Where firefighters come to talk training

Opening the Nozzle in Smoke

If you can remember from what you were taught or if you currently instruct in engine operations how do you handle the question of opening the line in smoke. I say you do not open the line in smoke, however when the smoke is extremly hot you must open the nozzle. Other options include leaving the area (fallback position) and increasing ventilation of the area. What do you say?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by John Ceriello on February 12, 2011 at 8:00pm

Ben go to ul.com/fireservice

It's not just about reading smoke we also have to read the air movement back into the structure. When you ventilate you better be prepared for how the fire will react. Go to the site it will explain it in detail. That goes for everyone reading this blog!

Ben Fleagle said:

Amen to that brother. We are not sizing up the structure or the fire itself. Dodson's effort to get us to pay attention to "reading the smoke" is very valuable for the simple reason that regardless of whether you agree with his conclusions, he has put the focus on what the smoke is telling us. We also have had serious close calls due to rapid fire growth and to be honest, failure to ventilate adequately. Once again John, great topic!

Permalink Reply by Ben Fleagle on February 12, 2011 at 8:09pm

Good point John. I think I've looked at that sight before and you are very right about air movement. And when I suggested the study of smoke, I was also including in my thoughts the pressure involved, which should tell you a lot about what is happening down the hall in the fire compartment, before you enter.

Permalink Reply by Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS on February 12, 2011 at 8:12pm

John Ceriello said:

Why is it so hard for ff's to say they would open up on smoke? almost everyones response was "I would not open on smoke, BUT if it was really hot I would- then the answer is YES I would if I need to! That is what I was trying to get people to say. YES if need be.

This is the key, and this is that make me think there os a "nozzle misunderstanding". In fact the "colling effect vs steam production" with a smothbore is not very good. And you know perfectly that, as using the smothbore against the smoke, you will suffer steam. So, you wait and the answer is that you'll open "only" when it's too hot. Waiting the temp to rise, frighten of being burned by steam (I would be too!) and at last, when it's not possible to stay, open the nozzle, hopping this will catch enought heat to survive.

In this condition, how can you imagine someone will reply "yes I always open my nozzle on smoke". ?

The difference is that, to the same question, I'll reply "yes, of course, I always open my nozzle on smoke". Why? because we use fog nozzle. But warning: we absolutly NOT use them as you use a smothbore nozzle! If you use a fog nozzle like you use a smothbore, you'll get burned. The way we use the fog nozzle is at low flow rate, with 1/3 second pulse, with a very wide fog pattern. The result is a very good cooling effect, with no steam. And, due to that, we start to pulse as we see smoke. We never wait to suffer heat to pulse: we start before. So in fact, we never suffer heat and we don't suffer heat stress (si no heart probleme). We don't run and don't break windows.

And this is not a theorical point of view but a very practical one. And after more than 300 live burn, I can say it works fine. But I perfectly understand that, before seeing that, you are full of doubt. I was too, before I tried.

Best regards

Pierre-Louis

Permalink Reply by Eric Hankins on February 12, 2011 at 8:19pm

Wow.... My phone has been BLOWING UP over the past week and a half with notifications of replies to this thread!!! I have finally had a moment to get caught up..

First off, GREAT DISCUSSION!!! All of you guys have really put some thought into your replies. Pierre-Louis is obviously an educated individual that has done some research on the topic.

Unfortunately I have seen first hand the improper use of a fog nozzle and while I am sure there may be an effective way to use a fog pattern, I've yet to see it in battle...

I am not a propeller head AT ALL. I am just a jake that has seen a few fires and learned from all of them.. I HAVE been caught in a flashover, unfortunately, and do NOT wish to relive that experience. Lets keep it simple the fire trinagle is Heat, Fuel, and Oxygen. With todays fire load, the smoke IS fuel. The well involved bedroom is the heat, and brother believe me it WILL find the oxygen. So what can we do about this? We cannot take the fuel out of the smoke right? and we cannot prevent it from finding oxygen. So our only choice is to remove or reduce the heat to a managable level. How? By cooling the atmosphere. The black fire above you in a hallway is exactely that... FIRE. How do we put out fire? By opening the nozzle until the fire is out, or in this case cooled to the point of less danger. I do not believe in penciling, but as I stated before, I DO believe in flowing the nozzle above you until you get cool water drops coming back down on you. Once that occurs I feel it is safe to proceed with the push. I ALSO believe that the larger the drop of water, the more heat it can absorb BEFORE converting to steam. Therefore limiting a disruption in the thermal balance...

Consider this (from my peabrain). Take a weed sprayer and fill it with water. Pump it up and spray a single burning log for 2 seconds. Do this 15 times. Would you pick the log up with your bare hands? Now take the log and dunk it in the sprayer for 2 seconds 15 times. Would you expect a different outcome? I would.

SO, in my humble opinion a straight, or preferably solid, stream fire attack is in the best interest of interior firefighters. I am quite sure there are many out there that would disagree and that is fine...

Sorry for my rant. I do not type or compose myself near as well as my Warrior Poet Brother above. Continue training and continue learning... Thats what this is all about!!! FTM-PTB

PS My phone has notified me of three replies just since I began typing this... LOL

Permalink Reply by Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS on February 12, 2011 at 8:31pm

Ben Fleagle said:

The cases I referred to are large buildings with wide-open floor plans (60' - 100'). No offense intended, but keep your math, I'm talking about what I have seen working and what obviously wasn't working. High fire loads in buildings with exposed steel structural support need to be cooled quickly. At 150 gpm, with two fog nozzles in use w/straightstream on 1 3/4" lines, there wasn't anywhere near the penetration and rapid cooling that was achieved with a 2.5" line, with a 1 1/8" tip is flowing 265 gpm. That's only one example.

And that's a wrong one. You try to compare appartement fire with a ceilling at 8' with a large hall with a ceilling at 20' !!! Be serious. The simple fact the guys tried to cool in these conditions with a fog pattern on a 1 3/4 demonstrate they don't really know their nozzle! Just test the reach of a fog pattern :) :) :)

Im living in Brasil and we have very very big superstores with big halls. In case of fire, we'll use 2.5 lines with very narrow fog pattern of smothbore, of course!

We can compare and we can talk. But we must compare things than can be compared.

Regards

Pierre-Louis

Permalink Reply by Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS on February 12, 2011 at 8:41pm

Eric Hankins said:

Wow.... My phone has been BLOWING UP over the past week and a half with notifications of replies to this thread!!! I have finally had a moment to get caught up..

First off, GREAT DISCUSSION!!! All of you guys have really put some thought into your replies. Pierre-Louis is obviously an educated individual that has done some research on the topic.

Unfortunately I have seen first hand the improper use of a fog nozzle and while I am sure there may be an effective way to use a fog pattern, I've yet to see it in battle...

I agree. In fact, be "logical": we use fog nozzle for years and see an important decrease of fire spreads, decrease of accidents, decrease of time on the fire scene, decrease of water damage and so on. And we never get burned by steam.

I can check the problem in all way, I always come to the same choices:

1) we are supermen, and even with steam we don't suffer

2) we are masochist and love to be burned by steam

3) we know how to use a nozzle

I think the right choice is number 3. I'm in contact with many other US FF which are beginning to think that, if we say "that's great" maybe there is a reason...

Regards

Pierre-Louis

PS: throw the phone by the window. :)

PS2: I'm also sure of one thing: I've had some students, with strong opinion against fog. After a few real fire demonstration, they were all OK with the fact that fog nozzles are great, and they quickly became the most "fiercy" to demonstrate and proove that to their brother. So I'm sure you will be in a futur (and sure, a near future) great defender or this new way of firefighting. ;-)

Permalink Reply by Ben Fleagle on February 12, 2011 at 8:49pm

I think we agree, ...I think..but I don't think you're understanding that. Anyway..love ya' brother!

Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS said:

Ben Fleagle said:

The cases I referred to are large buildings with wide-open floor plans (60' - 100'). No offense intended, but keep your math, I'm talking about what I have seen working and what obviously wasn't working. High fire loads in buildings with exposed steel structural support need to be cooled quickly. At 150 gpm, with two fog nozzles in use w/straightstream on 1 3/4" lines, there wasn't anywhere near the penetration and rapid cooling that was achieved with a 2.5" line, with a 1 1/8" tip is flowing 265 gpm. That's only one example.

And that's a wrong one. You try to compare appartement fire with a ceilling at 8' with a large hall with a ceilling at 20' !!! Be serious. The simple fact the guys tried to cool in these conditions with a fog pattern on a 1 3/4 demonstrate they don't really know their nozzle! Just test the reach of a fog pattern :) :) :)

Im living in Brasil and we have very very big superstores with big halls. In case of fire, we'll use 2.5 lines with very narrow fog pattern of smothbore, of course!

We can compare and we can talk. But we must compare things than can be compared.

Regards

Pierre-Louis

Permalink Reply by Ben Fleagle on February 12, 2011 at 8:55pm

Nicely put Boss, I love it when people speak my language! (No offense intended Pierre).

Eric Hankins said:

Wow.... My phone has been BLOWING UP over the past week and a half with notifications of replies to this thread!!! I have finally had a moment to get caught up..

First off, GREAT DISCUSSION!!! All of you guys have really put some thought into your replies. Pierre-Louis is obviously an educated individual that has done some research on the topic.

Unfortunately I have seen first hand the improper use of a fog nozzle and while I am sure there may be an effective way to use a fog pattern, I've yet to see it in battle...

I am not a propeller head AT ALL. I am just a jake that has seen a few fires and learned from all of them.. I HAVE been caught in a flashover, unfortunately, and do NOT wish to relive that experience. Lets keep it simple the fire trinagle is Heat, Fuel, and Oxygen. With todays fire load, the smoke IS fuel. The well involved bedroom is the heat, and brother believe me it WILL find the oxygen. So what can we do about this? We cannot take the fuel out of the smoke right? and we cannot prevent it from finding oxygen. So our only choice is to remove or reduce the heat to a managable level. How? By cooling the atmosphere. The black fire above you in a hallway is exactely that... FIRE. How do we put out fire? By opening the nozzle until the fire is out, or in this case cooled to the point of less danger. I do not believe in penciling, but as I stated before, I DO believe in flowing the nozzle above you until you get cool water drops coming back down on you. Once that occurs I feel it is safe to proceed with the push. I ALSO believe that the larger the drop of water, the more heat it can absorb BEFORE converting to steam. Therefore limiting a disruption in the thermal balance...

Consider this (from my peabrain). Take a weed sprayer and fill it with water. Pump it up and spray a single burning log for 2 seconds. Do this 15 times. Would you pick the log up with your bare hands? Now take the log and dunk it in the sprayer for 2 seconds 15 times. Would you expect a different outcome? I would.

SO, in my humble opinion a straight, or preferably solid, stream fire attack is in the best interest of interior firefighters. I am quite sure there are many out there that would disagree and that is fine...

Sorry for my rant. I do not type or compose myself near as well as my Warrior Poet Brother above. Continue training and continue learning... Thats what this is all about!!! FTM-PTB

PS My phone has notified me of three replies just since I began typing this... LOL

Permalink Reply by John Ceriello on February 12, 2011 at 8:59pm

I'm going to try and get to Sweden this summer or maybe the fall, I'm looking forward to learning exactly what the concept is, in the mean time I will continue working with our current tactics and see how I can improve the knowledge base. Who's going to be in Indy for FDIC, we should try and get together. JC

Ben Fleagle said:

I think we agree, ...I think..but I don't think you're understanding that. Anyway..love ya' brother!

Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS said:

Ben Fleagle said:

The cases I referred to are large buildings with wide-open floor plans (60' - 100'). No offense intended, but keep your math, I'm talking about what I have seen working and what obviously wasn't working. High fire loads in buildings with exposed steel structural support need to be cooled quickly. At 150 gpm, with two fog nozzles in use w/straightstream on 1 3/4" lines, there wasn't anywhere near the penetration and rapid cooling that was achieved with a 2.5" line, with a 1 1/8" tip is flowing 265 gpm. That's only one example.

And that's a wrong one. You try to compare appartement fire with a ceilling at 8' with a large hall with a ceilling at 20' !!! Be serious. The simple fact the guys tried to cool in these conditions with a fog pattern on a 1 3/4 demonstrate they don't really know their nozzle! Just test the reach of a fog pattern :) :) :)

Im living in Brasil and we have very very big superstores with big halls. In case of fire, we'll use 2.5 lines with very narrow fog pattern of smothbore, of course!

We can compare and we can talk. But we must compare things than can be compared.

Regards

Pierre-Louis

Permalink Reply by Ben Fleagle on February 12, 2011 at 9:01pm

Brother John, I would love to be at Indy, but financial life isn't getting easier, its going the other direction. I'll be staying close to home until the FOOLS Convention. I do intend to make to Indy some day.

Permalink Reply by John Ceriello on February 12, 2011 at 9:02pm

And you do not think steam production is a problem with opening the line and keeping it open?

Ben Fleagle said:

Nicely put Boss, I love it when people speak my language! (No offense intended Pierre).

Eric Hankins said:
Wow.... My phone has been BLOWING UP over the past week and a half with notifications of replies to this thread!!! I have finally had a moment to get caught up..

First off, GREAT DISCUSSION!!! All of you guys have really put some thought into your replies. Pierre-Louis is obviously an educated individual that has done some research on the topic.

Unfortunately I have seen first hand the improper use of a fog nozzle and while I am sure there may be an effective way to use a fog pattern, I've yet to see it in battle...

I am not a propeller head AT ALL. I am just a jake that has seen a few fires and learned from all of them.. I HAVE been caught in a flashover, unfortunately, and do NOT wish to relive that experience. Lets keep it simple the fire trinagle is Heat, Fuel, and Oxygen. With todays fire load, the smoke IS fuel. The well involved bedroom is the heat, and brother believe me it WILL find the oxygen. So what can we do about this? We cannot take the fuel out of the smoke right? and we cannot prevent it from finding oxygen. So our only choice is to remove or reduce the heat to a managable level. How? By cooling the atmosphere. The black fire above you in a hallway is exactely that... FIRE. How do we put out fire? By opening the nozzle until the fire is out, or in this case cooled to the point of less danger. I do not believe in penciling, but as I stated before, I DO believe in flowing the nozzle above you until you get cool water drops coming back down on you. Once that occurs I feel it is safe to proceed with the push. I ALSO believe that the larger the drop of water, the more heat it can absorb BEFORE converting to steam. Therefore limiting a disruption in the thermal balance...

Consider this (from my peabrain). Take a weed sprayer and fill it with water. Pump it up and spray a single burning log for 2 seconds. Do this 15 times. Would you pick the log up with your bare hands? Now take the log and dunk it in the sprayer for 2 seconds 15 times. Would you expect a different outcome? I would.

SO, in my humble opinion a straight, or preferably solid, stream fire attack is in the best interest of interior firefighters. I am quite sure there are many out there that would disagree and that is fine...

Sorry for my rant. I do not type or compose myself near as well as my Warrior Poet Brother above. Continue training and continue learning... Thats what this is all about!!! FTM-PTB

PS My phone has notified me of three replies just since I began typing this... LOL

Permalink Reply by Pierre-Louis LAMBALLAIS on February 13, 2011 at 5:20am

John Ceriello said:

I'm going to try and get to Sweden this summer or maybe the fall, I'm looking forward to learning exactly what the concept is, in the mean time I will continue working with our current tactics and see how I can improve the knowledge base. Who's going to be in Indy for FDIC, we should try and get together. JC

John,

Sweeden is the "historical" country for that, and was of course, the best place for "pulsing", a few years ago. The very small size of the country and the way the fire services are, had create differences between the small schools and difficulties in the transmission of knowledge.

In May, we have an international meeting in Lisbonne, at the fire school of the military fire service of the city. The meeting is one week, wih people from Brasil, Perou, France, Belgium, Italy, Spain and of course Portugal. We will have conferences about tactic, ventilation, FF health, and of course nozzle method, and we'll have minimum one burn per day.

The meeting is intended to be for flashover instructor only, but as you seems to be "open minded" enought to see "strange things" and that I'm in the organisation comitte, I can invite you. Nothing to pay for accomodation, plane ticket less expensive than for North of Europe.

Meeting is from 16 to 20 of May

Feel free to mail me (pl.lamballais@flashover.fr)

Regards

Pierre-Louis

‹ Previous
1
…
8
9
10
11
Next ›

RSS

Welcome to
Fire Engineering Training Community

Sign Up
or Sign In

Or sign in with:

Policy Page

PLEASE NOTE

The login above DOES NOT provide access to Fire Engineering magazine archives. Please go here for our archives.

CONTRIBUTORS NOTE

Our contributors' posts are not vetted by the Fire Engineering technical board, and reflect the views and opinions of the individual authors. Anyone is welcome to participate.

For vetted content, please go to www.fireengineering.com/issues.

We are excited to have you participate in our discussions and interactive forums. Before you begin posting, please take a moment to read our community policy page.

Be Alert for Spam
We actively monitor the community for spam, however some does slip through. Please use common sense and caution when clicking links. If you suspect you've been hit by spam, e-mail peter.prochilo@clarionevents.com.