jack10562

+1! Happy Mother's Day!!!

The best approach to any gas call is have your meter/tester equipment ready and don't rely only on your nose, although that is a valuable tool in your investigation arsenal. Ventilation of the area and eliminating any ignition sources if gas is present is the second step, after securing the source of the leak, if possible. Gas that migrates into a building from an outdoor leak can sometimes lose some or all of it's odorant as it passes through the dirt, and therefore you can have a greater percentage of gas in the building than your nose would indicate. Again, your meter/tester is required. The Maryland officer who ordered the ventilation made the correct call, however there is always the chance for ignition anytime the mixture is within the flammable (explosive) limits. In my opinion, it appears in the video that building went up as it reached the LEL phase, since there was very little flame visible during the explosion. If the mixture was ventilating down from a higher concentration there would have been a significant fireball enveloping the structure upon ignition.

This topic is very near and dear to me, my being a recently retired Con Ed gas emergency shift supervisor in Westchester Gas. I worked with Matty and Jim a long time, and they have really taken the bull by the horns to get the message out to the fire service, on the dangers and the safest way to mitigate the gas and electric hazards faced by emergency responders every day. If you want them to provide training to your department, they would be more than happy to accommodate you. Bottom line is don't be complacent. These are not your routine calls. You never know what is in store for you upon arrival. We only seem to hear about the spectacular disasters, like the recent blast in Queens, that had emergency personnel on the scene investigating when things went dramatically south right in front of them. This can happen at any time, under the right circumstances. Treat every gas call like it's an imminent disaster, because it could be. Sure, many times it's only a pilot light out on a stove, but then again, it could also be gas coming into the building from outside, from a cracked main with gas migrating through a sewer connection or an underground telephone or electric duct, or along a water service. Just because you found A source of the odor, it might not always be the ONLY source. Be safe.

Here's a similar link to the story: http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=679902

instant_DUI.wmv Short movie clip. No sound necessary.

Hey, How about having a Chief's Car Show at the BBQ? Bring your Department's Command Vehicles, and have prizes for different categories, like best layout, best Light package, Best Appearance... farthest distance traveled..><..stuff like that?..

Sorry, als, your response must be in the form of a question..... That is one heck of a water-thief.

Anyone else have election results to share? Thanks!

Happy Easter Everyone!

Rest in peace, John. It was a pleasure knowing you. My condolences to the Deems' family, John's friends, and colleagues.

Great article, and Congratulations, Chuck and DA. I am glad to have known Chuck since the day he joined Briarcliff FD. He's a true gentleman and wonderful person. I've never met DA, but I'm sure he is equally honorable. As for both of these guys, I admire their inspiration and can appreciate their enthusiasm.

I'd like to know how you would get electric outlets on any exterior walls. Surface-mount raceways? Ugg.... If you look closely at the last photo there is a gas can inside. Is that a "house-warming-gift" ?

In order to make a gear change the two transmission gears have to be rotating at the same speed. Large truck manual transmission gears are typically too heavy to have synchronization rings. In transmissions that do have them, these gear-mounted rings rub together during the shift to bring the gears to the same speed so they can mesh cleanly for a gear change. Double clutching is done to release the load on the gears to be able to move the actuator and get the input and output gears turning at the same speed so they can mesh. On an up-shift, the input gear shaft is spinning faster than the output gear, so the input shaft from the engine has to slow down in order to move to the next speed. The opposite is true for a downshift, you have to rev the engine to get the input shaft spinning faster.

Welcome to EMTBravo.net I hope you'll enjoy browsing our forums. Westchester County has a website listing job openings and test dates: HERE Plus, EMTBravo has a forum exclusively for our members posting openings for various positions they find out about: HERE

There ought to be a law...... for identifying locations of buildings of truss or other lightweight component / engineered materials construction. This way responders/rescuers don't become victims themselves when these fail.

Mmmmmmm.......Pancakes.....

Were you guys able to shut off the gas or was it necessary to wait for the utility co?

Those old Suburban's were great trucks! I like the address card-file system. I bet that took a bit of effort to compile.

I believe Nelsonville FD was officially dissolved in July 2001, the reason being a lack of volunteers to effectively man the department. The Cold Spring Fire Company was subsequently contracted to provide fire protection services to the Village of Nelsonville.

A couple of CO factoids: Fatal CO poisoning occurs long before reaching the flammability/lower explosive limit LEL of 12.5%= (125,000 PPM) of CO gas in air. 0.32 % =(3200PPM) is fatal for humans in 30 minutes, 1.28% =(12,800 PPM) is fatal in 3 minutes.

This Tuesday evening, March 17th (St Paddy's day!) around 7:40 PM (depending on your location) the International Space Station AND the Space Shuttle Discovery (STS-119) will be visible passing overhead, provided weather conditions permit a sighting. The space station/shuttle is visible to the naked eye, and can be easily seen moving across the sky at over 17,200 MPH! For exact sighting times, check out the NASA satellite sighting information webpage: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sight...y=United+States I saw the space station alone pass over a little while ago, It's amazing to watch! http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/tracking/index.html

Reminder to look up in the sky tonight!

You guys almost had one that looks just like your avatar, Mark!

Nice site! Good luck with it! Jason is one of our EMTBravo Site Advertisers, so if you need some website work or IT consulting, mention you saw his ad on EMTBravo!

The EOC was not necessarily activated for the typical storm that produced areas of "wires down" unless it was extreme. ConEd's Emergency Management Group (a separate management entity) would then send someone to the EOC if that was mobilized. The idea behind this was to have a liaison at 60 to assist their dispatchers with expediting crews to priority locations. Communities not served by 60 are on their own, where their dispatchers would call in their own jobs to ConEd through normal channels.