Clearwater (FL) Mayday (I)

Video from CL300 Incident safety officer's helmet cam with dispatch audio. Video starts approximately 20 minutes after arrival of first alarm units. Mayday is in part 2 just before the 9 minute mark.
Posted November 23, 2010

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Comment by Rockland USA on November 30, 2010 at 7:26am: Isn't this an older incident from a year ago? December 28, 2009? On December 28, 2009 at 1146 hours Clearwater Fire Rescue was dispatched to a dryer on fire inside a house. The initial response was three engines, one ladder truck, one ALS rescue, one squad (heavy rescue), one paramedic lieutenant (LR49) and a district chief.

Here is the full close call report ... http://www.firefighterclosecalls.com/news/fullstory/newsid/102191

Comment by Bekks on November 30, 2010 at 12:04am: For starters, I am glad everyone got out okay.

I don't want to sound like a "monday morning armchair quarterback" but by asking questions, I fear some are gonna take exception. I wasn't there. I'm just trying to learn. This isn't "show up and shut up time."

Alright, in part one, around the 9 min mark, they signal the emergency evacuation and redo PAR after announcing they are going defensive. Seems like a smart thing especially since I am watching a video with the word "Mayday" in the title..

But five minutes later, with what APPEARS to be worsening smoke conditions, they assign crews back into the second floor.

At the start of part 2 of the video (soon after they send the crews back in) IC gives an update that said they have a two story, baloon construction building with the bulk of the fire knocked down and are just looking for hot spots. Maybe its me but, I have not seen that significant volume of dark smoke from all sides refered to as hot spots.

Then a few minutes later they tell them to get out again, crew gets lost, RIT goes in, everyone gets out and flame erups from the A side...

I couldn't hear the safety officers conversations very well, mostly just the radio.

Can someone give me some insight as to why they went back in so soon after the evacuation? They knew there was nobody inside and had declared it as a defensive attack. Why try and go offensive again after a couple of minutes?

Like I said, I'm not trying to pick people apart, I am just trying to find out what and how the command decisions were made in this situation so I can learn from this video. Thanks in advance for your positive input.