res6cue

I wish more people had that outlook. Unfortunately, it seems many are very hardline either you have to be 100% pure volunteer, or you must go full out career (as 66Alpha1's post would suggest). It's usually not that simple or black and white. Like I said perviously, how many volunteer depts truly are 100% pure volunteer anymore? Probably not many if you take LOSAP into account. Or, what if your dept gives you free food after a run, aren't you technically accepting something for your service? It's a different world we live in today, a world where volunteers are fewer and the time they can give is less also. At the same time, taxes are already outrageously high around here, and to add yet one more bloated municipal service when it's not really needed would just kill some areas. I think programs like these can definitely help a dept with a moderate lack of volunteers issue keep from becoming a safety hazard for the community. Of course, I also believe there has to be a ceiling to it. You can't just keep increasing the perks until you get to a tipping point where it might just be more economical and effective going with a full time service. It would take quite a bit to get to that level in many communities, however, and I don't believe the amounts we're talking about here even comes close. Well, that's just my opinion anyway. 66Alpha1, I'm not sure what you mean by "coercion", but I think you're looking for a different word. Perhaps you meant "bribery"? Either way, I don't agree with your post at all for the above stated reasons.

I believe so, haven't been up that way in a while though. But yeah, Nyack is REALLY old school, and I love it!

Nyack still has them.

I've heard guys lean on the airhorns so bad, the tank runs out of air, no lie. Personally, I prefer short, quick consecutive bursts when needed, and maybe just a bit longer duration while clearing an intersection. There are times, however, where no matter how pinned you keep the Q or how hard you yank on the airhorn lanyard, there is simply nowhere for the traffic (or old ladies) to go. You just create even more confusion and chaos by making so much damn noise and scaring the bejesus out of people who are already panic stricken by the site of a giant red firetruck coming barreling down on their little Honda Civic. Intelligent and moderate use of airhorns and sirens goes a long way.

OMG no way...that CAN'T be real. Is that for real? Who the hell would even BUILD a truck like that?!?!?

Yeah I saw this article. Not surprisingly, I have mixed feelings about it. Who is paying for this program? I know with LOSAP, the funds that are contributed to the program generally have many years to accrue interest, thereby offsetting a good portion of the cost of the program. With an immediate payout like this program has, the opportunity for interest to help out is practically nonexistent. Sounds like quite a difference in potential burden to the taxpayers. On the plus side, I think a program like this that pays out annually has a more immediate impact on recruiting and retaining volunteers, as well as encouraging them to attend more incidents and training. Show up more, make more money at the end of the year. In my opinion, LOSAP isn't much of a draw to young people. To them, they see maybe getting a few bucks a year when they're in their 60s. How many 18 year old kids are genuinely concerned with 40+ years away? Not too many, in my estimation. So, while a LOSAP program may wind up paying out $9,600 a year at retirement age for 40 years of accrued service, which is clearly a lot more than this program would pay out annually, it just doesn't have the same luster to young people. If the max annual payout of this program doesn't ever increase. you could earn $46,000 over 40 years of service. Of course, your LOSAP max would pay that out in less than 5 years once you reach entitlement age, which isn't too shabby for those of us thinking that far ahead. I realize all these volunteer incentives are a hot button issue and some will say we're not even "volunteers" anymore. I actually agree with that. My personal opinion was that my own dept stopped being 100% volunteer the day we adopted our LOSAP program, and has decreased for every incentive thereafter, including any tax breaks we get from local government. Mind you, I don't think that's a bad thing necessarily, it's just the reality. I still know that for many areas around here, a full time paid service would be cost prohibitive. It's still a hell of a lot cheaper to throw the vollies a few bones than it is to replace them with paid firefighters. So, in the end, I'm all for things like LOSAP, stipends, tax breaks, reduced cost volunteer housing, etc. Within reason, that is. I feel very strongly that you must reward the taxpayers with outstanding service in return. You must be able to put properly manned rigs on the road within a reasonable amount of time. You must ensure your members are well trained and professional. If you want the public to reward you with these "goodies", you have got to earn them and constantly prove why it's worth their tax dollars to keep you around in lieu of going with a paid department. It's simply not acceptable to operate like decades past, a social club that occasionally has to respond to Mrs. Smith's burnt dinner or Farmer Jones' barn fire. Actually, come to think of it, we shouldn't still be operating like that anyway, incentives or not.

I'm not sure I follow (sorry, I'm half asleep ). Are you asking if I think there ARE certain 10 codes that are more or less already understood across the board? Or are you asking if I think it COULD eventually be implemented and work, a universal system? If you're asking if I think there are some that are already universal, I'd have to say maybe 10-4, but that's about it. I would suspect 10-4 means "acknowledged" just about everywhere, but there might even be exceptions to that one also, who knows. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but NYPD 10-13 is "Officer down", while FDNY 10-48 is "Request PD assistance forthwith", right? This is probably a good example of 10 codes gone wrong. You would think that in the same city they could agree on 10-13 being universal for "SEND HELP NOW!!!" Now certainly if you heard "10-13!" over the fire radio, you'd know what they meant, but I don't believe it's an official code? There isn't even a 10-13 listed on Frank Raffa's page that I can find. If you're asking if I think we could all eventually agree on a universal 10 code system, I have to be pessimistic and say probably not, no. Again, I believe there originally was a universal system, and it got tweaked along the way to suit the individual agency's needs, and here we are. So, as much as I think 10 codes have their place within a particular agency, I do agree that they're horrible for interoperability. I mean, if two agencies use the same 10 codes with the exception of just ONE, you might run into a problem, right?

That's part of the point I was trying to make. I firmly believe that had this happened ages ago, we likely wouldn't even be discussing this. I also believe that back in the day they DID intend for there to be a standard 10 code system (isn't there even an official APCO set?) but it just never stuck. First of all, between fire, police and EMS there would probably just be too many codes needed to make it realistic. Which is what started to happen, individual depts started tweaking the codes to suit their own needs, and flash forward to today's mess. Throw into that big city worship and it doesn't get any better. I mean, realistically, how many depts in our area added 10-75 so they could sound like FDNY? I'm betting more than just a handful. As I said, I'm glad Rockland uses barely any codes at all for fire. 99% of all transmissions have always been plain English, as anyone who listens can attest to. Sure, we have a few "signals" here and there, but more often than not we use the plain English along with them anyway! As for the PD (and EMS to a lesser extent) in Rockland, they have a little more of a challenge, having to move away from all their pseudo 10 code signals that run in the 100s.

Right, because the guy in the BACK seat shooting the video is the one who should be paying attention to "someone crossing the street", not the driver or guy in the shotgun seat.

My feelings are mixed. I have a few of those types of videos we took from years ago (with an actual camcorder and way before youtube or the like) and looking back on them, there are some good memories. Some of them are interesting, they can be used for training sometimes and they can preserve memories as I said. On the other hand, I can't help sometimes watching them and thinking "God, what a bunch of whackers", which I suppose makes me a bit of a hypocrite. As far as the guys having the time to shoot them, that's not really much of an issue with me. You gotta figure most of these are shot on fairly long runs, the guys are already geared up and most of the calls are BS. Which brings me to my final point about them, and often a hot button issue. I really don't like watching videos of trucks responding to BS calls where they can't lay off the Q and airhorns and are flying recklessly through traffic. I would say that they're doing it to play to the camera, but I know better. Some guys just respond all out like that for every little call, which as someone who has taught driver training classes, makes me cringe. Yes, I know someone is going to say "But you never know until you get there!" which has some degree of truth to it, but those of us that have been around for awhile know the score. I've gone on hundreds and hundreds of runs for automatic alarms to our County Health Complex, sometimes multiple times a day for days on end...and you know how many of them turned out to be legit over the years? A handful, if that...and we knew right away we had something as we were responding.

I think their quality has gone downhill over the past decade or so. I've heard that firsthand from our neighboring all-Sutphen dept, that they're just not building them like they used to.

Man, how could I forget Metz...literally staring me right in the face! Yes, the Metz is tremendously compact but at the expense of a ton of compartment space. More to the point, that enormous "turntable" is what kills it, but worst of all is that for the size of it, there's not even a walkway! It's nearly impossible to get off the end of the ladder without being an acrobat, and the basket is very small. As far as the Hill Hooks, I wouldn't want to comment for them, but I have heard rumblings that the honeymoon is definitely over. They have a very tight firehouse and were replacing a very small 75' ALF, and they wanted the most bang for their buck within the restrictions they had. All said and done, I don't think they did too bad. The Metz has some nice points and it's really fast to setup with a very small footprint. They're definitely not inexpensive, however.

Well, no one else that I can think of even makes a platform of any kind on a short, single axle chassis except for Sutphen, much less in quint configuration. The way I see it, if you need that kind of short, single axle chassis; need a short outrigger footprint; need a pump on it; strongly desire a bucket; don't mind not having a traditional ladder for climbing; and don't mind losing about 15' of reach off what you currently have...then the Sutphen SP70 is really the only choice. If the bucket isn't a big deal, then look at some straight sticks. The only trouble there, once again, is that most of them over 75' are tandem axle. So if I had to choose between a 75' stick or a 70' platform, I'd likely take the tower. The reach isn't all that different but the bucket would sell me on it for sure. Not to mention the low overall height of the mid-mounted aerial, which might also be a concern for you.

Stony Point FD here in Rockland has one also. Great truck, nice and compact on a single rear axle. I've never once heard them complain about it. There are actually quite a few Sutphen towers around here and they seem to hold up well and I don't hear many complaints about them. Personally, I love having a bucket to work from, so if given a choice between a stick and a tower, I'll take the tower 9 out of 10 times. http://www.stonypointfire.com/18-Tower.JPG

The only reason "10-75 the box!" is considered buffy is because of FDNY worship, that's all. Yes, I agree if the only reason depts added 10-75 was so they could sound like the city, then it's buffy, no question. However, 10-75 or any other 10 code in and of themselves are not buffy, no. I'm sure many, many decades ago when radios first came into use they used plain English. Obviously something prompted them to come up with codes and signals. Perhaps because plain English was just too wordy, perhaps when someone said "send me a bus to this location" the dispatcher sent a school bus and they wanted to do away with interpretation of plain English, or perhaps they're just a holdover from the really old days of telegraph signaling. Whatever the case, as I said I'm not opposed to plain English, but it has to be implemented properly and terms must be standardized, otherwise we may as well just keep the oft-ambiguous 10 codes. No one is going to convince me, however, that the ONLY reason 10 codes and signals exist is for whackers who like to play back the tapes and listen to themselves. Sorry.

Well...good luck with keeping any bad element off of here, and hopefully you won't need much of it! BTW, a few people at firepics.net have posted the link to the new section here, as a few of the Code 3 guys have already signed up over there too.

As much as I like their new truck (and Pierce rearmounts in general), I like our Pierce midmount a whole lot more.

Forgive my total naivety and ignorance (I wasn't a member of the Code 3 board), but am I oversimplifying it by thinking that there were a bunch of troublemakers there that caused the eventual shutdown of the place...and we just invited them all HERE?

Oh c'mon now, you're really trying to make the point that the only reason 10 codes exist is so we can sound "buffy" on the radio? 10 codes were actually designed to AVOID confusion, not create it. As you yourself implied, you can refer to an ambulance by quite a few terms, including the potentially confusing "bus". However, if there were a 10 code for "send ambulance", there's really no confusing that, is there? Which sounds more professional: "Put a rush on da bus!" or "6-Command to 44-Control, I need a 105 here forthwith"? As I said in my previous post, there's nothing wrong with the concept of using plain English. The trouble starts when people either can't comprehend what "use plain English" actually means, and they start with the slang...or when people just can't speak clearly or pronounce words properly. If they had come up with a standard set of 10 codes back in the day that everyone had actually adopted, this most likely wouldn't even be an issue to begin with. Furthermore, if the Federal Government weren't so clearly inept at emergency management, there wouldn't be a need for them to use "lack of communication among local responders" as a scapegoat for their own ineptitude. But now we're all forced by Uncle Sam to change our ways...ways that have worked for decades just fine...and to take a bunch of BS NIMS classes...or we can kiss any grant money goodbye. I'm sorry, but it's ridiculous, really it is.

Hmm, I suspect Rockland will be going that route also, although we have very few "signals" here to begin with and almost always we use plain English along with them. For example, a dispatch would come across as "Signal 10, oven fire..." or "Signal 20, request for extrication..." so the signal is clearly redundant anyway. We'll just have to get used to saying "We have a working fire" instead of "Signal 12" or "Fire is under control" instead of "Signal 11", but that's not too bad. While I'm not opposed to plain English, in some situations it most certainly will take up more air time. It's too bad we could never agree on or stuck with a nationwide set standard of 10 codes decades ago, this whole restructuring might've been avoided. Oh well.

Actually I think I misspoke. I can't find anything to substantiate that. Still, it was a tragedy even if they walked away with minor injuries, and I'm sure it also traumatized those poor kids.

Apparently two of the guys died. What an absolutely mindboggling and senseless tragedy.

One full setup (onboard + portable power, Transformer spreader, O cutter, straight cutter, 3 rams, airbags, etc) on the Heavy Rescue at the first station One full setup (onboard + portable power, ML-32 spreader, O cutter, Road Runner combo tool, 1 ram, etc) on the Rescue-Engine at the second station One very minimal (portable power, ML-32 spreader) on the pumper at the third station

In Rockland County Spring Valley Rockland Hook & Ladder's building used to be on North Main Street (Rt 45) just south of the railroad tracks and almost across the street from where Spring Valley Hook & Ladder is on West Furman Place. You could easily see across from one firehouse to the other. They vacated it around 6 years ago and moved further north to an old bank just south of Maple Avenue. Suffern Vol Hose's building used to be on Wayne Avenue (Rt 202) just east of the Rt 59/Rt 17 intersection. In 1995 they moved to their new building at the corner of Washington Avenue and Cross Street.

I'm quite sure Brian didn't mean it as an insult to the rest of the house, but you do have to admit the coincidence of him just happening to be from that particular house probably couldn't be scripted any better. Besides which, he knows this guy anyway.