antiquefirelt

This topic and incident highlights why our department just changed our "sign off" documentation and training to better ensure the patient is properly advised of the dangers of refusing care/treatment and our people and service are better protected from lawsuits.

We touched on this in the Hackensack Ford thread a month or so ago. It seems that often the Fire Service latches onto something and then ends up taking the "lesson" to the extreme. Two decades ago we beat into everyone's heads that the bowstring truss was the firefighters widowmaker, thus the reaction is to stop interior operations where they're present. We've done nearly the same thing with lightweight trusses and engineered wood products. I know that in my area vertical ventilation is made into such a big deal in FF I&II that it seems to have elevated itself to be equal to putting water on the fire. It seems many places cannot leave a fire without putting a hole in the roof, which often in the smaller towns is after knockdown anyway!I think in the end, due to the millions of things we are forced to do (haz-mat, EMS, public ed, inspections, etc. etc.) we start cutting time out of training, now focusing on the "how to" and leaving the "why to" out.

Probably my favorite DP tune. They've got a long list of great music, those that only know Smoke on the Water are missing out.

Would you change how you do things if they denied any infectious diseases even though you suspected one? Chances are someone with a disease that has a stigma attached to it, will not give you an honest answer if they don't think it's pertinent, best to try and treat everyone the same and protect yourself all the time, many people may have infectious diseases but not know it.

I thought some of you would appreciate this story and video. It happened a few weeks ago and now their releasing the cruiser cam footage: http://www.pressherald.com/news/maine-State-police-video-cruiser-wrong-way-intercept.html I was the third of fourth vehicle back in the intersection Tr.Cropper last passed through to re-enter I-295 just before hitting the vehicle "head-on". At first my GF and I thought the officer was going to a call and taking a lot of risk given his speed and route of travel through surface streets in Portland, only to see just 30-45 seconds later he had crashed on the opposite side of the highway. As we passed he was out checking the passenger of the car he'd hit. We thought he had attempted to reverse directions and hit an innocent motorist. The next morning the news reported the motorists was an elderly male travelling northbound in the southbound lane in by far the busiest area of interstate in Maine. Had the man made it just another 500 yards he'd enter a winding bridge area where three lanes of traffic come southbound at 50 mph. No exit and no room during a very busy traffic time. It proved to me, yet again that when you don't have the whole story even firsthand observations can be misleading. Turned out no one suffered any injury of note and the elderly man agreed to surrender his license.

I'll just note that we go far beyond the level you speak of here. It doesn't matter how long the victims been down in most cases, they get worked where they fall, short of the public spectacle or other mitigating circumstances. Witnessed arrests are maybe slightly more likely to be transported, but basically our personnel begin aggressively treating any arrest in the field and after 20 minutes of failed effort the medic will usually call the ER Doc (which is not required, but has numerous benefits).For us, how easy it is to load the patient is a significant factor. Kids almost always get scooped up and transported. It's far more difficult to convince a parent their child is gone and the ER wouldn't have made a difference. Also, we know the younger the person the better chance of recovery, so why not be heading where your going anyway? Lastly, somewhat selfishly maybe, no one wants to have to pronounce a child if they have another option. On the other side of this, codes out in public usually have the benefit of an easy load and go scenario (off the side walk, grocery store floor, on the lawn, etc), so these folks also get transported. But, in a difficult or labor intensive extrication to the bus the quality of your treatment actions suffers, thus, they most often are treated where they drop.

This story got a pretty good laugh around the table on Sunday. We've been doing this for at least the last 10-12 years and really had no clue that others weren't. It's possible that we had a few forward thinking Doc's as our E.R. medical control that transitioned us to this, as we have only one hospital to transport to. In Maine each "region" has a regional medical control doctor that can impact the local protocols. We used to bring all Code's into the E.R. only to have the Dr. call them pretty early on after arrival. Once our staffing was such that we were putting paramedics on 99% of the runs, nearly all the cardiac arrests were worked in the field and transport was only indicated where there were signs of positive results. Our state protocols have always allowed paramedics to call codes in the field, and in the last few revisions they can do this without advice of medical control (we get them on the line anyway, no harm can come of having a doc back your decision). Nearly 50% of our career staff are paramedics so aggressively treating on scene is easy for us, those with fewer or no medics need to begin transport, and once the patient's in the bus it's nearly as easy to transport (set aside the financial impact or public perceptions). As far as observations having utilized this for a decade: 1. It's not as easy as following an algorithm, you have to look at the total situation. We haven't and likely won't ever leave a patient in a public place, short of the arrest being a result of a crime. It's one thing to speak the family, it's a whole different ballgame to convince a crowd. 2. For us with plenty of medics it's different than those who are waiting for a medic to arrive, if by chance we have no medic it's back to bag and drag while a medic is called in. 3. Speaking to the family is very difficult when the deaths is unanticipated or they're just not ready, how this is done and by whom is important. We always send an engine to back up the bus on cardiac arrests (and others) calls and the responsibility generally falls to the officer and often the senior medic. The officer is usually more hands off the pt. so he/she ends up having more interaction with the family and/or bystanders. They gather information on the pt., medical history, drugs, allergies, recent events, etc. Most explain to the family while treatment is being done, why we're not just taking them to the hospital, explaining the pt. is getting everything they'd get there, right now, not 10 minutes from now and without losing any continuity of treatment. If they are unconvinceable we try and get the ER Doc on the phone and let him/her explain. 4. Some people cannot be convinced that we're not all just medical taxi drivers, and in cases where tensions or emotions runs too high, we transport. Nice to know we were ahead of curve, at least up here anyway.

I looked into PFD a long time ago and determined that I couldn't take the minimum wage for the first 6 months part, then the thought of being stuck on a bus for a year or more with only 5 for the population they cover put the nail in that coffin. A friend from nearby by us works Special Hazards and we got to know a bunch of guys from there. The Lt. on my shift ended up going to work for PFD about 6-7 years ago. As I recall, he had to go through recruit school then go to EMS school to become an advanced EMT or something of that nature by RI standards? He got placed on the bus about 18-24 months in for a 12 month stint I think, then out to a Ladder Co. where he was at last report.

Classic city government.

Maybe some one can clear this up for me? Who's in charge when you have two parallel organizations that cover the same membership? I'm pretty certain that on my job, not only would the person responsible for harassing another be disciplined but any or all of those officers whom granted tacit approval by their failure to enforce policy, laws and rules would also be disciplined. This is another example of a significant difference between career and non-career FD's. While I'm sure some non-career dept's provide supervisory training, my guess is that far less actually do and a percentage of those that do give the bare minimum, while some career FD's may follow the same, many (most I'm familiar with) require far more supervisory training and testing. This makes it clear who's required to do what and eliminates the "we didn't know" excuses. Point of order: while I've had countless hours or supervisory practices, sensitivity training, diversity training, legal issues for supervisors, etc, etc, ad nauseum, when it comes right down to it, I already knew what was right and what was wrong as I'm sure most of us do, those that don't should not be given authority over anyone.

While that number is being thrown around a lot, even most sprinkler advocates have to admit it's no accurate for many/most areas, yet. This may be the average in areas where sprinklers have been mandated for many years, PG Co. MD, Scottsdale AZ, a some others. The places this pricing is accurate in tend not to have unhydranted areas or areas of poor water pressure where other tanks and pumps may be required.As advocates of home fire sprinklers we warn others to be honest about their costs rather than pitch the lowball number and find that no bids even come close. In our area the systems run about $4-8 per square foot with the larger homes seeing smaller per sqft. prices. One hopes that as more contractors come on line, more cities mandate their use, etc the prices will fall. But be careful using the $1.61 figure publicly as even unintentional misleading will have disastrous affects on credibility. The same goes for telling people they'll save the cost in their insurance, which gives on average (here) 15% off for sprinklers, that only is taken off the fire portion of the policy which is not that large to begin with.

Now if they could just change the shape of their mask and make it fit a Scott 4.5 and they'd have a decent pack! OK, maybe that's harsh, hopefully they've come a long way in 20 years, but there was a reason they were referred to as Surprise Air...

As I said above, I've never even heard of such a device made for fire service applications. I've got a shelf of books that have pages upon chapters about supply systems, I've attended workshops with water supply companies and hydrant manufacturers, and to date I've not heard about any such use. The nature of a positive source system such as municipal hydrants would make it very difficult to flow water into the system, you'd have to work at it from the connections to overcoming the supplied pressure. Of course they're required at most service entrances, my assumption is that this is done to ensure that in a high demand situation they don't pull a vacuum on in building components?

I've never heard of this being done.

We've been speccing Cummins for the last two major apparatus purchases. The only real reason is that one of our call members is a retired Cummins Diesel Mechanic trainer, thus he knows the engines inside and out. He also provides a direct conduit to many "insiders" so that any question doesn't long for an answer. Having no other preferences (service for either is the same distance away) this seemed like a good idea. So far it's paid off, though it means nothing to anyone outside our FD.

The tragedy in Hackensack happened in the early years of my being on the local VFD. It's the first real incident I remember being used in training at nearly every class for a few years afterward. The fear of bowstring trusses was pounded into us (our response area including normal M/A had none). Until the dangers of lightweight trusses came out, nothing else seemed to be as dangerous. In fact, we put so much emphasis on the danger of the bowstring truss, that we ignored the inherent dangers of other types of construction. Just a few years ago I sat on a promotions exam board for one of the larger career FD's in the state evaluating the tactical simulator portion or the candidates exams. One part of this had 360 degree pictures of buildings in their city and they had to list concerns/considerations for each. With the exception of one, they all missed a bowstring roof. Sadly, one of the evaluators (a B/C from another larger career FD) didn't get it as two of us discussed this after the testing. Many of these candidates had been firefighters when Hackensack Ford happened, yet it seemed that not everyone learned the same lesson that I'd thought was driven onto us all. As has been noted with regard to the NYS curriculum and others, our State's FF1&2 program merely glosses over building construction while pointing out it's importance. I truly beleive that my having pounded nails for years helped me immensely from the smallest task of routing out hotspots to be promoted. (Brannigan's Building Construction book is heavily used in our promotions testing) Anyway, wrapping this up, I'd say the Fire Service seemed to do a good job of turning Hackensack into a "teachable moment" after it happened, and while some other tragic LODD's are used today, many of those from the year before should not be relegated to the past, they still have significant implications.

I kind of look at this like fingerprinting teachers or random drug testing: if you have nothing to hide, then broad-brush allegations likely don't affect you. As a member of a VFD starting out, I can honestly say we wouldn't have cared about comments that seem to paint most VFD's in poor light as we'd have been certain that we could prove that we were above that, please ask to see the books, we'd love for anyone to take any interest at all. Those who protest maybe feel slightly embarrassed to be part of an organization that while providing a valuable service cannot be totally open due to the "perks"? I generally could care less about broad brush anti-career statements for similar reasons, ask us we'll show you anything, please prove us wrong, show us how to be more efficient while providing better service and maintaining a margin of safety for our personnel. These days we (career folk) may be slightly less impervious to negative comments given the nearly all out assault on public employees. If we thought our departments could be scritinized singularly we'd not care, but it appears the perceived financial situation has people making brash decision based on half-truths, and as long as it costs less, they're willing to ignore all the facts. To this end I've yet to see VFD's nationwide be subjected to such scrutiny from the mass public, so no it isn't the same. So go ahead tell us we're fleecing the public with pensions, sick-outs, padded OT, details, joyriding in public vehicles and sitting on our a$$es while being paid, I know I don't care as any reasonable investigation into any allegation will reveal this to be false. Now if you can't say the same about your own FD, volunteer or career, then maybe it's time to re-evaluate priorities?

A couple of our call guys used to work at Bangor ANG FD,who staff the airport fulltime, not the City of Bangor FD. I know I've never heard they had any more equipment or training for the diversionary flights, but we've bounced the idea around the table when the news reports these incidents and figured they have a very limited number of flights in/out for an International airport so shutting the whole airport down is not nearly as big a deal as some/most/all of the larger places south of them? The airport is also co-located with the Air Guard base and I think from time to time (more often than most knew) many Spec Op units flew in and out of here to do SERE training in the northwoods, though with Brunswick NAS closed this likely changed. I know fair amount of guys at the City FD and will ask the next time I see any of them or a member of the BANG FD.

Great points, but it requires the FD be honest in telling the community their limitations. Of course community "leaders" are looking for every dollar they can get, so saying "No" to a potential developer or large scale project is much more difficult for many people. Luckily codes are far more likely to prevent large multiple dwellings without sprinklers or require the number, location and types of egress to be such that upper floor entrapment is far less likely than those built just a few decades ago.

I know as an application/resume reviewer that we rarely look through any certificates unless we're looking to validate those things on your resume, such as FF1/2, Fire Instructor, HM Tech, EMS License level. I have known one City Manager who said he liked all the certificates, but he also had no clue what they meant and would move applicants higher on his pile based on the thickness of these certificates, regardless of what they were. They can show you're committed to the fire service, but a decent resume can tell 99% of what we who to see in interviews on one page. Of course this is merely my experience in hiring in a small system.

Very sad. This is becoming a far more common way for outside fire to rapidly extend into newer structures. Given the prevalence of vinyl siding and vinyl soffits and outside fire has the ability to rapidly extend into the attic/truss space and burn as Lad12derff had considered. This may have been the one type of scenario that a residential sprinkler system could not have prevented as unoccupied spaces aren't sprinklered and the fire gets way ahead of the system before it's ever activated.

If anyone every has the chance, the D-Day Memorial in Bedford, VA is probably one of most spectacular war memorials in the country, if not the world. It's a little "out of the way" from the DC, VB areas, but near the Blue Ridge Parkway. We were able to visit a few years ago and wouldn't hesitate to go back.

This is interesting and likely will become viable here in the U.S. As has been mentioned the first concern that's pops up is the adhesives resistance to heat. The fact that the these panels provide a large single face for fire to attack vs. standard framing that allows multiple surfaces to be affected simultaneously lends to potentially higher inherent fire resistance ratings, but it's all for not if the adhesive fails and the pieces delaminate.

One must hope that this finally goes to the Supreme Court and hope they are far more impartial than some lesser courts seems to have been.I still for the life of me cannot figure out how anyone can argue that written examinations based on anything less than or equal to HS equivalency can be discriminatory? One one hand the government argues that we must have and hold strict guidelines to graduate and even "punish" schools and systems for failure to have a majority of students meet these guidelines, then in the next breath argue that these guidelines cannot be used to measure a persons ability to comprehend the same reading writing and mathematics? Please if anyone can find some sort of answer to this riddle, point me in its direction: How do questions based on basic high school education standards discriminate against a particular race or set of races? The argument seems to be that the majority of the claimants are incapable of scoring as high as their white counterparts. Is this itself not a discriminatory statement, arguing these people are not capable of comprehending as well? What does that say to those individuals that actually do out score many others? I'd also like to know how the test statistics hold up next to national High School, ASVAB or SAT testing? Are the scores falling along similar lines or is this a fire service/public sector candidate issue alone?

All our TOG has radio pockets, so nearly every member carries their radio there. Additionally all officers (who might serve as an IC) must carry two radios, so each has a radio strap and the radio pocket. Each radio is left in a fixed freq. position, one on the dispatch freq. the second on our fireground freq. we found scanning allowed too may missed transmissions. Most everyone with a strap wears it under the coat rather than tangle it up with seatbelts and SCBA straps, and given the single channel operation, changing frequencies after gearing up is rare. We also have a clip mounted on the TOG above the radio pocket to clip the mike wire in. This reduces or eliminates the mike dangling at your feet when it comes un-clipped from the collar or strap or whatever.