AFS1970

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Everything posted by AFS1970

  1. I will echo the stance that this was completely foolish and dangerous. What I find interesting is that one of the main reasons people give for training without complete PPE is comfort. In this case I would bet it would have been a lot more comfortable inside in gear than in that T-Shirt, especially in that tolerable 120 degrees. Nothing that they were doing could not have been done in full PPE with SCBA, so there is really no excuse for it.
  2. I don't think this issue is so much about this site, or even the internet as a whole. This is more about the fact that for a long time we didn't talk about the fire service outside of our own department, and we certainly didn't do it in public. Of course the benefit to sites like this is the ability to talk with other that we likely would never have had the chance to, and this is a regional site. Imagine the potential of a site with a larger geographic scope. That is what really frightens some of our leadership, for a variety of reasons, many of them valid. Of course the ability of the public or the news media to get a hold of something negative is always there, but we also have to remember that in this law suit crazy country we call home, anything you say can and will be used against you. But I think the biggest issue is an internal department one. If I have a problem with another member of the department, and it ends up online, it could effect morale and end up making a small problem a big one for the leadership to deal with. This is why we, as members, need to police ourselves a little bit and keep thing professional and not personal, which is usually not a problem here. I think that as this site grows, and as more such sites pop up, management will have to sit up and notice the positive potential here and not dwell on the negative potential.
  3. I had forgotten about the verified member program. I remember giving my name and department info, which I will admit is more of a good will gesture, allowing the forum staff to check if they need to, than it is an actual verification process. I do however think that the existing system works well enough. I had not considered the safety implication of posting ones name here, but I don't think it is all that much of an issue, as the only ones who could see it are other members for the most part.
  4. I don't think it matters much either way, however just a quick look at the thread on how people came up with their usernames shows that for the most part they are well thought out and have meaning to us. In my case I use the same username on several fire related forums, so it has become part of my identity in the Emergency Services. Of course I have my name in my signature, so I am not trying to hide anything.
  5. You know it is funny (in a sad way) that SEMS Medic 4 has been workingout of a trailer for years with little if any notice, but Bridgeport Fire puts in a trailer to move a rig back to a better response area, and there is quite a bit of attention paid to this. Maybe now that Access is out of SEMS HQ, Medic 4 can have a station, since that was build as the old SAC Station and housed ambulance for years. As for Medic 1 being on the apron, that is simply the nature of the beast when one is a guest in someone elses station. The reserve rig gets the bay when it is in quarters. Of course 3 Company is still better (by leaps and bounds) than the various dungeons that Stamford Hospital used to find for Medic 1, including that strange almost triangular room at the E/R that used to be an Ace Ambulance office.
  6. I think one of the key issues, other than the relative age of the service, is the fact that EMS is dominated by private, profit making corporations. I know that there are alot of members of this board that work for commercial Ambulance Services, which have no equivilent in the Fire or Police worldss. Even in the towns where the local Fire Department is a private corporation, they are non-profit, and have no competition. We usually do not put our fire services out to bid, like we do with EMS. One would never see this in Law Enforcement. Yet we take it as the normal state of things in EMS. As for unions, I think the reason they have not taken off in EMS the way they have in Fire & Police departments is related to the above. Profit making corporations are notoriously anti-union, much more so that any branch of government. Union wages and benefits will cut into profit, as will stations, better uniforms, better ambulances. EMS is often seen as little more than a Taxi service, and a free one at that. The system abusers certainly feel that way, some EMT's complain about being that way, and everytime an article appears about the need for more units, it brings up the high number of non-priority calls, that strain the system. Yet we wonder why people do not consider EMS to be essential. As for News coverage, This handles itself in the PD's, because the media is always looking for info. FD's over the years have begun to embrace this trhough the use of PIO's. What has EMS done? How many EMS agencies actively talk with the media? How many issue press releases after major incidents? EMS usually hides behind HIPPA or other confidentiality laws, but in truth there is much that could be released with the specifics edited out, that would show the true nature of EMS to the public, and might help with all the other issues that have lead to the "Third Service" designation.
  7. I am not sure but I think Padraig is the Gaelic form of Patrick, whicich is probably the root of the nick name moving over from one to the other.
  8. That site didn't list two in my area, of course I am interested in Stamford's parade on 2/15, but also the Greenwich parade which is one of the biggest in the area, I think it is actually a week late this year. As for Paddy or Patty, We have a Chaplain who complained about units on the radio saying they were transporting to St. Joe's so we had an order put out that we were not to abbreviate the names of Saints. To be correct it is Saint Patrick's Day. Not to mention the fact that Paddy has been used as a derogotory term for Irish imigrants (but back then it was ok to do that and they were LEGAL).
  9. Once a case move to the Criminal Authorities (Police and ultimately the Courts) the department is often better served by waiting for a verdict. Imagine if there was an internal hearing and he was found guilty on Departmental charges based on the same actions he is awaiting trial for. Then he is found not guilty in court, basically saying he did not do what the department said he did. He now has a civil case against the department. Another way these could effect each other is if the department finds him guilty and that is reported in the media, it could in theory taint the case against him in criminal court. Once again, he may have a civil case against the department. If they wait for the court case(s) to be finished, and he is convicted on any of the three charges, the department has much more to stand on in the Departmental hearing. A convicted Burglar can not be allowed to have to access to peoples homes that we have as emergency responders. A convicted Sexual Offender can not be allowed to have the access to the general public, especially children, or in the case of EMS, to patients that we have as emergency responders. So it is a matter that will not get much debate and justice, while delayed will be definative.
  10. We just bought three pairs of the new Globe boots, I have heard from the guys that got them that they are comfortable. I only heard one complaint and that was from another department. Apparently there is not much of a heel, so when climbing a ladder there is a very small lip and your foot can slip forward on the rung. I haven't worn them myself, so I can't give you anything firsthand, but almost everything I hear is positive.
  11. It is funny that you bring up seniority. I have noticed another aspect of this in the younger generation in addition to not really respecting other members seniority. Once a new guy has the littlest bit of seniority over other new guys, then it becomes important. I recently fielded a complaint from one probationary about another probationary, the nature of the complaint.....the junior of the two sat in the front seat of the pick up truck when going to remove a pump that had been placed earlier by another crew at a basement pump out. The senior of the two thought this was unacceptible because the front seat should go to the senior member on the crew. I thought it was funny that the complaint came to me at all, because first and foremost this should have been handled amongst themselves, or at least with the non-probationary member who was driving the vehicle and was in effect in charge of the crew. But I also think that it is funny that for a generation that generally shuns authority attempting to prevent problems, they are very quick to come to authority to solve all their problems after they occur.
  12. One concern with not hearing the rigs sign on that may be a factor is this. If you are a driver on only some of the aparatus, and you normally go to the station to drive, whicle other memebrs go to the scene, what if all the rigs you can drive have already left? If the department relies on home responders, then in that case redirecting to the scene is the best option. WHile this is not quite a safety concern, more of an operational concern, it could delay some operations. Now if one were to get into a colision while enroute to the wrong location because of this, it would certainly be a tragedy, although I'm not sure there would be anyone to blames other than those involved in the colision. Here is a simple solution, which is (in theory, at least) how we do it in Stamford. We actually have an order out that requires us to repeat all transmissions that change the status of a unit or the incident. This means when E32 signs on, we are supposed to repeat back that E32 is responding, this way anyone going to drive E32 knows it has already been taken. We are also supposed to repeat recalls and closing of Incidents, so that home responders hear this over thier pagers, which don't do well with transmissions form rigs or portables. With the new increased in Automatic Aid we are doing between departments, this repeating has become more critical, in that the Dispatcher is simul-selected on the 800 trunked talk group and the 154 MHz dispatch channel, and there are units from different departments using different channels. The only way they will know they are both responding, is for the Dispatcher to repeat the information. I have already seen this be very important to Chief Officers who can divert to a second incidnet once another closer Chief is responding to the first.
  13. On the subject of knowing streets is also knowing key buildings. We are lucky enough to have a CAD system, which contains the names of most buildings that are known by names. We also have fields for apartment number and floor number. By way of a little backround the apartment field used to be labled APT/SUITE and the floor field used to be labled FLR/BLDG, but is the last update those changed to APT & FLR. Aparently most of my coworkers think that is because all office buildings switched from suites to apartments and all complexes switched from building number to floor numbers even if they are all ground level. Now Downtown Stamford, has more than it's share of office buildings, but so far only one really tall one. The 23 story tower has been the tallest building in Stamford since it was built (although that will change soon). Being that it is such a well know building, I fail to see how anyone can not recognize wither it's street address or landmark name (which is Landmark, oddly enough) yet yesterday I heard a medical call go out to that address and APARTMENT 15 for a male with back pain. First of all there are no apartments inthis building, so I would assume it to be a suite of offices, second of all no mention was made of the building name. Sadly we also get a slew of dispatches for health care facilities with these "Apartments" in stead of room numbers. To me this is nothing more than laziness. The box said APT so that's what I should call it. Don't bother learning anything about the city you work in.
  14. Since this started out as a dispatch thread, I will continue the rant. First of all, let me start by saying that the poor job performance and bad attitudes are killing our profession, however I think they are condoned and in some cases encouraged by the uniform management of the various Police & Fire Departments we work for. Despite all the changes in communications over the years, all the new equipment which has brought with it required new skills, and despite the new training requirements, many of which require periodic refreshing, this is still seen by many as a job for someone who couldn't quite cut it in a real job. A good place for the wives & girlfrinends who just want something to do while the men are at work. As long as that is what departments are seeking, that is all they will get, period. Over my almost 19 years as a dispatcher, I have heard several applicants or relatives of applicants express their lack of respect for the job they were applying for, here are some of my favorites: I am only taking this job until I get on the police/fire department. My sister just got divorced and has been out of the job market for a while, I figure she can do your job. My kid didn't pass the agility so he needs a job, I guess he'll have to be a dispatcher. I see you have ramps up there, my mom is in a wheelchair and she's a nice lady, can you get her an application? I know allot of cops/firemen, I should be great at this job. The latest one I've heard is: I already put in my 20 and I need to retire to something less busy/stressful, so I took your test. At least in my city, when they hire for the uniform jobs they put up posters, assign guys to recruiting, have an application window that lasts months. When they post the Dispatch job, the application window is usually less than 30 days, there is no active recruiting, and the only adds are the required ones in the legal notices section of the paper. If it weren't for members of forums like these (242 Steve & myself) who take it upon themselves to post the job info, the pool would be even smaller. One year they did make a recruitment video, they played it continupusly outside the welfare office and on late night public access. And people wonder why they get poor skills and attitudes. OK, rant done for now.
  15. I remember reading something about this last year, I think it is big on the West Coast. I seem to remember that the big reasons were that high cost of living in major cities and heavy traffic, made even commuting once every 24 hours to be a bad thing. Basically this allowed half the driving commutes, but for longer times, thus allowing members to live further from work. I guess that is OK, if you don't ever plan on needing your off duty members in a hurry. Then again, I work in dispatch and can't imagineworking more than 8 on a regular basis.
  16. Years ago in Stamford, we had a big problem with agencies canceling other services. In some cases this turned into a big turf war, in others the agencies got called back because they were canceled impropperly. This lead to a couple of orders in the Dispatch center that basically do not allow one service to cancel another. There has to be room to adjust to various situations however. The chief example I can think of is UNFOUNDED calls. Especially if multiple services are responding to a reported serious emergency, which turns out to be unfounded or worse maliciously false. Motor Vehicle Colisions (with reported injuries) are a great one for both the pro's and cons of canceling other services. In Stamford these calls get a Police, Fire & EMS Response. Most reports of injuries are from passers by who thought it looked bad and people must therefore be injured. The Police get on scene, all involved say they are not injured, so Police Cancels EMS & FD. A while into the investigation someone suddenly decides they have back and neck pain, which usually coincides with the ticket they just received, so EMS gets called back. Apparently some people think they will not get charged if they go to the hospital. Of course I remember hearing of one where EMS arrived first, found no injuries, canceled FD due to no extrication and left once PD arrived on scene. PD called FD back because the car had struck a building and severed a gas line when it hit. So no agency or service is immune for such problems. What is really needed is a little bit of cross training so that each service is aware of ALL the Duties that the other services are responsible for at scenes. Canceling the service becasue one of the tasks they do is not required is what leads to having to recall the service later in the incident. FD tends to think of PD as traffic control, but often ignores thier investigative role which is usually more important. EMS tends to think of FD as first responders or only for extrication and often ignores the haz mat or supression aspects, especially if it is ignition prevention and not supression that is needed. Everybody tends to think of EMS as a transport service, and ignores the fact that each potential patient is actually assessed and thsoe that refuse are RMA'd thus forgetting the triage part of the scene, especially if the incident does nto start out as a medical call. The sad thing is that our egos will not allow this kind of awareness training, simply because we all like to think that we know it all in our respective fields and attending such classes would be admiting to a shortcomming, or worse, yielding land in the ongoing turf war.
  17. Since EMT is based on Federal DOT standards, and especially now with the advent of many states using or encouraging NREMT, why does anyone have to sit for an exam when seeking reciprocity? Shouldn't verification of certification be enough?
  18. Grandfather clauses are nto a bad thing. Yes they allow some people to get away with less training, but those people will eventually phase themselves out. While I think that 36 hours is painfully inadequate, that is probably what brought this around in the first place. I bet you if we really look at it every one of our departments do more than 24 hourse of training a year, after all that's only 2 hours a month. I bet you most departments offer 3-4 times that amount at a minimum. The real key here is enforceing the attendance. I will bet however that it will not cause any reduction in less active members for at least 3 years, becasue that's how long it will take for people to realize they are no longer certified. I also wonder if you can make up hours in other years, so it this realy a 72 hours in three years requirement, that will average out to 24 each year? Either way I think this is a posative move, as long as the training is still fire training and does not get bogged down with two may lectures.
  19. So what we have is a bunch of idiots doing something stupid and actually filming it. Despite all the posturing and bashing in both directions here, not a single post has defended these morons. Drinking at or after a parade really has nothing to do with Career or Volunteer (I've been at parades and hoisted a cold one with friends who were Career Firefighters and who were Volunteer Firefighters). So leave this open for everyone to see, because this thread says allot about who we are, in that the posts are mostly calling for increased responsibility and respect. This thread, like so many others before it, will die a natural death without much fanfare.
  20. OK, now my perspective is as a Firefighter who is also an EMT, and I only use my EMT for First Responder call with the FD, but I do think there is another factor with EMS training and how it differs from FD training. Think about this, once you get Firefighter I, there is no recertification requirement. Yes there are certain other classes we need to recert on, but as far as basic firefighting we are left on our own to develop and deliver ongoing trianing. In most States there is a State Academy that develops and delivers specialized courses. But when we think of ongoing training at the basic and intermediate level this is almost always inhouse training, which I am not at all against. Within EMS, there are recertification requirements, and at some levels CME requirements. What I think happens here is that agencies get all caught up in the mandatory training, and a few advanced classes (ACLS, PTLS, ect.) that there is no real initiative to work on much else at the department or regional level. So there is noone working on good solid on going hands on training, because there is so much to lecture about in EMS. Usually if someone does come up with a class they start a training company to provide it and charge a fee. While I am not against anyone making money, we really need to sit down some day and decide to stop screwing each other with high priced training that forces departments to limit how many can attend, if they let any at all. Look at what it costs to go to any of the national conferences, now try to do that out of pocket or send more that a couple of members there. Another factor is since EMS is not really it's own agency, it is usually under the State Dept. of Health, they are very oriented towards classroom lectures, since they also train other healthcare providers. They are really not as well suited as a fire academy is to provide real world hands on training. And fire academies are by nature fire oriented, so any EMS classes they hold are an aside to the real business of fire training.
  21. I suppose that LA Fire Authority is one of those things like the LCPD that TJ Hooker was in.
  22. I remember it, the thing I thought was strange was that the Pilot son was also the Tillerman if the chopper was not needed. It was an all right show, but basically it was Bonanza in a Firehouse instead of a Ranch.
  23. First red engines and now this...what ever happened to tradition? Next you'll abandon the trolley schedule as a basis for the shift change.
  24. I have had the benefit of traveling a few years ago and seeing a fair amount of dispatch centers around the country. pretty much they all seem to work the same way, the call comes into the center, the information is entered on to a computer or a paper form, the response is looked up, and the call is dispatched. Several factors can delay this process and some of those factors are never tracked. In a case with multiple PSAP's like New Canaan, a call comes into one center and is transfered to another, this is a fairly quick process but can take time depending on call volume at either end. This is the way allot of EMS agencies get their calls. Once the call is answered in the dispatch agency, there can be a wide variable of processing time depaending on call type/priority, call volume, and even dispatcher skill (some of us don't type as fast as others). There may be problems with the caller, either hard to understand or hard to get actual information from. Often it takes several tries to get the location of the incident out of them. As for looking the response up, this can be manual on a card system or automatic on a computer, but there are also delay factors, if one excedes what was planned for. Years ago when setting up run cards in Stamford, one of the fire departments did not provide anyone past 2nd due on the cards, because they weren't planning on a 3rd alarm. This is exactly when we don't need to be calling the IC on one fire and ask him what he wants on another fire, so not having a ready resource can delay it while a better answer is figured out. Thankfully we fixed this problem in 1999 when setting up the new CAD system, but there are still times when lack of resources leads one to come up with non traditional dispatches. As for pre-alerts there is little easy way to do this except for the first due company, and if you think about it the times we really need to speed up dispatching is when the second and third due are now comming in first due. I did hear about a career department somewhere in the mid west (I don't remember where), that the dispatchers would just say over the radio "Pre Alert for [Address] and give the street address, not even the nature of the call. They would not even alert the stations at this step, but that way units in the field or anyone listening to the radio would know a call was comming in. Then the responding stations were alerted and the full announcement was made. While this is a neat idea, I think it could actually add to any delays by adding an extra step into the process.