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How do you get mutual aid to follow ICS?
I am a member of a small volunteer department and we have a problem with mutual aid companies working within the incident command system. Like all volunteer departments we are short handed and rely on mutual aid on all structure fires for man power and tankers. We had a structure fire recently and it became a major problem. Our asst. chief was in command and no one reported to him as they arrived. We also have a problem of a paid firefighter showing up and barking orders without confering with command. He almost got two firefighters killed because he knew the fire was in the ceiling and did not tell command. He sent them into the structure with that knowledge, and the ceiling collapsed on them. Fortunately they got out. We heard a recording of the radio trafic last night and it was evident that NONE of the other companies would go through command for anything. The asst. chief did not hear any of the radio traffic due to a poorly designed radio system. I'm sure we may be the only department in the area that trains and actually use the incident command system and the other departments all freelance to some extent on their scenes and try to on ours.
It sounds like command was out of the loop, but sometimes you do several jobs at the same time due to manpower.
How do we inbed the use if incident command into these other departments and get them to work with our scene commander without throwing them off the scene and/or PO'ing them in the process. It has ben done in the past, but we are trying to work with the other departments, even though they don't follow the rules.
It sounds like command was out of the loop, but sometimes you do several jobs at the same time due to manpower.
How do we inbed the use if incident command into these other departments and get them to work with our scene commander without throwing them off the scene and/or PO'ing them in the process. It has ben done in the past, but we are trying to work with the other departments, even though they don't follow the rules.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John on
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I know it works for us but Im not sure if it will work. On training nights we try to include our mutual aid companies. We work all of the trainings with them like a call with incident command and all. This helps them understand that when they arrive they have jobs we expect them to do. In our county most of the departments are taking up NIMS, which would be great for the ones that don't know how to work with incident command and the structure of it. If none of this works I'm not sure what else to do. The only other option would be to have your chief officers call a meeting on with the mutual aid chiefs 1 at a time and let them know how you want them to operate when they arrive on your scene. The best bet is if you cant work with the neighboring departments and they want to do there own thing, call the next due company and work with them. Hope this helps, feel free to message me and maybe I can kind of help a little more.
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Permalink Reply by Engineco913 on
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If all means of training together have been worked on and meetings to discuss the issue taken place, and it continues to occur on fire scenes, (depending on the size and need of a call) don't call them for help. Nothings a bigger insult than having a department come screaming through your town to go to your neighbor. It's sad that the FD's can't get on the same wavelength.
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Permalink Reply by ILDisasterEMT on
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Well...this is a very common problem and one that I hear about quite often when I teach ICS. One way is to have your mutual aide volunteers be required to take ICS 100, 200 and 700 and then administer the test to them yourselves so you know how well they know the material. Also, if they are mutual aide, when they show up, make sure that your liaison officer knows to tell them who is the IC and if you have a fire fighter who shows up and operates outside the chain, then I would let him know in no uncertain terms that he is free to leave the fire ground or be removed from it by the police for interfering with emergency services. That's how serious this is, which I don't have to tell you since it sounds like he nearly cost some of your fire fighters their lives and I'm betting this isn't the first time. If he is giving orders over the radio its hard to always tell whose voice it is. But if he is giving orders informally just by shouting them, tell your fire fighters that they ignore orders that do not come from the IC or deputy IC. This is why ICS exists. Its not just for a sense of order in a chaotic scene, its to prevent people from getting dead. I think I would confront this fire fighter privately and let him know that the next time he does it, he will be ordered off the scene, removed if necessary and there will be a complaint lodged against him. Also, when you can, call for mutual aide from departments that you know are working to implement ICS because at least they are less likely to go over the head of the IC/Chief.
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Permalink Reply by Jski on
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Lucky for us, the state of New Jersey has implemented a law requiring all line officers to have completed 100, 200, 300, 400, and 700 as of January 1, 2008. We do train with our mutual aid companies, as well, but we have been doing that for quite some time. In addition, we have had a representative from the Division of Fire and Safety speak at our Department about ICS and a program ?No firefighter Left Behind". During the "lecture" the rep stressed the importance of ICS and it's implementation throughout Emergency Services. We had invited neighboring departments to attend and had an excellent turnout. As a volunteer company, we receive LOSAP and get credit for any and all meetings, drills, etc. Besides, our auxiliary puts out a wonderful spread of food for after our meetings/drills. In turn, it behooved members to attend. And every month, the chiefs in our county meet. Each Department takes a turn at hosting the meeting. The consistentcy of open lines of communication with our neighboring departments has been beneficial to everyone from our members to the communities we serve. Good luck and remain safe.
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Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on
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I think that training together is a big step toward this goal. Another thing we have been doing is having a Line Officer's breakfast to meet all of the surrounding chiefs and officers, and discuss each department's capabilities and needs. It helps if you know them beforehand!
During an actual incident, we try to get radio channels established soon after arrival. These are standardized, more or less, but we have the dispatcher make a broadcast such as "water supply on 2, fireground on 3, interior on 4" so that it's firmly established and all incoming companies know where to tune. IC will be found on fireground, always, so there's no excuse for not communicating.
We also have the Fire Coordinator and Deputy Coordinators who are dispatched to incidents requiring mutual aid. Their main task is to make sure that the ICS is working. Since they all are experienced fire chiefs selected for these positions, they use the right amount of tact and diplomacy (and sometimes a few well-chosen words) to assist the IC in achieving a successful outcome.
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Permalink Reply by Art "ChiefReason" Goodrich on
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Man, this one is a no brainer.
EVERYONE wants to get into the fight.
If it's your fight and the other departments don't want to cooperate, then DON'T INVITE THEM. Invite departments that will follow ICS. When they hear your requests going to the eastern departments instead of their way, they will either change or self dispatch and then you can have them arrested. Now; there's a Kodak moment.
Don't let the other departments BULLY you. And I don't care if the loud mouth is career OR volunteer. Tell him to STFU and follow chain of command. If he doesn't, put him in charge of making the coffee.
You don't want to piss THEM off? So; you're sitting there eating crap. How does that taste? How's that workin' for you?
YOU CONTROL IT. End of story.
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Permalink Reply by Arthur T. Kline on
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I am not sure how your mutual aid system works, but here is how ours works. You may find that some of these things may need to be implemented into your system.
Our mutual aid system covers almost 100 depts. in the NH, Vermont and MASS area. They have worked with all the depts. a system that uses ICS heavily. They have meetings that all Chief officers can attend, to work on issues that affect the system. This has greatly increased response time for mutual aid companies, simplified operations with those companies, and made our job easier. They have a Chief, MAC1 (mutual aid cheif 1) that can and will respond to incidents and act as Communications Chief for that incident, and relay to all units info for the Incident Commander. This has been helpful for the small depts. that have limited manpower, where the chief officers can't help but get their hands dirty.
If you can, work it out with dispatch to get all chiefs together to work on this issue. ICS is a class that everyone in the system has to have and follow, or someday there maybe that one call that causes injury or fatality. Freelancing has to be addressed also, this cannot happen. It is very unsafe and can be very unproductive. This is an issue that needs major attention by all depts. involved.
I hope that you and your system can work on these issues for the greater good of the brotherhood.
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Earlier in the week, our department operated at a structural fire where mutual aid with three other fire departments was needed.
Overall, it went very well. Coordination of water shuttle and fire ground activities was shared by two chiefs. We will often put another chief in charge of water supply.
The only problem after the smoke had cleared was a lack of accountability. We recognize and appreciate that this is something that we are going to have to work with the other departments on. That is to say that WE had solid accountability for OUR people. The problem was the others. We will get better control for next time. We have a regional meeting next week and it will be on the table and it will get the attention that it needs.
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Permalink Reply by Matthew Brough on
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The faulty radio system is one bad thing you have going for you. We have the same problem here. Let me guess, is it an 800MHZ system??? Anyway
This was a problem we were having several years ago. First of all I believe the best way to take care of this issue is to sit down and have a NIMS class with the area departments and explain to them why it is such an important thing to have command set up. Our Department even uses command on medical calls. SO MUCH EASIER.
Now, this is what we ended up doing. We had trouble with a department that did what they wanted when they wanted, so even though that station was 1 block from our station, we didn't call them, we called the next town over. They got the point. We use them all the time now, and they use us. Of course a change of chiefs helped too.
This isn't going to be an overnight change though, command is something that you really have to work hard and teach yourself to use. I catch myself every once in a while yelling for central dispatch or county to have them get something when I should have used my IC. Also our radio system is setup with tactical channels. any traffic other than dispatches go over the tac channels. Sometimes we use more than one. And any interior firefighting happens on a talk around channel. Our CRAPPY radio system is a road ready system. It wasn't designed to use inside a building. So i feel you there with the radio issues. Good luck, stay safe and remember EVERYONE GOES HOME!
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Permalink Reply by Trever Richmond on
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i am also from a voulnteer dept that relies alot on mutual aid and worry bout man power and we have had some of the same problems in the past. when we have training such as house or barn burns we try to invite some of our mutual aid depts that we use the most just so we can try to stay on the same page. they also invite us to some of there training. it is nice when u get invited to go "play" at some one elses training it also makes it known to us that all feelings are good between the depts.
we have also had a problem with x firefighters showing up and giving orders and sugestions and getting right in the way but we were told when there is a cop/officer on scene to have them be asked to leave or step back that they r now a citizen
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Permalink Reply by Bill Anderson on
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I appreciate all the replies. I notice that the common opinion is to train with them. We tried to invite one of the deopartments when we went to live fire training, but they would bail out because it was too hot inside the burn building. We try to invite them all when we train, but most of the time it's only our troops that show up. Our radio system is an afterthought added to the S.O.'s radio system. We have one repeatred channel, and four firegrouind channels that are the same simplex channel, which is the same as the repeated channel, with different PL tones. Wish it was an 800 system so we could blame trrunking. Our chief was taking the tape to the next chief's meeting to show them what went on, but we haven't heard about the outcome as of tonight.
Probably gonna be the meeting of all meetings knowing our chief......
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