Washdown/ Decon Procedures

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vablackwater

Contributor
Messages
300
Reaction score
2
Location
Central VA
# of dives
1000 - 2499
We are working on a multi-agency (dive teams and FD) scenario where we are trying to simulate a need for a thorough washdown/ decon of the divers.

Our goal is to revise our MOPS/ SOPS for a focus on diver safety, and to have a simple one page reference we can hand off to a FD POC (an agency we have not worked with) that will help advise, educate and execute a washdown.

Diver Dress will be Viking Pro's or HD's with Sartek Valve and AGA (mix of positive and np pressure), latex hoods, dry gloves with 19/30 cu ft pony. Standard team includes primary diver + primary tender, backup diver + backup tender and a 90% diver.

Specific scenario - wash down after farm pond with high fecal content, fertilizer and pesticide runoff, and possible biological contamination.

If anyone can send an exert from their MOP or has something similar in place, please send it to me at vablackwater.com or post it here.


Thanks for your support.

John
 
I would be interested in reading this when you get it done, I had a dive in this exact scenario for a firearm recovery. We were a traveling team not from the area, but had the local FD bring out a truck and simply open a hose and do a thorough stand up clean, there in the field. We then rinsed off gear as we stripped down, and washed ourselves with anti-bacterial wash on site. Afterwords we did a proper gear clean back at the dive locker.
 
I actually just talked with our H/M Team Leader about something like this a couple days ago. He suggested Simple Green in water in a pump sprayer as it is bio-degradable. There are some other anti-bacterial cleaners out there as well (like are used in Drs. offices). Spray the diver with the pump sprayer and then rinse before he even goes off air.

DiscoStu had a good point in that you need plenty of water for decon. Depending on the mission, you probably shouldn't put a diver down until your decon is established. Our SOGs state that for any motor vehicle or carried cargo in the water that we need to investigate/retrieve, that we have full decon set up.

Steve Barsky's "Diving in High Risk Environments" offers quite a bit of insight into just this subject, even though it deals primarily with commercial diving.
 
I would be interested in reading this when you get it done, I had a dive in this exact scenario for a firearm recovery. We were a traveling team not from the area, but had the local FD bring out a truck and simply open a hose and do a thorough stand up clean, there in the field. We then rinsed off gear as we stripped down, and washed ourselves with anti-bacterial wash on site. Afterwords we did a proper gear clean back at the dive locker.


That's the best thing about riding in the big red truck 1,000 gallons of decon on tap. Seriously though, the fire dept. would be well equipped for this op'... Or you could go with the Haz-Mat style pressure sprayer with mild cleaning agent and fire hose to rinse it off.. You could even go as far as using little kiddy pulls to stand the divers in to control run off.. I wonder if a good Haz-Mat SOP would fit what your looking for?? "with high fecal content" Man talking about deep *****,And I thought I had it bad playing in gasoline.. :11: I wonder though, would you ever really get the smell out of your suit??:D
 
I will get you in touch with the guy who teaches this at the North Carolina Justice Academy, if you want too. I just goy home from undercrime scene mapping class. Training is also free to agencies outside NC.
 

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