A landslide in a city near the southern tip of the Alaska Panhandle demolished the back side of a grocery store. No one was injured early Thursday when the landslide took out the back wall of Tatsuda's IGA in Ketchikan, the Ketchikan Daily News reported. The building suffered severe enough damage to be condemned. Rock, dirt and trees knocked over shelves and pushed ceiling beams out of place. The impact ruptured the sprinkler system, affecting the entire structure, including an attached liquor store, city public works director Mark Hilson said. "Trees, rocks, overburden came down, went right in the store," Hilson said. "Blew out the back wall, came in through the roof, through the aisles, structurally damaged it. The impact of the rock falling, dirt falling, trees falling, blew out the insulation, the soffit, some windows." Behind the store, nothing is visible but rock, he said. "It looks like a rock pile," Hilson said. "It's just rock piled up."  

The International Association Firefighters (IAFF) and the Washington State Council of Fire Fighters (WSCFF) issued a joint statement reporting that several firefighters have been exposed to the virus. The statement reports that members from Kirkland Fire, Redmond Fire and Woodinville Fire had been exposed to the coronavirus, and were isolating themselves for evaluation. IAFF and WSCFF say they spoke with infectious disease experts and medical professionals to find resources and information, and develop a way to make that information more accessible. They announced the creation of their ‘Coronavirus online toolkit,' which aims to provide up-to-date information on the coronavirus and what has transpired so far in Washington.  

VIDEO: Falls happen on ice, in homes, and outside. When EMS and fire crews respond, Des Moines Fire says it's easy for them to get hurt when lifting someone that has fallen. That's why Jeff Downing, an engineer with Des Moines fire, created the Jak Harness. "I felt the need to create this because in recent years we've been going on more and more calls of people that have fallen down and they're not injured and they can't get up," Downing said. Des Moines fire crews have gone out on 700 public assist calls since last September. The thought is that the Jak Harness will make the calls easier. "I had this idea and I'm like, 'I'm just going to try it,' explains Downing. "It's been working really well!" The Jak Harness has been in the hands of first responders for a month and was used on four different apparatus calls. Downing says that the Ames and Bondurant fire departments are one of the few stations in the area testing out the product.  

First responders in Nebraska would be offered annual "resiliency training" to help combat and cope with post-traumatic stress disorder under a bill given initial approval by state lawmakers on Wednesday. State Sen. Mike McDonnell, a former Omaha fire chief, said that 1 in 4 firefighters on average will visit an emergency room during their career for physical injuries on the job. But, he said, "We don't think about the mental injury. A lot of times we don't see it. It's hidden." McDonnell made Legislative Bill 963 his priority bill. It was introduced by State Sen. Tom Brewer of Gordon, a decorated military veteran, who said that he received treatment for PTSD, but that was 11 years after he was shot and wounded in battle. Brewer said that PTSD has contributed to an epidemic of suicides among veterans that now numbers 22 a day.  

It isn't easy to describe the life of an emergency responder, but Jonathon Gould, with Chatham EMS, sees it as "sheer boredom interrupted with complete chaos." Gould, a 26-year-old emergency medical technician from Ludowici, has wanted to help others since he was a teenager, putting himself through EMT school at the age of 17. "What we do isn't glorious," Gould says. "You're supposed to fix people, but sometimes we can't. That's the most frustrating part, is throwing up your hands and saying: 'There's nothing we can do. They need more intensive care.'" Despite being a first responder for nearly a decade, the hardships of the stressful line of work can still be challenging. From these stresses and hardships, Gould created a way to make time go a little more easily. "We found this random rubber duck," Gould says. "We hid this duck to see who could find it, which ambulance crew could find it. Then police got involved, and they wanted to go find rubber ducks."