Florida ALS Competition Team Wins World Title

June 4, 2009 – The Flagler County Fire Rescue Advanced Life Support (ALS) competition team was one of two American teams to be invited to participate in the 13th International Ambulance Road Rally and EMS Competition (a.k.a. Rallye Rejviz), a world-wide competition for pre-hospital care providers, in Prague, Czech Republic May 29-31. After four days and three nights of competition, the Flagler team – all members of Flagler County, FL Local 4337 – emerged with the most points and the first place victory.

Paramedics Dennis Kline and Caryn Prather and fire fighter/paramedics Mike Pius and Cody King made up the four-person team. “Local 4337 is very proud of its members and their competition victory,” says Brian Gilbert, public information officer for Local 4337. “They train very hard and do it all using their own leave, shift swaps and sponsors.”

Each team was assigned an ambulance and given dispatches to various medical calls around the Prague. Medical calls ranged from chest pains, bus accidents and shootings to mass casualty incidents such as sports venue disasters and terrorist attacks.

The team returned to Orlando, Florida, and a welcome worthy of world champions. Orlando International Airport Professional Fire Fighters Local 4389 arranged to have a crash truck shoot water over the top of the team’s plane as it landed.

When the team is not competing, all team members are field training officers for new paramedics.