Scottyk107

FDNY does not regularly do this. The FDNY prides itself on aggressive interior attack.
As far as the discussion goes, making conditions more tenable sounds great except, 75% of fire victims die from smoke inhalation. Flowing water through a window to make conditions more "tenable" for firefighters to enter won't save victims. Getting them out of the building will. Since when does a firefighter put the rescue of a civilian at the bottom of the list? The training of firefighters is about developing skills. Firefighters are taught to put out fires from the interior advancing through a structure a certain way. These are just the basics and the basics take time and is not something that is taught in 5 minutes. Firefighters who have battled fires from the inside learn from experience and repetition how to do it better and more effective which allows firefighters to have the skill levels to extinguish fires from inside. When a firefighter shoots a stream through a window all of the skill development is over. There is no skill level to that and only lowers our skills and is a fire service failure. Another example of fire service failure is that we still have firefighters who cannot operate a 2.5 inch line due to poor technique and education.
"A fire department that writes off civilians faster than an express line of 6 reasons or less is not progressive, it's dangerous, because it's run by fear. Fear does not save lives, it endangers them." -- Lt. Ray McCormack FDNY
http://www.firehouse.com/blog/10631380/transitional-attack-is-whack

It's not exactly the trivial thing that you seem to be inferring. I don't have a specific term to throw out there, but here's an example to help you understand the argument.
Let's say that everyone who belongs to a fire department is titled "firefighter" regardless of what role they perform or don't perform. Using that same logic, everybody who works for a hospital can be titled "doctor" regardless of what role they perform or don't perform. We don't do this because titles do matter. The titles doctor, nurse, ER tech, janitor, aide, etc. help the patients and staff distinguish between the different roles and what they each contribute to the overall operation. So, if you are sick and in need of a doctor, you wouldn't want a "doctor" (aka janitor) to treat you.
If you polled the average citizen on what a "firefighter" is and what their expectations for them are, it won't be that they just drive or just help outside if that person's house was on fire and a loved one was trapped inside. Therefore, using the title "firefighter" for all members is misleading in the same fashion that "doctor" doesn't mean the person who pushes the broom down the hallways of the hospital.

I just came back from Detroit, I talked to guys who were at the Buhl building fire June 11 1982.(google) has a few pics of a 16 foot roof ladder lashed to the tip of a 100 stick, and the boys getting a 50 extension ladder to the tip of another 100 aerial to make multiple rescues.

Well said.

I'll bite. I really don't correlate those who propose safe fireground practices with writing off civilians. Most fire service leaders who advocate these changes are doing their jobs and looking to protect their members. The thought that our attempt to be safe on the fireground is killing or going to kill more civilians in fires is backed up by what? They are dying because they don't have working smoke detectors. The fact is the vast majority of fireground traumatic fatalities occur when there was no legitimate civilian life hazard. Are there savable civilians who die in fires? Probably but I doubt the cause is a safety mindset in the fire service. If we could get some departments on scene faster and train all our members to be on their A game when they get off the rig we'd be better serving the civilians that count on us. When the homeowner meets you on the lawn and says everyone is out should get treated differently then when you pull up and 3AM and no one meets you. Those the preach things like aggressive search regardless of intelligence gathered during size-up are pandering to the group that wants to hear that. I get it we all want be aggressive and fight fires but being a professional is not about doing want we want to do but doing what we should be do.

The difference between this picture and the use of Pompier ladders for confidence building is the design. One is used as it was designed and when used properly distributes the forces in a safe manner, so on top of being a confidence builder and physical ability test, it's also a decent lesson on distribution of forces. The aerial/ground ladder bridge is being used to defy the forces for which either ladder was designed and thus the lesson will hurt.

1) More about force than weight. Was it designed to have force in that direction? A number of ladder failures in the past were when one side was against the building and the other was not, as you crawl out does the weigh shift multiply because of the "level" you have created?
That's one reason why replaceable tips came into existence. Also many depts. do not test or do not care.
We had a catastrophic ladder failure in the 1990's and the litigation was in our favor because it was being used as designed and we had 100% compliance with the manufacturers maintenance policies and a recertification test 4 weeks before the failure.
2) we still train with them (but have not carried them in over 30 years). And you climbed or went home.

I'm in agreement with your overall view, but with regard to the original post photo I think the risk is too great, as the real "reward" is merely a confidence measure. Many of us have done things beyond our training, some more often than others, but there will always be that time that a little more length is needed, you need to crawl that much further, the heat is just above what most would consider safe to endure. These one-offs will always exist and we will never be able to train everyone for every eventuality. What we can do is train beyond the everyday routine to ensure we're ready, but we do owe it to our families and the families of those who work for us to not accept undo risk when the reward is not directly in front of us.
The only thing that picture proves to me is that some people will do anything they're told. Does anyone believe the rest of the fire service that doesn't take part in this kind of "confidence testing" really all "Sally's"? There is something to be said for a person who has enough presence of mind, self-confidence and sense to hesitate and question some orders, not all of us are 100% right 100% of the time.

This tactic does seem risky and I really cannot think of any practical use for it. That said, if I had to think outside the box and rig this contraption together in an effort to save my own life or rescue a fallen firefighter, then I'd climb across it. It can be done...it shouldn't be done...but it can be done...
Now comes the double-edged sword...If it can be done, do you practice the tactic so that firefighters know this is feasible even though it is not recommended? Or is it too dangerous to even train on this tactic? I probably would have thrown a safety line on the guy at the bare minimum if it were me running the training! God forbid one of these guys gets hurt while practicing it though...lawsuit waiting to happen!

I see your point of view regarding "if you had to... you could".... But this seems too risky to train on for me. No harness, not tied off, and you are putting a level of stress on the ladder that it wasn't designed to hold. I'm not an expert on ground ladder capacities and testing, but the strength of the ground ladder is dependent on much of the force being transmitted down to the ground. In this case 100% of the force is being transmitted the opposite way.... The exact same way that aerial devices typically fail.

Holy crap. That roof ladder is almost vertical. The players in that photo would be a great subject of a "where are they now" to see how that changed their lives beyond needing new undies.

This is one out of Ft. Lauderdale in the 80's.

This is one out of Ft. Lauderdale in the 80's.

Have seen this floating around on various social media sites today as well. From what I can gather the picture is as stated from a Louisville, KY probie class and is called the ladder bridge. It sounds like it is also practiced in Detroit as well. Some photos of rescues from Detroit, FDNY, and South Florida have also surfaced with some variation of a ladder, anywhere from a 50 foot extension to a short roof ladder, added to the aerial in some variation for extra reach.

Thanks X4093k. Its a 2012 Quantum, with a 70 gallon CAFS system run off the cascade system.

Thanks X4093k. Its a 2012 Quantum, with a 70 gallon CAFS system run off the cascade system.

Thanks X4093k. Its a 2012 Quantum, with a 70 gallon CAFS system run off the cascade system.

Thanks X4093k. Its a 2012 Quantum, with a 70 gallon CAFS system run off the cascade system.

Thanks X4093k. Its a 2012 Quantum, with a 70 gallon CAFS system run off the cascade system.

Nothing against the hard work of the moderators (particularly in this case FDNY 10-75) But this section is hurting the quality of EMTBravo.
I enjoy seeing what depts are getting. but this is just filler. This morning 80% of the recent board is about rigs being delivered or that might be put out to bid. With half the info either unknown or TBD.
Meanwhile it replaced, a LODD thread, Chains, Grants and other great threads.
If posters have real info on a new rig great, lets see. But this is just filler and is taking away from what makes EMTbravo great.
Rant over.

We received a post- arrest the other night in the local ER. She (a dialysis pt who missed her rx due to the winter storm) called 911 saying she couldn't breathe and "was probably having a heart attack." 2 minutes later PD broke down her door and found her asystolic-- started CPR. 2 more minutes later ALS arrived and loaded a few rounds of Epi and Atropine into her. Got a pulse. Gave 1 more of Epi and 1 more of Atropine. Scrambled her to me in the local ER with a pulse of 40 (mostly ectopic, med-based beats). We immediatley began the hypothermia protocol (AKA Code Cool).
Fast forward: 2 days.
She was warmed back up in our ICU from 93 degrees to 98 degrees and was extubated the day after. 2 days later she was extubated and asked ME, the one who received her and wrote her off as non-viable, ""What the Hell was I thinking bothering you people with my medical problems??? I'm so sorry I bothered you all!"
WE broke her ribs, tore her lip tubing her, and jammed lines and tubes all over the place in her tiny body, and she's apologizing to ME. This is why I do this. Beyond words. Seriously. There's so rarely a save post-arrest, and if the person survives, he/she rarely comes out of it as much more than a plant on a window sill. And she thanked ME.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, all. NEVER forget why you do what you do and NEVER assume your efforts are fruitless. This woman was proof to me to always the assume the outcome is going to be a GOOD ONE.

there are two mobile training uits, as far as I know. One in staten island and one in queens. They allow co's to stay in the districts and still do hands-on training, instead of being OOS for many hrs going to "the rock". Both were funded by their respective Borough President budgets.With so many co's OOS daily for educational day;training at rock; company medicals;special multi-unit drills, the hope is to keep co's skill levels up, while staying IS for fire duty. With the upcoming brownouts of 20 companies (or worse) at night, these units are a help.