Medical First Aid and Personal Survival Techniques
This domain tests immediate life support in the machinery space and the personal survival skills needed if the ship must be abandoned.
First aid
Scene safety first: do not become the second casualty. Airway, breathing, circulation. CPR at 30 compressions to 2 breaths, 100-120 compressions per minute, with an AED as soon as it is available. Burns are cooled with clean water and covered; adhered clothing is not removed. Chemical burns and eye splashes are irrigated copiously. Fractures are immobilised; hypothermia is handled gently and warmed gradually.
Personal survival
Muster station, lifejacket donning with the crotch strap secured, immersion suit, abandon ship sequence, boarding survival craft, righting an inverted liferaft, helicopter winching, and the HELP position or huddle in the water.
Worked example
A fitter collapses in the engine room. Actions: make the space safe and test the atmosphere, check response and breathing, call for help and the AED, start CPR if not breathing, keep the casualty warm, record times, and arrange evacuation through the chief engineer and the master. The reasoning: the atmosphere may itself have caused the collapse, so rescuers must not enter unprotected.
Traps
Entering an enclosed space without breathing apparatus to rescue a colleague; giving water to an unconscious casualty; interrupting chest compressions unnecessarily; wearing a lifejacket without securing the crotch strap.