Storm flooding did not impact Long Beach emergency room, officials say

South Nassau's freestanding emergency department in Long Beach, pictured when it first opened last August, had some minor flooding in its parking lot during Saturday's storm, which officials say did not hamper operations.

Herald file photo

The area near the ambulance bay of South Nassau Communities Hospital’s freestanding emergency department had some flooding during Saturday's record-breaking snowstorm, but both fire and hospital officials maintain that it did not prevent any patients from being transported to the facility or hamper operations there.

Long Beach Fire Commissioner Scott Kemins and South Nassau officials said that there was some minor flooding in the parking lot of SNCH’s emergency department, at 325 E. Bay Dr., adjacent to the Komanoff Center for Geriatric & Rehabilitative Medicine. Kemins noted that the facility, which opened last year, is elevated and did not take on any water.

“There was some relatively minor flooding in the parking lot but nothing that seriously hampered operations,” said Joe Calderone, South Nassau’s senior vice president of corporate communications and development.

Some residents expressed concern over the weekend about flooding at the emergency department, particularly the ambulance bay. Officials said the floodwaters temporarily prevented emergency responders and medical personnel from using a lift located in the rear of the facility that’s used to elevate patients who are transported by ambulance.

"They have a stretcher lift in the back, but they have a ramp in the front of the building and it didn’t prevent us from bringing patients in,” Kemins said. “For a short period of time during high tide, we had to use the front ramp, but the facility itself was never out of service.”

“No issues with the lift,” added Dr. Joshua Kugler, South Nassau’s director of emergency services, who noted that the unit was not damaged by any flooding. “[A] decision [was made] to offload [patients] using the front and side ramp due to better access while standing water in rear of facility. No impact on operations and it is good to have these built in redundancies for such contingent operations.”