April 2016 Blog Posts (38)

Endurance is a discipline worth mastering. Those who do are often the same ones who succeed in life. Most of us have experienced the battle between the inner voice and the physical body. Take jogging for example. At some point in your life you had made the decision that you needed to get in better shape. Perhaps you drove down to the local sporting…

(Author’s Note: As I was writing this series of posts, there appeared here on the Fire Engineering Training Community another blog on this same subject by Nicholas Papa [http://community.fireengineering.com/profiles/blog/show?id=1219672%3ABlogPost%3A627047].  Obviously, I decided to publish mine anyway, as there are enough facets to this discussion…

I would rather have one frustrated culture creator in my inner circle than 10 yes men. Yes men tell me what I want to hear. They make me feel smarter than I actually am because they are afraid of my response to…

The Old Stuff

Someday, in the blink of an eye, it will be the time to look back and to reflect on what you did with your life.

If you were chosen to serve, did you serve others well or serve yourself? Did you realize, early on or too late, that serving well requires a few simple steps from each of us who are chosen?

Did you keep a run journal of each run, what you were sent for, what you saw, what you did and most importantly what you learned? Were you able to bring…

The Sunday Preach



'Student and Master'



The second section of "25 to Survive" and the program at is entitled "Mastering the Environment." A powerful section, with chapters discussing pertinent fire service topics such as: residential building construction, home and community design, stairway management, basement fires, the 360' and fire behavior.  



Attain 'mastery' in…

Over the past 2 years my department has re-evaluated our high-rise setups.  In doing such we moved away from carrying 50’ of 2.5” hose, a gate-wye and 100’ of 1.75” hose to carrying 4 bundles of 2” hose.  Because we changed the hose configuration we also re-evaluated how we bundled it.

4 options

FDNY Load-Fit well in our compartments, deployed great, wanted a way to carry it over shoulder or bottle rather than on shoulder.

Denver Load-didn’t fit well in…

“The Ten Percenters; An Exclusive Club but its Doors are Open”

                        The best of the best. The hall of famers. The top performers. The ones you can always count on.…

Prevent Fitness Plateaus for Continued Growth

Why do people stop their fitness program?  There are many different reasons, but one of the most common is because they stopped seeing progress.  Nothing is more motivating that starting a new program, staying with it, and then seeing your body and performance grow.  Nothing is more disappointing than training and not seeing any changes.  …

Over the last few months I have heard some conversations about seeking out additional training/certifications or additional responsibilities in the department. I have heard these conversations lead into statements such as “what’s the department going to give me in return for obtaining these things.” I have heard the “what’s in it for me” statement also thrown around a few times. There are a number of things out there that could potentially infect our fire service in a negative way. To me,…

     As all of the “new” items are appearing in the fire service there are several firefighters that are all or nothing when it comes to adopting the tactics or strategies. Take for instance transitional attack. Transitional attack is a great tool in the tool box, however many are pushing it to be an all-encompassing tactic whenever there is a fire showing scenario.  On the flip side there are many old hats that insist that if you’re going to hit the fire, you’re going to hit it from the…

 Change, yup I said the dreaded C word.  This simple word with a simple meaning is one of the hardest things to do in life. If you are in the fire service it is even harder. Change in the fire service is one of those taboo processes that just cannot happen, but as a matter of fact the only thing in the fire service that happens more often than a medical run, is change. 

 When we speak of change the fire service ears perk up and we become a little defensive,…

You have spent the last 30 years in uniform, serving your country and your community as a firefighter. Today you retire; hopefully in good health and financially stable.  Now what?  You do not have to get up in the morning to report to your station; you have to make a decision as to what to wear for the day as you do not have to wear a uniform; you do not have to drink bad coffee and hear horrible jokes with your crew. You do not respond to calls yet your ears…

WHAT ARE WE REALLY GOOD AT?

I’m not big on meetings. I especially dislike meetings that accomplish nothing.

Maybe, just maybe, somewhere along the way I got hung up on the belief that the Fire Service was a problem solving organization made up of talented and trustworthy crews instead of a new initiative testing ground.…

WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?

Sometimes officer behavior leads me to ask “What were you thinking?”

Someone recently replayed to a friend from another department the story about a “group motivational retreat” that I held in the rear yard after a fire. I prefer to call it moonlight post incident…

Here is a simulation of a MAYDAY occurring in a Type III "Main Street" building, we do so much to try and avoid a MAYDAY and rightfully so, but how much does a command chief work on as far as preparation? I cringe when I hear fellow command level officers state that they are prepared to face a MAYDAY, no one is totally prepared no matter how experienced and confident one may be.

There are so many scenarios that could occur such as collapse, disorientation, flashover, etc. and an easy…