New discussion on coordination on the fire ground

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Kurt Callisen on November 27, 2008 at 12:49pm

Michael, I agree that the 21/2 is not used as much as it should be. But i would still use the 13/4 for this fire. I have been to a few basement fires in this very type of house. The stairs are narrow and the basement is small, the 150 gpm are line puts out should cover this basement. That being said the 2nd line would be 21/2 to the top of the stairs.

Michael Bricault said:

-Kurt, you're absolutely correct in stating that manpower is an issue in this video. That lack of manpower directly contributes to a lack of adequate ventilation taking place before the line or any personnel enter the environment.
-Aggressive venting may but a trapped victim some precious time, although it appears that the search was not addressed in a timely enough fashion so as to be effectual. Efforts appear to be concentrated on suppression. But, this may be a false impression created by the video. That being said, again this is a manpower and prioritization issue.
-Furthermore, in a known basement fire situation, ventilation on the entry level should become a priority so as to allow companies the ability of evaluating the floor they intend to traverse.
-Having fought basement fires, especially one as developed as in the video, I will respectfully disagree with you on the size of the line being used. The 1 3/4 just doesn't have the reach, penetration or punch for a quick and complete knockdown.
-I will fall back on the old adage that, if the fire has control of more than two residential sized rooms (which it appears to have) or for fires in basements or of an undetermined size and location then stretch the big lines.
-All to often firefighters are to comfortable stretching the 1 3/4 because of its pre-connected ease of use and speed of deployment, sacrificing the speed of true knockdown performed in a much safer fashion with a 2 1/2.
-Todays firefighters need to reacquaint themselves with one of the most potent weapons available to them; the 2 1/2 line and dispel the false impression that large fires are knocked down with the 1 3/4. In many instances the fire is actually kept in check and prevented from spreading while it consumes all the fuel in the fire compartment. It comes back to basic GPM's vs. BTU's. What many firefighters think is a knockdown is in fact a slow holding mission.
-We cannot be afraid or reluctant to stretch the big lines. If it causes concern then training is needed.
-Can two firefighters stretch and operate the 2 1/2 hand line? Sure, if they are familiar and well rehearsed in its use. Three firefighters would be far better, safer and much faster
-On another note, we do agree on the low priority of roof ventilation in this video.
-Stay safe,
-BRICK

Permalink Reply by Jim Mason on December 8, 2008 at 3:49pm

These basments are tough to get down for sure. An 1 3/4 would be guessing that the basemnt had some walls in it so we could take each room as it's own little fire. If not, we would be throwing water for a while before entry into it.
Do you think they had an idea that the fire was there to begin with? It seems like they went straight for the first fire they saw, the living room. The investigation for the seat of the fire is one of the most important parts of the operation, but also protecting the search for the bedrooms on the second floor needs to be addressed. The line went in but know one in the video went past the hose line to get upstairs.
With the limited manning on the scene what would be the first thing to do - check for fire in the basement or knock down the fire in the living room so the search could get to the bedrooms upstairs? That's the decission here.

Permalink Reply by Michael Bricault (ret) on December 8, 2008 at 4:20pm

Jim, I think a good size up here would have been worth its weight in gold. However, in defense of the department in the clip, it looks like staffing is a huge problem and they therefore must prioritize very carefully.

From what can be seen in the video (and they are deceptive sometimes) it would appear that you are correct; no one goes past the living room fire. My personal belief is that aggressive horizontal ventilation would have been the most beneficial thing (on so many different levels) one of these members could have done while the other was stretching the 1 3/4. This venting would have probably allowed the vent member to discover the basement fire. There are basement windows visible in the clip.

The decision of attacking/venting the fire vs performing a search first will be dependent on staffing, their experience/training level as well as available information and the impressions of the company on scene as to the severity of the fire and the Rescue Profile created on scene.
For those in larger FDs this will be made somewhat easier due to available manpower (though there is never enough anymore) and their training/experience levels. This really illustrates that departments that are not as large or fortunate with staffing must really put extra effort into slowing down and doing a proper size up.

A captain once told me, "Firemen don't respond to emergencies; they solve problems". This has been a principle that helps put firefighters in too the proper frame of mind, slowing them down and taking them out of hyper drive. Slowing down, not slow. Just not frenzied rushing around like many of us have seen on the fire ground.

There are instances where the fire must be ignored while rescues are performed. Then there will be times when the fire must be addressed before anything else can happen. Hence the reason for the proper size; especially when strapped by manpower.

Deferring to the video again, it looks to me like these firefighters were a little overly focused on the fire; ie suffering from tunnel vision. Why else would they have not have taken the time to perform ventilation of the front window BEFORE entering? Especially since they are already standing there.

The bottom line Jim is that you are correct in your observations that these guys would have benefitted from a thorough size up which may very well have saved them time, effort and even prevented unnecessary damage in the latter stages.

Stay safe, BRICK

Permalink Reply by Jim Mason on December 11, 2008 at 4:12pm

Doug
I'm full of gas and loaded for bear with my bad brain farts. That's a good vent program you guys have. I bet it works well.
Good job on putting the fire out in this one!
How about this for a question on this one - would you have a second line placed to back up the first line in the basement? and if so, how and who?

Doug Ott said:

Jim, I wasn't my intention to skip the first floor during my venting of the 2nd floor windows. I just didn't include the 1st in my ramblings. My thoughts on venting the 2nd floor windows was as an alternative to cutting open the roof.
Typically when we actually have fires, the officer does a 360 of the building while the engineer and the back-step fireman grab the irons and stretch the initial attack line. While the officer is circling the building he would look at the windows and see which one has self-vented, has the most smoke staining or has the darkest/fastest smoke issuing from the seams and vent that window prior to our entry. I believe this practice came from our lower manpower days when we had 3 engine houses and 3 personnel (including the officer) on the trucks.
And back to venting the 2nd floor windows: I know the fire might travel up to the second floor by opening it up, but I was hoping to prevent that by having the second hose-line placed at the stairs. And if we were to take the first line through an outside opening, have the second line team close the interior door to the basement stairs and stage there for protection.
After reading your reply and thinking about it some more, it would be a beautiful thing to vent windows as we search. That was a bad brain-fart on my part.

Thanks again for everything that you all share. Stay safe, Doug

Jim Mason said:

Doug
We're all on the same team here and none of us are experts.

I like what you say when you would go in the outside entrance to get to the basement fire. It looks like the fire is down there. This would get us down into the basement below the heat on the basemnet ceiling before we enter that level.

How about the venting plan. Would you skip the 1st floor and move the open ing of windows on the second floor?
Do you think the fire might travel up through the building if the second floor were vented?

When we are searching we vent windows from inside. This way we can monitor the conditions and search for life and fire.
Whe the hos eline is moving into a room with fire we vent from the outside so the engine can move into the room. Is this how you guys do it? Or do you hve a different plan of coordination?


Doug Ott said:

I'm not the smartest person when it comes to tactics so I'm mostly posting this to get everyone's comments to see if I'm on the right track.

I would've taken the hoseline in the front door as they had, only it would be charged. We use Task Force Tips fog nozzles on 2 of our attack lines and they seem to do a great job as we pump them for a minimum of 150 gpm on an 1-3/4. We have an additional 1-3/4 with a SabreJet combination fog/solid bore (with all due respect to Akron, I think I'd rather have a standard solid bore instead). Our largest attack line is a 2" with a TFT. I would have the basement windows and exterior basement door (if present) opened. I would also have the front window of the half-story laddered and taken out and cleared. If there is a rear window on the half-story then the same treatment would be given to that one as well. The hoseline would be taken to the interior stairs that lead to the basement if conditions allowed, if not then attack through the exterior basement door. The second hose-line would follow the first but be in position to protect the interior stairs while a team performed the primary search. Hopefully everything goes as planned and everyone goes home. I think with the staffing level in the district for which I am lucky to work, this is do-able.

I still haven't been sold on performing roof ventilation on basement fires. I'm more comfortable using the windows instead if they are of adequate number and size. From what I saw that appeared to be an older structure. If the fire hasn't entered the wall space then by opening the roof and the rafter space it just seems you'd be inviting the fire to travel up that way instead of out a basement opening.

It seemed that by opening up that front window the way they did without water flowing on the fire from the interior basement stairs that they brought the fire up to them. I think I would've left that window intact and take my chances with taking out the upper ones.

That's all I'm going to blabber out for now. Let me know what you think. I have a lot to learn and am really enjoying this site.

Thank you all and stay safe,

Doug

Permalink Reply by Jim Mason on December 11, 2008 at 4:38pm

Mike
We like to let the fire do what it wants to do but only when there is not a chnace that there are vicitms Endagered. that was whatt some of the questions were on another of the threads here when there was a backdraft on the film. Guys, that haven't sen a bachdraft or a flashover are nervous about them, and rightly so. But they are a fact of firefighting and they can be worked with. We just don;t want to get caught up in them. Let it do what it wants , but not so we're in there. So venting aggressively is good with that in mind. What do you think?

Permalink Reply by Jim Mason on December 11, 2008 at 4:46pm

Yeah Brick,
I think they might have sized up better. Being from a large dept. I think we have a luxury not only that we have a lot of fires to "practice " on, but that we have alot of FF's show up at each event. I think that smaller depts need to be great at size up and assigning available resources because there aren't that many available to begin with. We have that when a single engine company shows up first to a good fire and is working without help for a few minutes. That's when it is really challenging, the first five minutes.

Michael Bricault said:

Jim, I think a good size up here would have been worth its weight in gold. However, in defense of the department in the clip, it looks like staffing is a huge problem and they therefore must prioritize very carefully.

From what can be seen in the video (and they are deceptive sometimes) it would appear that you are correct; no one goes past the living room fire. My personal belief is that aggressive horizontal ventilation would have been the most beneficial thing (on so many different levels) one of these members could have done while the other was stretching the 1 3/4. This venting would have probably allowed the vent member to discover the basement fire. There are basement windows visible in the clip.

The decision of attacking/venting the fire vs performing a search first will be dependent on staffing, their experience/training level as well as available information and the impressions of the company on scene as to the severity of the fire and the Rescue Profile created on scene.
For those in larger FDs this will be made somewhat easier due to available manpower (though there is never enough anymore) and their training/experience levels. This really illustrates that departments that are not as large or fortunate with staffing must really put extra effort into slowing down and doing a proper size up.

A captain once told me, "Firemen don't respond to emergencies; they solve problems". This has been a principle that helps put firefighters in too the proper frame of mind, slowing them down and taking them out of hyper drive. Slowing down, not slow. Just not frenzied rushing around like many of us have seen on the fire ground.

There are instances where the fire must be ignored while rescues are performed. Then there will be times when the fire must be addressed before anything else can happen. Hence the reason for the proper size; especially when strapped by manpower.

Deferring to the video again, it looks to me like these firefighters were a little overly focused on the fire; ie suffering from tunnel vision. Why else would they have not have taken the time to perform ventilation of the front window BEFORE entering? Especially since they are already standing there.

The bottom line Jim is that you are correct in your observations that these guys would have benefitted from a thorough size up which may very well have saved them time, effort and even prevented unnecessary damage in the latter stages.

Stay safe, BRICK

Permalink Reply by Mike Kuryla IV on December 11, 2008 at 7:02pm

Ok, This is my first reply every as I am new to this. To answer Jim's questions I think they had a poor choice in ventilation from what I saw in the video. It does look as they had a line going to the rear, which may have been the 1st line off the eng. Looking at the house I would guess the that the basement stairs are right by the rear entrance of the house, and the front stairs are straight ahead of the front door with probably a bathroom at the top of the staris and 2 rooms one left, and one right. I think the members going in the front door should have waited for water in the line before making entry, or at least waited to get water before they took the picture window. As for personal being used adequately yes and no. They may have been limited to the amout of guys the got on the still. It looks to me that the seat of the fire is in the basement towards the front of the house. You hear radio traffic telling the members of a h*** in the floor, and if you keep an eye on the picture window you can see fire comming out of the h*** on the 1st floor. It does not look like they guys made it past the front door when they went back in due to the h***. As for going the the roof I would have not been up there, and would of used the guys to go the the 2nd floor and search for victims and fire spread. As for going with the 1 3/4 line I think if they made a good push down the basement stairs they may have got a good knock on the fire. If not they may have been able to back out and hit it through the outside windows. At this point not being able to make entry I would hope a 2 1/2 is pulled to back up the pre-connect. Hopefully I made some sence in this and im looking forward to some replys. Mike Kuryla

Permalink Reply by Doug Ott on December 12, 2008 at 12:22am

The Mike's (Walker & Kuryla) are right, there is a line going to the back. If you look along side 4 (I'm still not used to the ABC thing yet) you can see it snake into the neighbor's yard then into a door on the 3-4 corner, so it does appear that the first charged line is into the basement. Maybe that's how the fire got to the first floor after they gave it some fresh air from the open front door and somewhat vented window. The basement line possibly pushed it that way since it appeared to be it's largest vent opening at the time.

Jim, Thanks for opening my eyes on the additional line for the basement guys. I'd still have the 2nd line taken inside to protect the interior stairs and a 3rd line follow the 1st. I would have them stand-by at the basement entrance so that the already tight quarters aren't made tighter. As far as how and who, bear with me, this could get long.

Our typical residential 1st-alarm consists of our 5 trucks (2 quints, 3 pumpers) and a mutual aid truck (usually a pumper). 1st truck stretches the line to the rear basement entrance as the officer does his 360 and takes out the appropriate basement windows. 2nd truck usually assists with water supply, sometimes it's just the driver of that truck assisting the first with making the hydrant if it's close, otherwise more of that crew may be involved if it's a longer lay, usually a forward lay, but after typing that out I can see where a reverse lay by the 2nd pumper would free up a man for other tasks. Anyway, I'm thinking the 2nd truck to take the 2nd line inside and protect the interior stairs(with the basement door closed). I was thinking of having the 2nd crew perform the upper window venting and performing the search with tools and a water can instead, but after seeing how much fire came up the stairs I think I'd end up with that crew getting chased back out of those windows by fire. Depending on how confident the officer was of that crew, I could see leaving a guy or two with the line at the stairs while the remainder perform the initial search on the 1st floor. If that crew is aggressive and gets both tasks done I'd have the 3rd crew stretch the 3rd line (2nd line for the basement). If not I'd have the 3rd truck perform the vent/search. Instead of how it was performed in my initial post, I think I'll have that crew search the first floor initially since it's directly above the fire and vent as they search then move up to the 2nd floor and have the 4th truck take care of the 3rd line. 5th truck would take care of any utilities they could outside, usually the gas since we don't mess with pulling the electric meter, then they would set up for RIT. 6th truck would be in personnel staging. And looking at how many crews I have tied up it probably wouldn't be a bad idea to consider calling for one or two more trucks.
As far as the use of the 2 quints, I'm probably not going to worry about the use of the aerials unless it becomes defensive. It appears that this house is easily handled with ground ladders. Of course at least one would hopefully be parked out front.
I've read through what I've typed a couple of times so hopefully it's, at least, just a little murky. Let me know what I missed.

Have fun, Doug

Jim Mason said:

Doug
I'm full of gas and loaded for bear with my bad brain farts. That's a good vent program you guys have. I bet it works well.
Good job on putting the fire out in this one!
How about this for a question on this one - would you have a second line placed to back up the first line in the basement? and if so, how and who?

Doug Ott said:

Jim, I wasn't my intention to skip the first floor during my venting of the 2nd floor windows. I just didn't include the 1st in my ramblings. My thoughts on venting the 2nd floor windows was as an alternative to cutting open the roof.
Typically when we actually have fires, the officer does a 360 of the building while the engineer and the back-step fireman grab the irons and stretch the initial attack line. While the officer is circling the building he would look at the windows and see which one has self-vented, has the most smoke staining or has the darkest/fastest smoke issuing from the seams and vent that window prior to our entry. I believe this practice came from our lower manpower days when we had 3 engine houses and 3 personnel (including the officer) on the trucks.
And back to venting the 2nd floor windows: I know the fire might travel up to the second floor by opening it up, but I was hoping to prevent that by having the second hose-line placed at the stairs. And if we were to take the first line through an outside opening, have the second line team close the interior door to the basement stairs and stage there for protection.
After reading your reply and thinking about it some more, it would be a beautiful thing to vent windows as we search. That was a bad brain-fart on my part.

Thanks again for everything that you all share. Stay safe, Doug

Jim Mason said:

Doug
We're all on the same team here and none of us are experts.

I like what you say when you would go in the outside entrance to get to the basement fire. It looks like the fire is down there. This would get us down into the basement below the heat on the basemnet ceiling before we enter that level.

How about the venting plan. Would you skip the 1st floor and move the open ing of windows on the second floor?
Do you think the fire might travel up through the building if the second floor were vented?

When we are searching we vent windows from inside. This way we can monitor the conditions and search for life and fire.
Whe the hos eline is moving into a room with fire we vent from the outside so the engine can move into the room. Is this how you guys do it? Or do you hve a different plan of coordination?


Doug Ott said:

I'm not the smartest person when it comes to tactics so I'm mostly posting this to get everyone's comments to see if I'm on the right track.

I would've taken the hoseline in the front door as they had, only it would be charged. We use Task Force Tips fog nozzles on 2 of our attack lines and they seem to do a great job as we pump them for a minimum of 150 gpm on an 1-3/4. We have an additional 1-3/4 with a SabreJet combination fog/solid bore (with all due respect to Akron, I think I'd rather have a standard solid bore instead). Our largest attack line is a 2" with a TFT. I would have the basement windows and exterior basement door (if present) opened. I would also have the front window of the half-story laddered and taken out and cleared. If there is a rear window on the half-story then the same treatment would be given to that one as well. The hoseline would be taken to the interior stairs that lead to the basement if conditions allowed, if not then attack through the exterior basement door. The second hose-line would follow the first but be in position to protect the interior stairs while a team performed the primary search. Hopefully everything goes as planned and everyone goes home. I think with the staffing level in the district for which I am lucky to work, this is do-able.

I still haven't been sold on performing roof ventilation on basement fires. I'm more comfortable using the windows instead if they are of adequate number and size. From what I saw that appeared to be an older structure. If the fire hasn't entered the wall space then by opening the roof and the rafter space it just seems you'd be inviting the fire to travel up that way instead of out a basement opening.

It seemed that by opening up that front window the way they did without water flowing on the fire from the interior basement stairs that they brought the fire up to them. I think I would've left that window intact and take my chances with taking out the upper ones.

That's all I'm going to blabber out for now. Let me know what you think. I have a lot to learn and am really enjoying this site.

Thank you all and stay safe,

Doug

Permalink Reply by Jim Mason on December 23, 2008 at 5:54pm

I've been doing alot of holiday prep so I haven';t been wathcing the page as well as possible
Doug, That's alot of trucks. Can you guys get that many members on the scene for this?
Let's start with this What can the first engine hose line accomplish? If we think there are persons to protect in the bedrooms let's use that line to protect the search of the bedroomson the second floor. If not let's put out the fire. If we have someone in the rear who tells us there is fire in the basement , should the first line go there ( as in a basement entrance)? Maybe it should. Then if they don;t overcommit and there is venting opposite the advance of this hose line they can get to the seat of the fire in the basement. Venting is done oppsite the hose advance , no matter where it goes. If any one hose line can;t overcome the fire in front of it, the officer needs to tell the IC of such and help can be ordered.
The search on the first floor is good becasue it is nearest the fire, unless there is a report that there are bedrooms in the basement. this is not normally something that we would thinbk of, unless it was usual for the area where we work as FF's. Then it's got to be searched first, along with the hose line protection. I think that the 1 3/4 " can do the job, one on each floors, unless there is unusual burning in any area .
I don;t know if the roof is needed in this fire unless it gets away from the first few companies on the scene.
What do you think?

Permalink Reply by Doug Ott on December 24, 2008 at 4:56pm

Jim, That is a lot of trucks, but 6 is our usual response. We don't have initial responses for fires (still alarm?) and then upgrade from there. It's usually the whole deal dispatched from the start. Our 5 apparatus plus a mutual aid company. Our minimum number of personnel on that response is 18 (not including chief officers ) if it's a mutual aid company that has 2 personnel. Some of our neighbors have 3. On a good day when no one is off we get 21-22. Whether that's enough to accomplish everything in my ramblings, I don't know, I'm still learning that part of the job.

I do like your thinking on having the first line protect the search crew instead of my initial attack through the outside basement door. It reminds me of Ray McCormack's video on attached garage fires from "Training Minutes, Season 1".

Anyway, I'm gonna end it there since I can't keep my focus because my wife wants to tidy up the basement today. I hope your weather clears up with no one getting hurt. Merry Christmas to you and everyone that reads this. God bless you all.

Permalink Reply by Ray on December 24, 2008 at 7:26pm

One of the initial problems is the two firefighters waiting for water and doing nothing else. How about flaking out the line? This is so common it's overlooked or ignored. Forget all the command, RIT, additional resources, NIMS and all the other systems we establish. Get your firefighters to do their job!

Merry Christmas

Permalink Reply by Michael Bricault (ret) on December 26, 2008 at 6:32pm

-Interesting comment; hummm.... BACK TO BASIC FIREFIGHTING. I could not agree more with anyone that emphasizes correctness in firefighting basics.
-I like Ray's observation, and have seen similar things like inexperienced firefighters relying on the driver cranking up the pressure to blow out the kinks in place of proper hose work. That is just the epitome of sloppy firefighting.
-I also believe that the video is a prime example of the quintessential problems facing the American fire service in that there is an obvious manpower shortage, a deplorable lack of truck work functions being initiated and/or accomplished, and a general deficiency of some really basic firefighting skills.
-Basics; Brennen stressed it for years. Truck work; its gotta get done whether your department has a Ladder Company or not, whether the fire is in a phone booth or a large structure. Proper and correct hose work; there is no substitute.
-Stay safe.

Ray McCormack said:

One of the initial problems is the two firefighters waiting for water and doing nothing else. How about flaking out the line? This is so common it's overlooked or ignored. Forget all the command, RIT, additional resources, NIMS and all the other systems we establish. Get your firefighters to do their job!
Merry Christmas

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