Peter J. McBride
Safety Officer
Ottawa (Ont., Canada) Fire Service
I am currently finishing a two-year collaborative study of PPV for smoke movement and control and fire suppression in high-rises at the National Research Council of Canada. The live fire tests are conducted in a full-scale, 10-story high-rise test facility. To prepare the initial proposal for this study, I read hundreds of articles and a small number of science papers on the benefits of PPV for smoke and fire control contained. In all the documents I read was a caution: “Failure to understand the concepts of PPV and train crews in the practical applications of the blowers could lead to disastrous results.”
Some would argue that we should not use PPV because of the potential harm to victim(s) or property. I ask these naysayers, What happens when you stick a charged handline into an area in opposition to advancing crews? What happens when you take a line and place it into the vent opening? What happens when you start pulling a ceiling of a truss-roof structure with advanced fire? My response is, “Fire can be pushed throughout a building, and firefighters can be seriously injured or killed.”
Firefighting is inherently dangerous work, and much of our operational knowledge is hard won at the street level. In my research of street-level operations, PPV has proven to be a superb tool.
