Window attack.

It was brought up at a discussion at training about a quick window fog stream attack prior to interior attack on a confirmed room and content fire, what is everyones thoughts on this?

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Permalink Reply by Eat The Roof on February 10, 2012 at 10:17am

Lou,

You hit the nail on the head.Clear,concise and based in fact.Best Post on the subject by far.

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Permalink Reply by Bob Callahan on February 10, 2012 at 10:29am

And it's not my style either, which is why on every department I have been on I have worked to improve it.

On my last VFD I built a highly respected public education and juvenile firesetting intervention program, and was involved as an instructor teaching at least 6-7 weekly drills a year, and teaching in the rookie program. I taught classes on public education regionally and statewide, and was involved in several pubed and JFS intervention associations, organizations and state and regional level committees.

On my current combo department, once again, I built a very active and respected public education and juvenile firesetting intervention program, and once again have been involved as an instructor on the daily and weekly training level, as well as ijn FFI/FFII and First responder/EMT-B classes, and once again have taught JFS and pubed regionally and statewide. I have cmpiled a 1500 class data base in the computer that makes tracking our training a very easy task, especially for the line personnel that now just have to write a code on the training sheet as the class description is pre-loaded into the computer.

On my current VFD, I serve as, along with the training officer, as the primary instructors for the department, and teach reading snoke, search and rapid intervention classes parish-wide, and I am working to build a public education program.

So yes, sitting on my hands ain't my style either.

That being said there are departments that are happy where they are. Are there members in those departments that may like to change things? Have they tried and failed? I don't know.

Jack, as far as your drunk Bubba comment, you know that's aload of crap and below the belt, and you know that in most cases, these are folks trying to help out there community giving what time they have. They may not have the a college education, and may not have a pile of certifications, but the vast majority of them do take time to train, even though it may be very limited.

It's difficult to improve resources when you are working on 30 or 40K a year operating 7 or 8 stations over 300-400 square miles, like many of the larger rural districts here, or have a total population of a few thousand to recruit from. I know of some very dedicated rural departments that do a very good job considering what they have both in terms of funding and manpower. And I also know of some that do not do a very good job, just like many career departments that deliver sub-par service. And for those poorly funded rural districts, it is likely, that is the best they will ever do simply because they don't and never will have the funding, as they don't, and never will have the tax base or the income level in the district, to bring in very much more. And that is simple the reality.

If you call that sub-par, maybe it is. But again, it's up to resdents to change that. Some have, and voted to increase milages when asked by the districts at milage renewal votes, like at my volunteer department. Others have not.

In the end, it is up to residents as to how much they want to fund the fire districts. And I'm sure many of them would like closer fire stations, with more personnel, better apparatus and shorter response times. But they also understand that they are paying what they can in fire taxes, and they fully understand that living in the rural areas means compromise. Just like they accept limited LE and accept limited EMS they accept limited fire protection because they know that limited is the best they will be able to afford. They fund LE through taxes, but they know that there may be only 2-3 deputies on the road at any one time for a 1200 square mile parish, and they may fund EMS through taxes too knowing that there are only 2 EMS crews available for that entire area. The roads are primarily taken care opf by the state, but the parish does provide some limited maintainence through taxes. Again, the residents accept the fact that they don't have the money for all the LE, EMS road work they would like, or they don't have the fancy stuff in the schools that a better off district has, because most of them fully understand the finances of the parish, as well as what they can afford to pay.

But I do know that either of my current departments are not like that. My VFD has some restrictions based on manpower, response time and funding, and we know that, are we are trying to change that, but we recognize that some will take time and some limitations likely never can be overcome. Call that whatever you like. I call it being realistic about what we can become.