By Tom Brennan
Oh, no! Not another treatise on boring, old safety! Well, let’s see just how boring it is. We start with a couple of points about the “job” as it relates to firefighting.
1. We work in the most unsafe job in the world.
2. We work in an uncontrolled environment—all the time.
3. Firefighters are not killed or injured performing our more sophisticated emergency operations like haz-mat entry and mitigation or confined space operations or even extrication procedures.
Combine these points with the “new”? direction of another national group to set a goal of reducing firefighter injury and death over a designated time, and you have a need to take another look.
Collapse of a structure on fire is a great mystery to me. First, we don’t have an understanding of just how serious this cause of collapse is because of our reporting system. For years, we have been saying that if a piece of a building comes apart and injures a firefighter, that is a “partial collapse” and not a “falling object.” Seems like a little thing (you say), but if the statistics read 20 or more percent as they should, perhaps there will be more attention paid to this problem by our management teams, then to our leadership, and on to the members.
Collapse is NEVER (almost) a surprise! From historical structure data to preplan activities to simple collapse indicators measured from outside the structure, from the time of alarm to response and set up to ongoing data retrieval and recording from all the sectors and divisions within and around the structure, a probable collapse picture will almost always show itself to the aware command staff.
The trick here is to have the “troops” able to recognize the ramifications of what they see. Train about collapse! Know the building is coming down before it catches the troops!
So what else can we do about the simple tactics that we perform that can cause so much pain (mental and physical) when they go wrong or are not performed at all?
Hose stretching. This is most basic at structure fires. Is it the right size hose for the operation or simply the stretch we always use? If we are to realize our goal of interior firefighting for all the lofty reasons that echo around our vocation—the hoseline has to win! It cannot be stopped or overwhelmed because it is unable to supply enough “ammo” to reduce and mitigate the target.
Trying to hold a growing fire from the location at which the insufficient amount of hose made you stop is sure to cause injuries. The wait for the additional hoseline to be inserted in a short stretch is an exercise in hysterics and time loss that sometimes should be on a stage in a comedy show. The problem is that if the nozzle does not smoothly and quickly reach the seat of the fire, we are in trouble.
Water supply. This is also an indirect cause of injuries. This problem exists in more municipal areas even when hydrants are in sufficient supply at the rate of less than 300 feet apart. The streets that bring our apparatus and equipment and the all-important personnel to the scene are mostly “too narrow” to begin with. If we are ALWAYS stretching large-diameter hose from a hydrant to a pumper that is not equipped for a simple reverse lay (back stretch) operation, then we are delaying all the extinguishment support tactics necessary to make the building behave early enough to make a difference and indirectly create a more safe envelope in which to operate.
Ventilation. Without prompt, proper, and sufficient ventilation, the structure is guaranteed to bring our interior firefighting forces to their knees (literally). The explosive phenomena that we face in today’s firefighting—smoke explosion, flashover, rollover, and excessively high-heat atmospheres for lengthy periods of time—and lost and trapped firefighters who run out of air supply are all directly tied to lack of ventilation on the fireground. Ventilation may indeed be the most important life-saving tactic you can perform, short of putting out the fire.
Smoke explosion and flashover can be eliminated by employing rapidly moving interior hoselines sufficient in strength (size and amount of hose) combined with prompt, proper, timely, and sufficient ventilation of the structure. Eliminated!
Remember, burn centers and burn units that treat our members have become necessary only recently—within the past 25 years. Why not during the years of interior structural firefighting prior to that? To make a building behave, you need training and PEOPLE!
Forcible entry. How does this tactic influence our injury records? Timely entry into the proper opening in the structure is important to a safe interior firefight. So is ensuring that alternate exits for those teams are not locked, blocked, or nonexistent. The safest entry is to open the structure for the hose advance where the owner enters the structure—certainly not a window or interior locked door. Remember, the hoseline usually goes where the forcible entry team goes. For safety’s sake, make sure it is the best location.
TOM BRENNAN has more than 35 years of fire service experience. His career spans more than 20 years with the Fire Department of New York as well as four years as chief of the Waterbury (CT) Fire Department. He was the editor of Fire Engineering for eight years and currently is a technical editor. He is co-editor of The Fire Chief’s Handbook, Fifth Edition (Fire Engineering Books, 1995). He was the recipient of the 1998 Fire Engineering Lifetime Achievement Award. Brennan is featured in the video Brennan and Bruno Un-plugged (Fire Engineering/FDIC, 1999). He is a regular contributor to Firenuggets.com.
