CHIEFPHIL

A bar or a returant would be a great thing. I spent a lot of time there as a kid as my old man was a member , past Captain of Mellor Hose. Playing shuffle board , drinking yuhoo's on the 3rd floor on sundays was the best. A private concern purchased the old Danbury Fire HQ and turned it into a steak house and then a club. They did a real good job on it . Actually became the anchor for thier entertainment district.

In house systems are good and worth the money. In my station, we are in a dead spot, no cell service and pagers will not open up. During daytime hours, the siren will go off - only if the dispatcher hits the tones. So once we are in the station we need to rely on the inhouse paging system. we are in the middel of going from low band to UHF with satilite receivers and the like, so hopefully that will solve some of most of our problems. Hopefully it will help us in the station.

there seems to be a big problem in the entire area, almost all low band channels are having the same problem. In Ct is seems to be affecting the 33 meg freq the most, although I was told at the county chiefs meeting last night everyone is being hammered in low band. One possible cause i heard last night was the broad banding being carried by the power co. on their lines.... I'm unfamiliar with this so I dont hold it to be the truth.

Pleeeasseee stay away from oil trucks or any other tanker not specifically built for a fire department tanker. the largest percentage of fire apparatus accidents involve tankers, most of them are converted fuelers. It is a good idea for an urban department to utilize a tanker, in some aspectas it could cut down on the wear and tear of your frontline equipment. Departments that have multiple limited access highways with out bridge standpipes would benefit. how about open spaces/parks that are far from a municipal water system ? [ look at the fire in central park this week ]I thought my water system was great, until last year when twice, in a matter of a few weeks I had to revert to tanker shuttles in my business district for structure fires due to frozen hydrants/damaged hydrants. Although buying a tanker may not fit into your plan of operation or pocket book, you should be able to know where to get them in a hurry. If you do buy one, look at what your needs are. Plan on how it is used, where are you going to get water from ?[if your system fails, where do I fill it/them] If I have one, will it be enough, will you need to supplement ?[figure out what you flow today with hydrants] If you use LDH and have a long lay, remember 1 .1 gallon per foot in 5" hose. [so if you have 1000' of 5" out , you have a resiviour of 1100 gallons you cant use]If you use it in a nurse situation minimum 500 gpm, 2000 gallons. [in mysituation last year, both tankers 1000gpm/2000gallons, supplied a master stream on my second due and stop the spread to an exposure] there are pro's and cons, its really up to what you need.

Firefighter dies after being injured in drills Email to a Friend Printer Friendly Version WOLCOTT (AP) -- A Southington firefighter who was injured during a training exercise has died. Justin Wisneiwski was injured when he fell off a ladder during a training exercise at the regional state fire training school in Wolcott on Saturday. A spokesman at Saint Mary's Hospital in Waterbury says Wisneiwski died yesterday. Wisneiwski suffered serious injuries in the fall Saturday afternoon at the Wolcott State Fire School. Fire officials reported he fell off a 24-foot extension ladder and from a height of about 20 feet. Wisneiwski, whose age isn't available, joined the department January 18. He was participating in entry level training for firefighters. (Copyright Sad day in Ct. may he rest in peace.

Black gear has some disadvantages, first black will absorb more heat , whereas a tan or white will repel heat. this can have an impact to the health of a firefighter . As the one other writer wrote that the black is a dye. Yes, this has a profound outcome on the life of the gear. A natural color coat [tan] properly maintained will have a longer life expectency then black gear that is properly maintained. The dye is a bit acidic so over time the dye will work to undu the stiching. thus over time the dye will weaken the gear. the dye will also break down the fibers of the shell overtime and loose some of its strength. Some will say, hey my black gear is 15-20 years old... I'll say thats good, you must have taken care of the gear. I headed up our dept's committee on changing gear starting in '92 and did a year study with 12 sets of gear 6 tan 6 black Both held up pretty good and we went with the tan. Those original 6 sets are still in use [tan] The black ended up in the dumpster about 5 years ago. Same gear, just started to fall apart.

Date: 2-27-05 Time:1412hrs Location: 17 Grassy Plain Terrace Units: Engines 5, 6 & 1, Tower Ladder 1, Rescue 2, Amb 2, 3, Car 1, Car 2, 300 & 301 Description: Heavy fire on side D from 1 car basement/garage extending to # 1 and # 2 floors exterior on arrival of Engine 5/Car 1 3 lines stretched in operation Ct. DEP notified and responding to of unusual runnoff of oil. West Redding Engine 1 cover fire headquarters [bethel] Hawleyville Engine 331 to cover Stony Hill Station unit cleared 1430 hrs. Writer:CHIEFPHIL

Date: 2-9-05 Time: 0635hrs Location: 66 Nashville Rd. "Quail Run Condos" Units:E5, E1, E6, Tower 1 , Amb 2, Car 1, 2,3,4, 300 Frequency: Description: Fire in apartment 66L in condo complex. Writer: ChiefPhil Fire in second floor unit of 24 unit building. Heavy smoke on arrival, Evacuate 30 residents . Fire held to unit with no extension. Resident treated for smoke. all units clear 8 a.m.

Bethel Ct: South St Engine 5 - Old Forgotten Engine co. - "the battle wagon" Engne 6 - Grassy Plain hose co - "cross town express" Tower 1 - Eureka H&L - "the queen mary" Stony Hill Fire Co Engine 2 / Rescue 2 - "the deuces wild"

My dept is in the process of changing from low band to UHF. Currently because of budget restrictions etc, we are phazing in with uhf portables and cross band repeaters. question, currently we use motorola 1250's for the uhf, 2 on each rig with the balance of low band being mt1000, what uhf radios other then motorola are being used in your dept ? pro/cons of changing brands etc? our phase in : 1] license 6 uhf freqs 2] set up cross band repeaters on rigs / 2 portables per rig 3] balance of rig / chiefs w/ uhf portables [next phase] 4] vehicle radios / base stations/ pagers thanks in advance

how about a dog who jumped up on a stove, turned the burner on and cooked the pot, which then did the cabinets.... and well the whole house. could'n t believe it when I heard it... still shake my head.

1 on the first due engine in the down town dist. 1 on the second due engine down town /which is 3rd due across town 1 on the cross town first due engine 1 on the cross town rescue so at any job 3 will be onscene on the first alarm. the 4th comes on a sc or 2nd alarm

knox boxes are another great tool for us. We have an alarm ordanice and in it it states if you have an alarm system [commercial] then you must install a knox box with keys/floor plan and a list of hazmats stored in the site. Actually we have had a number of people install them on thier private dwelling. They are good as long as the owner remembers to contact us when he changes locks/tennants etc. a few times we have run across this problem. Last year we had a n alarm at a facility that runs about 10 fa a year. Nothing showing, opend the knox box walked in and had a job. kept the fire small and k/d was quick, if we had waited, well... as for the keys. we had some concern as for accountability. we initiallpt a key in the 2 first run engines [either end of town] but relized that there was some liability of having this key on the dash board of the rig. then the chiefs refused to carry them... so we invested in a radio controlled vault from knox. The key is inserted into the box and is held in by magnets and locked. When we need it we have the dispatchers activate the tone for that specific engine [all 4 have boxes] and it releases the key. this way there is a record of when the key is removed in the event the knox box is violated and used to illegally gain entry. This system has worked well now for 8 years. another ket thing is to have a liason with the owners, one person to handle the "dog and pony show" do the paperwork , keep track ofbuildings that have boxes etc.

As I read about another firefighter killed in Iraq, it brings tears to my eyes. My department [bethel , HQ co.] has 3 men in Iraq, one has been wounded. We sent care packages to the men this past month and when one of the service groups found out that we had 3 men in uniform , they sent packages. One man calls the FD every Sat. and Sun morning. I miss them and pray everyday for their safe return. One man is in the 1st cavalry, one in the 1st infantry and the other with the 24th meu. Just wondering, soes your department have men/women in uniform in Irag or Afgahnastan ? If so, has your dept or co. done anything for them ?

Another good place is Olde Tyme Graphics in Danbury , just over the line off of I-84. They are good on prices and turnaround time is good. Also has a good "idea" base if you are looking for a new design, mural or whatever.

When I was a kid, we lived across from the RB&W plant in PC, when that went up... wow. That burned for 3 days. /My old man came home just to change his sock 2 or 3 times that week. My grandfather fell into a vat of oil and my mom had him in the shower for an hour trying to get the oil off of him. that was Nov. '73. I went to Holy Rosary Scool which overlooked the plant, so the first day I had a birdseye view of the fire. didnt go to school the second day, stayed home and helped my mom and aunts make sandwiches. Went to school the third day, but stayed at the window all day. the Gullivers fire was bad, I remember my dad coming home, crying etc, my mom dragged me and my bro's to church that morning...that was emotional day for us. The worts for me was the fire at Midland and Armet street. Cant remeber the year, but think it was 73 or early 74. I saw this guy pull the box in front of our house. My dad ran out after the guy [box 34 cronic FA] , but the guy just pointed down the street, we ran out and here was this house well involved. My uncle and dad ran down and I watched as my uncle climbed over garbage cans to get into a room where a baby was, my dad went thru the front door. They both bailed out another window, I didnt see them come out as the first floor lit up. I was crying and thought I'd lost them both. One of the old guys grabbed me and put me on the running board of the old E61 and told me not to move and kept his hand on my shoulder . After a few minutes they came around the building and started to pull lines. They could'nt get to the kid... It was a sad day in the nieghborhood. A few years later when I got in my dept, I we had a fire with a women trapped. I was on the second due engine and was an EMt, the mom had thrown the kids out the window, so 1 was hurt, I had to tend to the kid, as one of the older kids was screaming at me and the dept chaplin who was active about the mom, Once I splinted the kids arm I made entry to the room via ladder to search for the mother, The house was going real good, and some guys were pushing thru the front door, I found the mom and carried her out the window, it was bad, all I could think of was this little kid crying in my face as I was splinting his arm, he knew the outcome well before I did. when I got down all I could due was puke in my mask. years later I had a a live grab, got an award and guess made a difference.

having the same problems in CT, for the last two days.

09:00 Structure Fire 11 Vail Road, near Bethel town line Heavy body of fire on arrival side b&c, report of a person in building. aggresive s&r , no one found. Building became untenable, ff's pulled out Aerial master stream k/d bulk of fire. Tanker Shuttle - 4 tankers for handlines LDH laid 2000+' to Town of Bethel for aerial ops Brookfield E1,4,5,21,22,R23 EMS 18-1 & 2 Car 1,4,5 Tanker 1 & 3 Bethel E2, Tower 1, Tanker 3 Car 1,2 S-1,S-3 Hawleyvile E331 Tanker 339 s/b in quarters Bridgewater Engine / Tanker SB Brookfield HQ 10:30 Bethel units clear 11:00 s/b co brought tos cene for o/h and relief 33.58 brookfield ops 33.98 bethel aerial ops

I know this may sound stupid, but I do not know everything about Westchester County since I moved out of the area a long time ago, but here is my $.02 worth. Is there any reason why a dept or company in the county cannot sponsor or hold their own FF1 class ? Take for instance here in CT. the CFA only teaches the FF1 at the recruit level [career depts] , each volunteer dept then has two ways of holding a ff1 class, first contract with the state or seek out certified instructors in the area who would teach the class at those depts. There is a cost, usually dpending upon the class size $ 300 to $ 500 Usually a dept will send out letters and get students from 4-6 dept.s to take the class . Myself and the instructors in my town run about two FF1''s and a FF2 class yearly in the region . I guess then my next question would be , is there a level of certification for instructor ? Because it sounds like the pool of instructors is very small. In the region here, I can pull together 21 instructors from 5 towns. By the way 16-20 students are the best size, over 20 , you loose focus of the students . Plus when you do practicals, you set up teams of 4, the job based testing we do in CT. is based on 4 ff's . I see a lot of frustration with the system in place as it is today from the post I see. Time will make the sytem better. But as some one else said and not exactly sure of the quote, but being a ff1 does not make you the great know it all firefighter. Time, independent trainig and expierence make the firefighter. Again, not tryin to knock any one or system or policy. Just my observation.

bunt - bunt -bunt. Yankees should played dirty and bunted the way on with schillings bad leg....

The Bethel Fire dept. wishes to pass our condolences to the LaRocco family, the VMFD and Mamaro E&H . Your time and energy given to both the VMFD and PCFD will be missed.

Having the Fd respond to PIAA is a good thing, First you can alsways use an extra hand or two. Lets say your not needed, well then you can RTS . Plus another adsded benefit is that you can use your rigs to secure thescene , make them safe as you can use them as a wall to shied the EMS crew, patient and others at the scene. a few weeks ago I had a discussion with the local chief pf police on why we need/should respond to PIAA. When I brought up the recent rash of fire/police/ems crews being involved in secondary crashes , he saw our point of view.

The Town of Bethel Ct. had it's bid opening yesterday for 2 rigs, a Class A engine and a Tanker. The Engine prices came in from 370K to 385K. The Tanker bids ranged from 255K to 258K. The engine was for a 1500/1000/50 rescue style body. The Tanker was for a 500/ 2500 with minimal equipment on a commercial chassis. Depending upon the equipment added to the rig and or your options requested [special dims /hieght / length, your prices could be right up there. Several area co's up here in Fairfieldcounty are looking at rescue pumpers and they are getting looking at 400K+

Pant leg pockets: spanner wrench shove knife gloves coat pockets: ems sheers knife 10' small rope w/ carbiner on each end leatherman rubber gloves additional lock picking devices On the coat: my portable id tag x2 nomex hood scba mask [we issue each his/her own mask I have two sets of gear, one i keep in my pov and the other at the station. Each is set up the same, so if I'm in the need of something it is always in the same pocket.

:cry: Kinda loosing the interest now. I only like it to watch the scenes with denis Leary, I pick up a magazine or a book during hte others. One more night and I'll watch it then that will be it. I can kinda relate to some of the players.... my wife doesnt want me to talk about the fd at home, any fd related phone calls I get must be on the dept cell phone and take in the other room. So I can relate to the poet Lt, when his OL tells him not to talk about work. did you notice that in each scene the engine and ladder tend to be different in the response modes versus the onscene scene ?