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We need to have the Courage to be Safe...
I took a class called Courage to Be Safe. It was a very interesting class. This class was about speaking up and keeping yourself and your fellow firefighters safe. We discussed the fact that firefighters are dying and was it preventable. As it turns out most were.
What we saw were firefighters that died because of vehicle crashes, these crashes were in fire apparatus and personal vehicles. Why? Well they didn’t drive like they would on a normal day that wasn’t having them respond to an emergency. They were responding to a call and were not obeying traffic laws. They didn’t stop at stop signs or stop lights. They were speeding some of them and why? You don’t get there any faster and you put your life, the lives of your crew and the public at risk for what? I don’t get it and I have tried to figure it out and haven’t come up with an answer. The other result from the crashes were that some of the firefighters who died were not wearing their seat belts. What is wrong with these firefighters? I don’t get it. We enforce and reinforce with our children to buckle up and we also preach to the public to buckle up and yet we don’t. What is wrong with this picture? It needs to stop and we need to take responsibility for each other. If we see a member in the apparatus and they aren’t wearing their seat belt, speak up and tell them to buckle up. If the apparatus driver is driving to fast and is going over the speed limit, tell them to slow down. We need to drive with due regard.
We discussed the fact that firefighters are being killed in fires because of being trapped or collapse. This is unacceptable. We are going into burning buildings and getting right up on the fire. Why are we doing this? We have hose lines and nozzles and we can spray water great distances and yet we go in and get right on top of the hazard that we are trying to put out. We don’t need to be right on top of the fire. We need to decide, what are we saving, is there a life to be saved and is this, a rescue or is it a recovery. I know we tend to not want to think of the later but, we need to sometimes. The new materials that are being used in buildings is not necessarily better for us the firefighter.
One of the last things that we discussed on why firefighters are dying is health issues. There are firefighters dying from heart attacks and this is a concern but it is also confusing. Some of the firefighters are young and there was no history of a heart condition. We asked ourselves and discussed what may have caused this. We never really could come up with an answer. We did say that we as firefighters are not necessarily in good health. Some of us are over weight and out of shape. We need to get ourselves in better shape. We are in a very strenuous job and it is a strain on us physically and emotionally. I know I could be in much better shape than I am and I know that I need to make this happen. Truly it is not an easy task.
As I said in the beginning, this was an interesting class and in the end an excellent class to take. It reinforces the fact that we need to speak up when we see something. If it raises a question in your mind then ask. Don’t wait or question whether you should ask it or not. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and that the only stupid question is a question not asked.
This class is a class that all firefighters and all officers whether they are fire or EMS. There is plenty of information to be learned.
What we saw were firefighters that died because of vehicle crashes, these crashes were in fire apparatus and personal vehicles. Why? Well they didn’t drive like they would on a normal day that wasn’t having them respond to an emergency. They were responding to a call and were not obeying traffic laws. They didn’t stop at stop signs or stop lights. They were speeding some of them and why? You don’t get there any faster and you put your life, the lives of your crew and the public at risk for what? I don’t get it and I have tried to figure it out and haven’t come up with an answer. The other result from the crashes were that some of the firefighters who died were not wearing their seat belts. What is wrong with these firefighters? I don’t get it. We enforce and reinforce with our children to buckle up and we also preach to the public to buckle up and yet we don’t. What is wrong with this picture? It needs to stop and we need to take responsibility for each other. If we see a member in the apparatus and they aren’t wearing their seat belt, speak up and tell them to buckle up. If the apparatus driver is driving to fast and is going over the speed limit, tell them to slow down. We need to drive with due regard.
We discussed the fact that firefighters are being killed in fires because of being trapped or collapse. This is unacceptable. We are going into burning buildings and getting right up on the fire. Why are we doing this? We have hose lines and nozzles and we can spray water great distances and yet we go in and get right on top of the hazard that we are trying to put out. We don’t need to be right on top of the fire. We need to decide, what are we saving, is there a life to be saved and is this, a rescue or is it a recovery. I know we tend to not want to think of the later but, we need to sometimes. The new materials that are being used in buildings is not necessarily better for us the firefighter.
One of the last things that we discussed on why firefighters are dying is health issues. There are firefighters dying from heart attacks and this is a concern but it is also confusing. Some of the firefighters are young and there was no history of a heart condition. We asked ourselves and discussed what may have caused this. We never really could come up with an answer. We did say that we as firefighters are not necessarily in good health. Some of us are over weight and out of shape. We need to get ourselves in better shape. We are in a very strenuous job and it is a strain on us physically and emotionally. I know I could be in much better shape than I am and I know that I need to make this happen. Truly it is not an easy task.
As I said in the beginning, this was an interesting class and in the end an excellent class to take. It reinforces the fact that we need to speak up when we see something. If it raises a question in your mind then ask. Don’t wait or question whether you should ask it or not. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and that the only stupid question is a question not asked.
This class is a class that all firefighters and all officers whether they are fire or EMS. There is plenty of information to be learned.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Butch McCurdy on
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this sounds like a great class.
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Permalink Reply by Kimberly A Bownas on
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it really is and reality really sinks in with what is happening and how much we could prevent some of the LODD...
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Permalink Reply by Ben Waller on
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Kimberly,
The answer to the question about why firefighters are dying of heart attacks when they're in shape and have no cardiac history is simple - heat stress and dehydration. The mechanism isn't well understood yet, but the essentials are that when you get heat stressed, you lose a lot of sweat as your body tries to cool itself through evaporation. When you too much sweat, you get dehydrated. Your body shifts fluid from the cardiovascular system to the cells and intercellular spaces in an attempt to keep them hydrated.
The result is that the bloodstream becomes more concentrated. Less-dilute blood clots more easily. One little clot in the heart - and BAM, there's the unexpected heart attack. That's why rehab and rehydration are so important, and why being in good physical shape is not guarantee that the combat challenge types won't have a heat stress-induced heart attack.
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Permalink Reply by Steve on
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The first one is certainly a problem. People must learn to be in control of whatever they are driving regardless of the call they are responding to. We are no good to the people we are trying to help, if we never make it to the scene because of reckless driving.
The second one: I think this happens in some cases because people don't wanna look bad. Even when some knows it is time to go they wonder if others will get on them or tease them saying; I would have went in there, there was no reason to back out of there. People need to remember sometimes that we are responsible for the health and well being of ourselves and our crew when doing this job. To some level i also think some is from people being to afraid of what is gonna go wrong.
Three and the easiest: It is the drastic changes to our heart rates. When we are fighting the fire our heart is going crazy to keep up with us. The problem is afterward' s our hearts are still racing ; yet we are sitting down and not doing anything. Thus causing heart attacks. We must also try to keep ourselves in better shape.
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Ben,
Thanks, I didn't realize any of that. Good information to know. Thanks again.
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Permalink Reply by FETC on
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That was a great class Kimberly! I teach this NFFF program in the State of New Hampshire. I have delivered "The Courage to be Safe" 15 times in 2007-08. All of them were for free and I donated my time and travel expenses. I feel very passionate about the material and please let others know about the program.
I now have added a box of tissues to my instructor box, as the memorial rolls always shed a few tears in the audience. The program was designed to make you really think, emotionally, about how our actions affect the one's we love. Having the Courage to be Safe is not about the courage to be a hero, but having the courage to take a stance at decisions and upholding policies/procedures that may not be popular within the crew, like making your members wear their seat belts on every run or slowing down our vehicle responses to arrive alive!
Glad you liked the program, sadly it was rolled out in 2005 and people are still just hearing about this awesome and free material, plus there is many more modules to come from the NFFF. Check out their website @ www.everyonegoeshome.com and look at the training section.
Stay safe!
Bill
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Thanks and I most definitely will check that out. you are right though, it is to bad that this only started in 2005. Thanks again...
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Kimberly,
Let me try to give you an answer to your concern with #3. It is unfortunate that you left without a better understanding of why younger, seemingly healthy firefighters are dying at an early age. Steve has some of the issues correct but let me expound on why we are seeing what people think are healthy young firefighters having a heart attack. First, everyone of us here at FFN should consider our bodies as INDUSTRIAL ATHLETES. We go where other will not and in the process of this, we expose our internal organs to outside conditions that are "Uncomparable" to any other occupation. First, most of us live a busy and fast moving life, and we are under allot of stress. Chronic Stress is very bad for us. Our liver and heart are under stressors that prevoius generations were not. Chronic stress is like living on the FIGHT or FLIGHT response, all day / every day. When this occurs it causes our liver to run on overload and dump stored glucose when it is really not needed. Hypertension and diabetes problems are potentially at higher risk under these chronic stress conditions. Now add in our poor diet that is caused by our very busy schedules, to include high fats, greases, sugars, soda, coffee and alcohol. We are literally walking around overfed and undernourished. These foods cause plaque build up in our arteries. So we are busy, we work two/three jobs and eat junk food like fast food, basted in high fat grease.... I think we all understand why these are bad for us right? So getting back to being an Industrial Athlete, you are sleeping and the pager goes off for a fire alarm, probably at a resting heart rate of 50-60 (lower if you are a runner)... but lets say 50. You are startled awake and hear the report. Your heart rate spikes to around 100 or so. You get up and your body dumps a bunch of stored glucose under the fight or flight response from your liver. This gives us energy to fight the battle. You respond to the station, jump into the truck and go down the road and the Chief calls dispatch and says cancel the engine we are under control, it is a false alarm. Boom, no fight but our body is ready for one. You respond back to the station and ultimately back to sleep either at home or in the station and try to grab some zzz's. What does your body do with all the extra fat and glucose? Well it is put onto our spare tire around our waist for storage. Now lets do that 5 or 10 times a night and you can see how our occupation is slowly killing us.... call by call. OK now same scenario but your tone this time is for a building fire with reports of kids trapped on the second floor. HR 50... Boom and instantly spikes to 120+ and this time, as you quickly dress it feels as though your heart is coming out of your chest! BOOM, BOOOM, BOOM. Holy Sh*t I think I can literally feel my heart pulsing out of my chest. (Been there, done that) and by the time you get to your car, it is gone? Vanished? Where did it go? OK, brain says fight or flight, dumps glucose, and spiked your heart rate for the fight. When your heart responds that fast your blood vessels are still in a homeostasis state, meaning the apporpriate size for your heart rate at 50 and keeping your BP in a normal range. When it doubles its rate, the vessels do not respond as fast and it creates back pressure. hence your heart feels like it is jumping out of your chest for a few seconds. This is bad. With this back pressure, your brain then demands your blood vessels quickly VASODIALATE, (expand) when this occurs with back pressure, remember all that plaque buildup from Mickie D's or KFC? Well it is flushed from the interior walls and it is sent down the pipes. These are looking for a pipe that is smaller in diameter than the flake and it loves to clog up pipes. Just like pouring bacon grease down the kitchen sink, (it will clog up a 1 or 2" pipe over time) We see alot of heart attacks or cerebral vascular accidents post emergency response from these conditions.
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Nick, you hit the nail on the head. Thanks. Stay Safe
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thanks. I like when I get good input like you just gave me. More to learn and I love to learn...
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OK,
So how do we avoid this from happening to you and me? Well like the class says, first make sure you have no-predisposing medical conditions. Then we must look at our lifestyles, I know many of us can not change how busy we are, but if we want to live a long and healthy firefighting career, then we must get serious about ALL of these things.
DIET: We must start eating better. Eat organic if possible. Food is less nourishing now-a-days. We need more nutrients. Layoff the junk food! All of that grease and fats are killing us! Food saturation, you could eat 3 lbs of carrot sticks before you ate the same caloric intake of a piece of carrot cake topped with ice cream and whipped cream. 3 lbs? You can't eat 3 pounds of carrot sticks. But eating carrot cake tastes better. Eating carrot sticks until you are full will provide you with more nutrients, less sugar and less empty calories. Here is a BIG ONE, stop drinking soda and watch the scale! Talk about empty calories...
WEIGHT: stay away from these yo-yo hollywood diets. Dieting is a pretty basic formula: 1 pound of fat equals 3500 calories. If you could reduce just 500 calories a day, you should see 1 pound of weight loss per week without yo-yo results. A 500 calorie reduction can be obtained via reduced food intake or burning calories by vigorous exercise.
EXERCISE: At least 20 minutes of cardio 3-5 times a week. Get up, get out and get moving! Exercise reproduces our body's response on a much slower and more controlled environment. It prepares our internal organs for the stress of being a firefighter.
STRESS REDUCTION: We must all take time for ourselves. Whatever it is that you love and gets you away is good for the mind, soul, body. Hunting, fishing, hiking, exercising, dancing, singing, reading a book, gardening, whatever it is but figure it out and do it once a week. I personally arrange a date night once a month with my wife, we go out and have someone watch the kids. I also can attest to a good hard workout in the gym. I follow it up with swim at the Y. And every other month I pay to get a massage. AWESOME!
AT WORK: Respect the job! Everyday we are confronted with new hazards that want us to die. Wear your SCBA all the time. Air is FREE. Somebody else paid for it so don't breathe the bad crap! and TRAIN, TRAIN, TRAIN!
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