ON "60 MINUTES": FIRST RESPONDERS AND EMERGENCY ROOMS ARE LEARNING BATTLEFIELD FIRST AID IN THE WAKE OF DEADLY MASS SHOOTINGS INVOLVING AR-15-STYLE RIFLES

Devastating Wounds from a Weapon Made for Combat Used in the Pittsburgh Synagogue Tragedy Call for Military Medical Response

In the wake of the growing number of mass shootings, first responders and emergency rooms are now being trained in combat first aid to save lives. The AR-15-style assault rifle causes devastating wounds similar to those found on the battlefield. Scott Pelley reports on the kinds of injuries caused by those weapons and on the new protocol medical personnel have been forced to adopt as the use of AR-15s in mass shootings becomes more frequent, on the next edition of 60 MINUTES Sunday, Nov. 4 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

In Florida, Broward County medical director Dr. Peter Antevy says the wounds they are seeing, like those from the shooting last February at the nearby Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, call for combat first-aid training. "Almost everything we do is based on what the military has taught us. We never used to carry tourniquets," he says. "We never used to carry chest seals. These are the things that were done in the military for many, many years."

The new protocol helped paramedic Laz Ojeda save Parkland victim Maddy Wilford from bleeding to death. "We carry active killer kits in our rescues. A kit that has five tourniquets, five decompression needles, five hemostatic agents, five emergency trauma dressings," Ojeda tells Pelley.

The horrific bleeding is caused by the extraordinary damage done by the rifle's high-velocity rounds. The lightweight bullet travels at three times the speed of sound, and as it penetrates the human skin, it shatters bones and shreds tissue and organs. The weapon and its rounds were originally developed for the military in the 1950s, but Americans now own at least 11 million AR-15-style rifles.

After the Parkland tragedy, Antevy says his 12-year-old son was so afraid of returning to school that he decided to help his son by training him on how to stop bleeding. "My first instinct was 'He needs a bleeding kit.'" With these mass casualty events becoming so common, Antevy gave him the kit and taught him how to use it.

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