FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — A dozen employees are working through the pandemic on the assembly floor of First Line Tech in Fredericksburg, Virginia. They're seeing nursing homes around the country overwhelmed by COVID-19 infections, and racing to provide a way for fire departments to evacuate the elderly safely and quickly.
"We took an old school bus and designed a kit that can go right inside of it to convert it over and handle six, 12, 18 patients," First Line Tech CEO Amit Kapoor said. "The idea for Ambubus came up after [Hurricane] Katrina where a lot of issues during Katrina was evacuating our nursing homes and hospitals. There weren’t enough ambulances available. So it was practical to convert school buses."
The "AmbuBus" kit is a metal frame, like an "erector set" that allows first responders to convert most buses into an emergency evacuation transport within two hours.
"One of the great things about the AmbuBus is that it comes in a crate," Kapoor said. "The crate is as big as one of these tables you get at Costco that comes folded."
First Line Tech faces challenges in securing its supply chain. Simple parts from bolts to straps are now in short supply.
"I think the adrenaline rush has been pretty exciting to see that our products are in action," Kapoor said. "By the end of the day, it’s pretty exhausting because we hear a lot of the emotional concerns our customers, the first responders, are having."
First Line Tech is shipping their AmbuBus kits around the country, including new orders in Hawaii and South Dakota. Locally, Stafford County and Virginia Beach are the first equipped with the evacuation bus kits.