Weather Stories: Hospitals, Iowa City digs out, rescue crews

Some patients had difficulty getting to Eastern Iowa hospitals today because of the snowstorm, but other emergency rooms were kept busy with weather-related injuries.

Mercy Medical Center in Cedar Rapids saw one patient with a broken ankle from falling on ice; two sprains from falling on ice and snow and one patient who had a heart attack while shoveling.

St. Luke's Hospital in Cedar Rapids had one person with a pulled back from shoveling snow come to the emergency department.

In Iowa City, Dr. Michael Miller in the Emergency Department of University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics said this morning that the area was brought to a standstill, with just a few patients walking in to the hospital.

Also at issue was the inability for smaller hospitals to transfer patients to the hospital. Miller was providing phone consultations to those small hospitals on how to care for the severely injured or ill who couldn't be transfered because of the weather.

- By Cindy Hadish

Iowa City snow removal will take days

IOWA CITY – Iowa City hopes to have sent plows down each street at least once by 7 a.m. Thursday, said Rick Fosse, the city's public works director.

Arterial streets were all plowed by mid-afternoon Wednesday, and the city then started on other routes.

Over the next few days the city will work to clear streets curb to curb, he said. He acknowledged this will block driveways and create a lot of work for people shoveling, but he said plow operators try to angle their blades as best they can to limit the amount of snow deposited on a driveway.

Downtown, the city will stockpile and truck out much of the snow over the next two days, with the goal of having downtown cleared by Friday night or Saturday morning, Fosse said.

Trash and recycling services resume Thursday. The recycling trucks do not drive well in the snow, so garbage trucks will collect the recycling, Fosse said.

- By Gregg Hennigan

Emergency crews rescue dozens of travelers

Highway assistance crews including more than a dozen National Guard soldiers rescued about 30 stranded travelers in Eastern Iowa during the blizzard on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.

Heavy wind and snow created treturous driving conditions on several highways in the state. Rescue workers from the National Guard, the Department of Transportation, and the State Patrol were dispatched around the area with snowplows, law enforcement vehicles, and Humvees to assist endangered motorists. The crews' first assignment was around 7 p.m. on Tuesday and 18 hours later, Department of Transportation officials reported the crews had been deactivated.

The crews carried out 10 search-and-rescue missions during the blizzard, rescuing 36 people and three dogs throughout Eastern Iowa, according to Department of Transportation officials. The rescue teams are also credited with escorting an ambulance to a hospital.

“You just never quite know what's going to happen. It's important that you go into these missions with a good set of tools in your toolblox so you can respond,” said Col. Greg Hapgood with the Iowa National Guard.

These crews - which officials call Highway Assistance Teams - aren't called to weather situations very often. The last time they were put to work was more than a year ago when snowstorms hit the state in December 2009, said Dena Gray-Fisher with the Department of Transportation.

“It's not really all that common that we go out and provide assistance in a storm,” Hapgood said. “If you've got big storms, high winds, and low temperatures, you're looking at a very deadly combination and the last thing we want is someone out there who needs help and doesn't have it.”

Outside winter weather emergencies, National Guard personnel work with state responders during other disasters as well.

“The agencies have a lot of experience working together in serving the citizens of Iowa,” Gray-Fisher said.

- By Adam B. Sullivan