By Doug Miller
Most of the calls came from the beach, where a few people collapsed while waiting in line for the showers. "They were dropping like flies," said Scott Kemins, a fire department spokesman. "What little breeze we had blew warm air, so it didn't seem to help much."
The city's two working ambulances (a third was being repaired) were not enough to handle the eight heat-related calls that came in between 2 and 4 p.m. on Sunday, Kemins said, so backup ambulance crews were recruited from Island Park and Atlantic Beach. All the calls were directed to the beach, he said, as opposed to private residences or senior group homes, whose residents typically suffer the most during heat waves.
And at the peak of these hellish two hours, a young man put his arm through a window in his home, also requiring an ambulance, Kemins said.
To make matters worse, at 5:52 p.m., just as the heat began to subside and the tourists started to head home, a pickup truck driven by a 44-year-old Long Beach resident collided with a sanitation truck on West Park Avenue at Pennsylvania Avenue, bringing West End traffic to a standstill for an hour. The driver of the pickup, who was not identified by police, was taken by helicopter to Nassau University Medical Center, where he was treated for severe facial injuries.
But for the emergency room staff at the Long Beach Medical Center, the clientele was mostly victims of summer. "Yesterday and today we've seen several cases of heat exhaustion, mostly elderly patients and landscapers and outdoor workers," said Sharon Player, the hospital's director of public affairs, on Tuesday. "Fortunately, all of them were reversible and had good outcomes. Over the weekend, we saw many younger people with a variety of summer illnesses, a few water injuries such as dislocations and fractures, two near-drownings, a few corneal abrasions from sand, and heat exhaustion."
According to Dr. Dawn Williamson, assistant director of emergency medicine services at LBMC, it is important for people to stay well hydrated during hot weather. If possible, they should stay indoors with air conditioning or in a cool place, especially between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., when the sun is strongest. "If you must be outside, wear light clothing and a hat, rest frequently and drink plenty of fluids," Williamson said.
(Anyone experiencing symptoms of heat injury should seek medical assistance immediately, even if they are unsure if it is heat-related, she added. Heat injuries can be life-threatening, but are reversible if treated in a timely manner.)
In short, it was the rare weekend when sitting on the couch in front of the A.C. was the healthy thing to do, although LIPA warned that while it had the resources to keep everyone cool without brown- or blackouts, conservation was still a good idea. In a statement released Tuesday, LIPA Chairman Richard M. Kessel said that LIPA had 6,100 megawatts of electricity available to meet that day's projected peak demand of 5,600 megawatts.
Monday's heat generated a LIPA-record 5,340 megawatts of usage during the day's busiest hour, and on Tuesday the record was broken again, with peak-hour usage of 5,426 megawatts. "While supplies are sufficient, customers should use electricity conservatively, to maintain the system if something goes wrong and to help keep customer bills down," Kessel said in the statement.
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