THE FLOOR ABOVE, PART 4
BY TOM BRENNAN
Parts 1, 2, and 3 appeared in the July, August, and September issues.
Last time, we were discussing how safety increases as the number of apartments on each floor increases. We will continue with our discussion of how having more than one apartment per floor provides easier access to the floor above the fire.
If on arrival the interior stairs are impossible to use to the floor above the fire (or any other reason), go another way. Get an exterior entrance from outside by aerial or portable ladder. In buildings with many fire escape installations, forget the ladder and use a fire escape remote from the one to the fire apartment. Ascend to the floor above, and force your way into the “clean” apartment. Notify and calm occupants, or quickly check for the occupants of that apartment and open the door to the hallway above the fire that could not be “made” seconds before. Remember to disable the lock or use any other method to prevent the door you just opened to the hallway from locking behind you. You now have reached your destination goal. You are fresh, your air supply is full, you are calm, and the hall to the apartment above the fire is as cool and as least exposed as it is going to be that day. One of your prayers is that the roof person (er, ah, er team) is in the process of breaking the skylight.
Fire escapes. As the buildings get larger, the number of fire escapes increases. The fire escapes are great tools for the floor-above person. They are much better than portable ladders or aerials (which can be used for something else). Also, usually there are openings to two apartments on each fire escape, a large platform to work from, and ladders to each balcony at the correct angle to “play on.” Remember, your goal here is different from that of the firefighter assigned to the rear (remember the articles on this position a few years ago?). Your goal is to get on a fire escape as far from the smoke and heat as possible and get to the floor above the fire.
These larger buildings that provide more than one fire escape to public halls are a pleasure to operate in compared with the alternative (no fire escape or one serving all apartments). The firefighters assigned to the “rear” of the fire sometimes have a tough time figuring out which fire escape serves the fire apartment. They must be on it as rapidly as possible and open and search what can be gained of the fire apartment at the rear of the fire before water starts (not to even mention positive-pressure ventilation).
But you have it easy. You want a fire escape on which little or no smoke and heat conditions exist. You want to enter the apartment most removed from the vertically extending fire–not all the time, but those times when real rescues are made and count.
A question. Why is the opposite apartment (separated front from rear) safer than apartments adjacent to each other (separated side from side)? Because public hall walls that separate opposite apartments usually are fire walls and, other than for top-floor fires where cockloft spaces span the public hall, do not allow much, if any, horizontal extension. Apartments adjacent to each other, both running front to rear of the same building (railroad flats), have common separation walls–not fire walls–and allow for easy extension and explosive heat and gas buildup that can cause smoke explosions and other extensions. See how simple it is?
Fire escape review. As long as this column is called “Random Thoughts,” I want to review some things about fire escapes. Previously, I remarked that the firefighter assigned to the “rear” position (as outlined in this column some years ago) had a difficult time getting to the correct fire escape, the one serving the fire apartment on these large-area multiple dwellings. Well, there already have been some phone calls on that one.
The rear person is to enter the fire apartment from the opposite side of the fire, where the nozzle will push the fire when it gets water. The function of this position is to look for those human beings who have the least time after water starts–trapped between the advancing nozzle and the horizontal ventilation through which it pushes the products of combustion. That means that if the fire escape is the choice of methods to enter to that dangerous position, the question of which fire escape is the correct one to use can become a problem in urban areas with these large-area multiple dwellings built in the 1940s and later–the building with five or more apartments on each floor.
Each balcony of each fire escape serves a maximum of two apartments, and there may be more than one on the front wall and more than one on the rear and another in the accessible shaft. There is so little time for this search position at the rear of the fire to be effective, so if the wrong fire escape is accessed, it is too late to correct it–at least when operating with aggressive engine companies for whom getting water rapidly is a matter of routine and pride.
If the fire is evident by products of that combustion`s showing from one of the windows directly on the fire escape balcony, the rear person has no problem. That fire escape is the one to be on. You will have access to the fire apartment and the one immediately adjacent to it.
But, what if there are multiple fire escapes and the fire is showing from a window that is not on any balcony? Well, take the time to look. Look at the closest balcony. Is there a smoke condition issuing from any of the windows on the balcony? Is the smoke condition stronger in windows in another direction? Look at the window treatments of the two windows adjacent to the fire window. Which are similar, and in what direction do they go? Go to that fire escape.
The difficulty here (and the only lessons are experience and critiques) is when the window showing fire exposure is on or near the corner of the structure or on the top floor. If it`s at the building`s corner, the fire escape that serves that window`s apartment may not even be in your view from the sidewalk and indeed may be in the large accessible air shaft (remember, fire escapes that are in the shaft must be served by street-access corridors). And, if the fire is on the top floor, many apartments may be charged and many windows on all the fire escapes may be showing smoke conditions. It is never easy–this assignment to and into the rear of the fire. But, it is very rewarding. Next time, high-rise buildings.
TOM BRENNAN has more than 33 years of fire service experience. His career spans more than 20 years with the City of New York (NY) Fire Department as well as four years as chief of the Waterbury (CT) Fire Department. He was 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).
