How Pittsburgh first responders rescued woman pinned under pickup

In less than 10 minutes, the lives of both a driver and a pedestrian in Pittsburgh changed this week.

At about 7:15 p.m. Tuesday, a gray pickup headed down an alley near Allegheny General Hospital on the North Side struck a pedestrian, police said. After dragging the young woman, who police did not identify, for about 20 yards, the truck stopped with her pinned under the frame of the vehicle.

Two paramedics from EMS Rescue 2 joined four firefighters from Pittsburgh Fire 32 on the scene on Hazlip Way. As the EMS members worked to stabilize the truck, two paramedics from the Medic 14 unit arrived to assess the patient, who was conscious throughout the rescue. Police from Zone 1 assisted.

Then, they got to work.

“The tricky part about it, the way the patient was under the vehicle, we could only see her from the waist down,” EMS District Chief Jennifer McDermott-Grubb told the Tribune-Review. “There just wasn’t enough clearance to remove her from under the vehicle. She was literally pinned.”

Emergency responders built “cribbing” — essentially constructing a small support system using wooden blocks — under both sides of the pickup, so it wouldn’t collapse on the victim, McDermott-Grubb said. They then placed a 24-inch square airbag under the truck’s passenger side and inflated the airbag using two hoses.

The truck rose and the woman was freed.

The whole episode, from McDermott-Grubb’s arrival on scene to the victim getting out from under the truck, lasted just 8 minutes.

Though the woman said she was not injured, paramedics placed her in a cervical collar and on a backboard before an ambulance took the victim to nearby Allegheny General Hospital, where she was in stable condition with mostly superficial wounds, McDermott-Grubb said.

“There could have been more internal injuries,” McDermott-Grubb said. “She was unaware of what had happened, but she didn’t have complaints of anything hurting.”

The driver of the pickup, who authorities also did not name, remained on scene to provide information. No charges have been filed but the investigation is ongoing, police said.

“It was a fantastic effort by all the crew involved, by the way they used their years and years of know-how to safely and quickly remove this patient,” she said. “It was a great collaborative effort between everybody that was there.”