. |
