mstrang1

Geppetto- You forgot about Truck 5(the old tower ladder)

How many hundreds of thousands of dollars and man hours have spent by Greenburgh "looking into" this? It seems like they are just doing this to line peoples pockets. They never seem to make any changes, just spend money and time.

My bad. I looked up New Windsor FD(in NY), but the one in Maryland came up and I did not look closely enough to recognize the difference. Just for the record, how many runs did NWFD do last year?

Actually, this is VERY relevant. Population density has a direct relationship with call volume. From another post on this website "FDNY 489,354 total incidents. 213,292 EMS Runs. 26,595 Structure Fires." NWFD (from their own website) "269 Fire Calls. 502 EMS." Way different worlds.

NWFD- Doing a quick search, I found the population density of New Windsor is about 650 per square mile. New York City has a population density of 27,532/sq mi. That is 42 TIMES more dense than New Windsor. A 10 minute response time covers maybe a few hundred thousand people. This IS a big deal.

EMS- They did it precisely BECAUSE the GOP would vote it down. If they don't put it to a vote, it is their fault. If they put it to a vote and the GOP votes it down, then the GOP are the a$$holes who voted against, as W called them repeatedly, "Americas Heroes." It is just a political return-fire.

?Did you throw out your boxers at the scene, or once you got back to the firehouse?

Just an eye opener about what could happen if that semi was half a lane to the right. The engine would have been totaled, probably running over the four guys standing in front of the engine plus whoever else was around. I am not sure how far, or even if, the engine got pushed forward. A lot of people are under the impression that the engine will stop everything, but in this case the truck kept going for some distance beyond the engine, right past the pump panel.

No firefighters, but the Trooper had to get stitches as a result of injuries from flying debris.

RIP Lou.

RIP Brothers.

Dispatch informed LR Fire that "the alarm company is trying to cancel." That is when they canceled all units except for Banksville FD. When Unit 4 (SFRD Deputy Chief Smith) asked for clarification, dispatch asked Engine 71(LRFCo)and they again reiterated that they were canceling all units. After U4 responded "Received, what could happen?", Engine 71 responded to the call. Turns out the call was a false alarm, and was handled by Banksville's Chief. There was a delay in confirming through 60 control if Banksville was responding. In my experience, citizens should not be relied on for canceling at any time. One time I pulled up to a house with smoke puffing out of the eaves with the homeowner standing at the door yelling its a false alarm! We calmly asked her to step outside and look up! It is Long Ridge Fire Cos. responsibility to ensure that the call is handled appropriately. They did not know what resources were responding from Banksville FD. No Banksville engine ever made it to the scene as far as I could tell. How would it look if it was an actual fire in their own district that they did not respond to?! Now I am a firefighter in an urban area, but I imagine a hay filled stable in the extreme heat of the summer is something that can burn easily and quickly and should not be taken lightly. Upon questioning, maybe in the always reliable Stamford Advocate, Bennett said it was probably due to the result of extreme heat.

RIP, Cap.

Stamford Fire and Rescue does not have the squrt anymore. At one point, we had two of them, and both have been sold off a few years ago.

Did anyone happen to make it to the last line of the article, stating that the city will be paying 2 MILLION A MONTH in OT costs if they do not hire a class?! I have a 2 suggestions, a) If this judge thinks that every fdny test is biased, why doesn't the all wise garaufis create an unbiased test himself? and maybe he can find the 2 million a month to pay for his decision?

Happy Birthday and Congratulations!!!!

RIP, Brothers.

RIP. I never met your Dad, but if he was your biggest influence, you turned out well enough to know what kind of man your dad was.

RIP Brother

RIP Brother. My condolences go out to everyone from Rye FD and FDNY.

Alpine- Just to clarify or correct a few points you made, FLSA says that you are not allowed to volunteer at the same place that you are employed. Under the old system, any of the career guys that came to calls when they were off duty got 4 hour minimum overtime pay. For every call that they made it to. That amounted to A LOT of taxpayer money. That is a Federal Law, not a IAFF Bylaw. Under the old system, and still currently, there are 3 firefighters and 1 fire captain assigned to E7 (Springdale), not 3 as you mentioned. Your math on the proposed system still has me confused. You are saying that there will be 18 FFs per shift, but they are only looking to employ 60+1 people (the 1 is the paid chief), giving you 15 FFs with a 4 group system. So either there will 3 overtime positions EVERY SHIFT BEFORE VACATION, SICK, IOD, etc or the manpower will not be as you say. In addition, you assume that there will be at least 1 volunteer available. I beg to differ. I was assigned to E7 for 6 months, and very rarely saw a firefighter (only Chief Fahan oftentimes) show up for a call. I work quite often at E8 and E9 and during the day they MIGHT get 1 or 2 younger members out in the Explorer for a medical, sometimes R66 gets out with 2 people on it. That is not spin, that is what I have seen. I am not sure where you are a volunteer, but if it is TOR or Springdale, please show me NFIRS reports for the last month, and I will compare them to E7, E8 and E9 reports. Springdale has not done an NFIRS report since 2003. That means that, according to the state law, they have not responded on a single call since 2003. TOR has gotten out for some calls, but by all means not all of them, not even in the utility. In your final paragraph you talk about volunteers riding out on SFRD apparatus. SFRD has allowed this for years at E7, as long as you had permission from the DC on duty. A few years ago, a young, energetic Springdale member (and member of this board), rode out with Engine 7 on at least one call. That member was reprimanded by Chief Fahan, and soon thereafter, was either thrown out or forced to resign (unsure of which). If you were to look at SFRD SOGs, that one is still in there, but I don't think anyone will want to ride along for fear of retribution. You say that it is not insurmountable, but it is not just SFRD that has to climb that mountain. It is the volunteers (Chiefs mostly) who have to stop shooting themselves in the foot.

Yes, being able to cross staff for ToR is very important because they are the only stick, and their rescue covers the Merritt. It would be nice to staff Belltown's rescue and Tower, too. Cross-staffing does bring the RIGHT allotment of apparatus to a scene, and with multiple stations responding with their career members, and the volunteers, you have your manpower. Also, they are not all drivers. Only 1 man on a 3 man crew drives. Alpine- Cross staffing is not truly a viable option. You are assuming a 3 man crew in all stations, although I see nothing in the Mayors plan that supports this, and the math does not totally add up. There will be 6 stations(2LR, 2 TOR, 1 BFD, 1 SPFD) manned by 61 "career" firefighters". Assuming there are 4 shifts, that means it will be 15 per shift divided between these 6 houses. That means that if they all are staffed equally, that is 2.5 guys per house. So if the scenario is a fire in the current Long Ridge district, you would get option 1) 2 guys each on 2 engines from the LR houses, 1 guy on the tanker from TOR, 1 on the truck, and 2 guys from the other TOR house. We also have that ".5" per house to figure in. But that works out to 8 (maybe 10) guys riding on about 5 apparatus. That is about half drivers, and barely enough to satisfy 2 in 2 out. Option 2) 1 guy on each engine out of each LR house (4 guys-3 engines/1 tanker) and and the 4.5 guys from TOR houses staff tanker (1 guy), truck (1 or 2 guys), rescue (1 guy). That leaves possibly 1 guy to be a second man on one of those apparatus. That option gives you 8 or 9 guys on 7 pieces of apparatus. Either of these options does not have a proper ratio of firefighter to apparatus ratio. It depends on the volunteers to show up to every call, or failing that, Mutual Aid from SFRD, Pound Ridge, New Canaan, etc. In regards to cross staffing, if all the members take the rescue, and oops, you need the truck, what now?

Alpine- With the Mayors plan, what you essentially get is manpower that would cross-staff the rescue, ladder and tanker and engines. Currently Long Ridge does not have a ladder or rescue in their district, so I am assuming you are talking about TOR stations. So, under the Mayors plan, at a fire you may get engines, a tanker, ladder and rescue staffed by the 6 or 8 paid personnel in those current districts, but they are all drivers (deja vu?). That is what the Mayor says will be the response for a house fire in the current Long Ridge district. Cross-staffing does nothing to help put a fire out, it just brings more apparatus with no manpower (See recent NIST report). Chief Browns plan does have only staffed engines in both Long Ridge houses and Engine 5 (actually a decently equipped Quint) at TOR Sta. 1. This plan allowed for the volunteers inclusion as "support" for engine company work, including tanker, rescue, and truck work. In most career departments, these are sought after riding assignments for senior and well trained members, and should be treated by the volunteers this way.

Rest in Peace.

NFD- close on my name, but I'll take it. The City actually DID do something. They spent 3 years, 100s of thousands of taxpayers dollars, days in Court, etc. to just go back to the same system, but worse. Hard to believe it could be worse than the old system but, yes it can! Now there will be another level of Chief-dom, and a new tax district and Commissioners as well! All of the previous employees in these districts, except LRFCo, are now part of SFRD and Local 786. So they will be starting from scratch up there.