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Water Supply

I dont want to sound like a Monday Morning Quarterback but we have had two significant fires in the last three days and water supply has been an issue at both. One question I have is how can you as an incident commander NOT have an engine catch a hydrant on their way into a working fire?

Jake, you can answer this question. I heard someone say that at the Saratoga Winners fire the closest hydrant is a couple thousand feet a way and you'd have to relay pump and that's a lot of hose to pack. OK, with the amount of help on the scene a couple thousand feet of LDH would get packed you quick. Wouldn't you want a constant water supply as soon as possibe and not wait for a tanker shuttle to get set up?

At the fire at Murphy's an engine was told to not hit a hydrant. They have a limited water supply and were tasked with protecting multiple vehicles from a large body of free burning fire.

Have we gotten lax in establishing a water supply? I know that I would rather have to pick up a lot of hose that I never needed than run out of water and get someone hurt.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jake Oreshan, III on May 1, 2009 at 4:14pm

Ben, we do hit a hydrant at any working fire. I am not sure what the reasoning behind the Winners fire was. I did wonder why we did not lay in for the hydrant at Crescent Terrace and dump the bed, allowing the next engine to pick up where we stopped and continue laying in, so on and so on. Placing and engine in the middle to boost pressure. In defence of the chief who made the decision not to lay in, the building was COMPLETELY gone, there were no exposures (ragardless of the reports of seveal out buildings and boats on fire), and there was nothing, and I mean nothing we were going to do, even if we had a hydrant in front of the building.

I do have to question, however, the mentality of always relying on your first in piece to bypass the hydrant. In this day and age, can you rely on that second engine making the hydrant? Is the going to be a second engine? In the case of the Wade Road fire, establishing a water supply to protect the exposure is a must, and should not have been left to the second or third due. Again, I am not trying to Monday morning quarterback.

In the case of the Winners fire, they were relying on "tankers", or tenders, depending on where in the country your are reading this from. What they got were engines with 1000 gallons of water. In southern Saratoga county, the tanker has gone by the wayside, replaced by hydrants in more and more locations. These tankers were not equiped with dump shoots, they had rear discharges. Nor did they have the ability to take on water at high rates. This greatly inhibited our efforts of a "tanker relay". But again, this falls to conformity, and comfortability, of our chief officers.

Do they get tunnel vision? Absolutely. Do they get lax in their command? Absolutely.

Do they continue their education and training? No. Do they understand what they are doing? No.

We do not get fires like we did 10, 15, 20 years ago. We have "young" officers. Not only am I talking about age here, I am talking about experience. The race for the white hat effects us all. Do you see a common theme to all of our discussions?

Ben, I'd pick up a mile of hose before I go through another Winners fire of 15 seconds of water, followed by several minutes of waiting.

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