The Blow Out Kit

As you may already know, I am finishing up week one of my two week Reserve Annual Training.  The first week was spent with the normal mundane housekeeping stuff that we have not had time to complete.  If you think that you have it bad with the occasional but, nonetheless, obtrusive corporate HR training requirements, you have not seen what the Army is forced to sit through with the quarterly gauntlet of mind rotting, tax payer subsidized, power point slides and online courses.  Not to make light of the epidemic of veteran suicides, but after you have sat through your hundredth session of quarterly sexual harassment or master resiliency training, hanging yourself by your own safety reflective belt just for a diversion seems pretty attractive.

One thing of note, however, is that I took a refresher Combat Lifesavers course and it gave me the inspiration to publish a series of posts relating directly to the immediate life saving actions that you need to take after an active shooter incident.  This will be coming from the meathead perspective of  the military, but you can easily adapt them to your situation, whatever first responder role that may be.  This will be another easily digestible, slow burn of posts that describe what you can do at a very basic level as a first responder of an active shooting incident or explosion.  Surprisingly, it is actually quite a lot.

"Legal Disclaimer" up front
One caveat is that these actions can be performed by anyone that has the approved hands on training.  The skill illustrated on this blog are for educational purposes only and should not be interpreted as the same thing as real world training.  This does not give you the qualifications to perform emergency medical treatment any more than watching Scooby Do makes you a private investigator.  It would be a good idea to read on your local or state interpretation of the Good Samaritan laws before you get yourself in a situation a high priced lawyer cannot get you out of.


The Stuff


First things first, we need to cover the very modest equipment that you need to provide this care.  On every Soldier's armor, you will find the Individual First Aid Kit (IFAK). Please reference the picture below or you can go to this link for the pdf.

In short, you will need the following items:

1 container/pouch

1 CAT Tourniquet

1 Israeli Bandage

1 Nasal Pharyngeal Airways

2 Pair latex gloves

1 Combat Gauze

1 Tension Pheumothorax needle

2 Chest Seals (H&H, Bolin, HyFin)

1 roll surgical tape

Sterile Gauze

Combat shears

Fine point Sharpie Marker

You will also want:

SAM Splint(s)

3 cravats

Additional gauze

For SHTF scenarios:

Pill pack with the following doses:

Mobic 15mg

Tylenol 2, 650mg

Moxifloxacin, 400mg

What it is and what it isn't

That is the "stuff" for one person's individual kit. You may want to have a larger first responder bag that can handle more than one incident/victim.  The IFAK will get you out of most trouble given that you can get to a hospital in a decent amount of time.  It will not treat heart attacks, strokes, poisonings, spine injuries, and other much more common life threatening incidents.  This kit is strictly for the aftermath of gunshot wounds, blunt trauma, compound fractures, and other life threatening but treatable incidents that are common to the battlefield.

I would caution you to keep your boo-boo kit separate from your blow out kit.  You will not want your band aids and Imodium to become jumbled in with the actual life saving materials.  Every tool has its place.  I would also encourage you to have at least two CAT tourniquets either in or attached to your Go Bag or directly attached to your gear/rifle.  Whatever's clever for you. 

Also,  if you are a III Percent vendor that sells any of the equipment listed above, shoot me an email (not the Georgemason, but the Sipeystreet account),  and would be more than happy to link to your products.