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Riddle Me This, Batman
...as the Joker used to say in the old Adam West TV show...
I just caught a quote from the recent tragic LODD and multiple LOD injuries in St. Anna, WI. One of the nine injuries was an Explorer.
According to Capt. Adam Schuh of the SAFD, "Among those injured were 17-year-old Chase Fritsch and 15-year-old Joshua Scott. Fritsch, who is Schuh’s stepson, is of legal age to serve as a firefighter, with parental permission. Scott is a fire department explorer, a training program for teens aspiring to become firefighters. Scott was never in the actual danger zone on Tuesday night, Schuh said." (Emphasis Supplied)
Source: Statter911
This begs the question; If the Explorer was not in "the actual danger zone", then how did the explosion injure him?
For those of you who are Explorers or juniors and can't wait to get close to the danger, this should make you think. Even something that appears as routine as a dumpster fire isn't alwasy what it appears. Sometimes "out of the danger zone" is still too close.
So should this story from Glen Ellen, CA, where an Explorer was treated for heat exhaustion suffered while reportedly ....
For those of you who have Explorer or junior programs, these incidents should give you pause.
Why would anyone let an Explorer fight an interior fire for any reason?
How can an explosion injure an Explorer who is thought to be out of the danger area?
I wonder what their parents are thinking right now?
Any LODD is tragic. I share in the sorrow for the St. Anna department's loss, and am greatful that this incident or the Glen Ellen incident were not even worse. The potential was certainly there. The adult firefighters generally understand the risks when they respond to any call, even if it's "just a dumpster fire". The juniors and Explorers among us clearly don't have the experience and judgement to do the same.
If your department has an Explorer or junior program, the rules for what they can do, how close to a hazard zone they are allowed, their PPE, need to be clear, concise, and enforced. Their supervision needs to be absolute.
I sincerely hope that this is the last time we ever hear about an Explorer injury while operating at a fire.
I just caught a quote from the recent tragic LODD and multiple LOD injuries in St. Anna, WI. One of the nine injuries was an Explorer.
According to Capt. Adam Schuh of the SAFD, "Among those injured were 17-year-old Chase Fritsch and 15-year-old Joshua Scott. Fritsch, who is Schuh’s stepson, is of legal age to serve as a firefighter, with parental permission. Scott is a fire department explorer, a training program for teens aspiring to become firefighters. Scott was never in the actual danger zone on Tuesday night, Schuh said." (Emphasis Supplied)
Source: Statter911
This begs the question; If the Explorer was not in "the actual danger zone", then how did the explosion injure him?
For those of you who are Explorers or juniors and can't wait to get close to the danger, this should make you think. Even something that appears as routine as a dumpster fire isn't alwasy what it appears. Sometimes "out of the danger zone" is still too close.
So should this story from Glen Ellen, CA, where an Explorer was treated for heat exhaustion suffered while reportedly ....
For those of you who have Explorer or junior programs, these incidents should give you pause.
Why would anyone let an Explorer fight an interior fire for any reason?
How can an explosion injure an Explorer who is thought to be out of the danger area?
I wonder what their parents are thinking right now?
Any LODD is tragic. I share in the sorrow for the St. Anna department's loss, and am greatful that this incident or the Glen Ellen incident were not even worse. The potential was certainly there. The adult firefighters generally understand the risks when they respond to any call, even if it's "just a dumpster fire". The juniors and Explorers among us clearly don't have the experience and judgement to do the same.
If your department has an Explorer or junior program, the rules for what they can do, how close to a hazard zone they are allowed, their PPE, need to be clear, concise, and enforced. Their supervision needs to be absolute.
I sincerely hope that this is the last time we ever hear about an Explorer injury while operating at a fire.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on
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WP,
You made me question my spelling, which was correct so to answer your question, I have no idea.
Imagine how many lines it would take to write out the description of how to tie one's shoes? Did you at least try it?
I agree likewise with John's assessment. Key here is oversight. How well supervised are these kids? And yes, kids do get badly hurt and sometimes killed playing a sport, nothing is without risk. But then, football (the example given) is played under typically well lit conditions, clear visibility, proper equipment and training (!), mostly well supervised and refereed with nothing more dangerous coming at the kids than other kids. It's not like the opponents are liable to burst into flames. All in all, I think the benefits far outweigh the risks...in playing football.
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Permalink Reply by Art "ChiefReason" Goodrich on
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In my mind, here is the crux of the whole problem:
When Chris Kangas was killed, he was 14 years old, was a junior firefighter for a department in Pennsylvania, heard a call come in, jumped on his bicycle and raced to the fire station. He never made it. He was struck and killed by a car. Then, in typical emotional fashion, instead of taking this tragic event and changing junior/explorer protocols to reduce the chances of it happening again, a movement started to get him Firefighter status. It's a God awful tragedy for sure, but I felt it was a stretch to view this as an LODD.
In the two most recent incidents involving juniors, no one died.
But instead of taking the opportunity to fix a system that might be ripe with underqualified mentors/sponsors, we are making efforts to justify their use at incidents in various capacities.
NO.
Until we can force a better effort out of the "adults", reduce the number of LODDs each year and continue to reduce the number of FF deaths, we don't need to add kids to the list.
We have departments out there that can't even hit a minimum and we are going to trust them with juniors? I wouldn't trust them with a junior cheeseburger; let alone my child.
In 2009, heart attacks was the number one killer again and occurred in FF above age 35.
But, trauma killed the young ones. Vehicle wrecks and other struck bys.
If these junior programs are working so well, then why is there a higher accident and injury rate among the youngest FFs? And don't you DARE say that it's because they do more. It's not.
Think about what needs to be done and stop living your dreams through the eyes of the children.
They need to grow up and we need to wait until they do.
IMHO.
Art
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Permalink Reply by WestPhilly on
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Viola/Voila - Guess you had to be there.
Of course I tried tying my shoes. I know how to do it. Oh, you mean did I try to copy and paste. No. I'll get my 9-year-old to show me that technical stuff.
Just to be clear on this, I'm not talking about giving some kid the tip on a basement job over here. There are lots of things to do on the fireground that are not gonna cause anyone to "burst into flames". For juniors, is there no middleground on the fireground?
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I was there, just thought you had misread it and thought I had misspelled the word and were being funny (droll more likely).
Since one doesn't need to get up to actually change the TV channel anymore it's good to see that kids are being put to other uses.
I think we both agree that the bursting into flames option was tongue in cheek it does serve to point out that playing football is far, far less hazardous than having said child on the fireground.
I know you like to play Beelzebub's Barrister but personally, do you think it's a good idea to have 15 and 16 y/o's doing anything on the fireground besides observing?
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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the State of Wi needs to rethink this very serouisly.
Whoa, hold on there chief. It would be one thing to say this is just a State of WI thing here, but reality is you see the same damn thing everywhere, all states. This is not something the State of WI needs to rethink, this is something the entire fire service needs to rethink.
The difference here is that a couple kids were injured on a fireground. Not responding, not while riding in a tanker or other rig, on the fireground. I'm willing to say that kids have been used much more often and placed in danger but "nothing ever happened", this time kids were hurt and should be a lesson for all. As for the incident with the explorer going interior, that was NOT in WI. The WI incident is the dumpster explosion.
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Question for the group:
In Illinois, when firefighters are injured fighting a fire intentionally set or at a meth lab, it adds aggravating circumstances to the charges and the perp, if convicted faces more jail time.
In other words, when someone wantonly and willfully injures a firefighter, they are charged with a crime.
When a firefighter who is responsible for the safety of their personnel through their direct action or inaction, injures one of their people; in this case, a junior, what should be an appropriate punishment?
Because I feel that, until we get it under control with harsh punishment of the ones who are causing harm, I don't see it getting better.
Oh wait: you couldn't get officers, there wouldn't be explorer programs any more, everyone would be afraid of getting sued, the sky will fall.
You get my point.
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Permalink Reply by Oldman on
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"you couldn't get officers"
If the Chief is ultimately responsible, then we'd have to have a jail for just Chiefs. Then nobody would want to be Chief?
The only absolute way to deter this from happening (IMHO) is to simply make it illegal to have a Jr/Explorer programs.
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Having a junior or explorer program is not the problem, there are many established programs where such issues are not happening and they do follow the established rules. The problems come in with those depts that knowingly and willingly allow juniors and explorers to participate on the fireground because "it works for them".
I have a different opinion on explorers and do see these programs as beneficial. One can still get an idea about the job and have an understanding of what the job entails without having to be on a fireground to learn. Explorers, through the Boy Scouts, is nothing new and are in many jobs out there, there are set rules established which outlines what explorers can and can't do, where you see a bending of such rules are with depts that do their own junior program and don't fall under the Learning for Life program.
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Permalink Reply by Loyd Dittfurth on
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Ok I know this is going to aggitate a lot of you. It depends on the area in which you are in. In the small towns of america its not like the big city where adults that want to help out are a dime a dozen. In small town USA they dont have the luxury of picking and choosing the people that they want to help. You have 5 maybe 10 people show up to a fire and 4 might know how to put on an airpack and 2 of them have no business going in a burning building. So that 15 year old kid over there who is begging and pleading to let him go with you Is your best bet.
Like I say its all in the area where you are at. Some things I wont budge on. Such as ems any one under the age of 18 I will let be a gopher on a wreck and maybe help load the back board onto the cot. But there is no way that I will agree to having them provide lifsaving treatment. That could cost me my license and I worked very hard for that. I also dont believe that they should be allowed on any HAZMAT scenes. There is to much of a risk to the individual because of unseen hazards
ok yall can yell your heads off at me now
thanks
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I also dont believe that they should be allowed on any HAZMAT scenes. There is to much of a risk to the individual because of unseen hazards
In hindsight Loyd, what really is the difference between a HAZMAT scene and the fireground? Come to think of it that dumpster explosion in WI was a HAZMAT scene for the most part, would you agree? There are just as many unseen hazards in a structure fire as a HAZMAT scene.
I don't buy the 15 y/o eager to be a FF as a best bet either, even in small town USA. There should be no reason to use kids on a scene, if that means the inadequacies within a dept mean the loss of the structure, well so be it. The term "you get what you pay for" holds true even in the fire service and people who choose to live in areas with such inadequacies take that greater risk and is also why insurance can cost more. That seems to be the issue at hand though with a take what you can get approach, it creates excuses instead of solutions.
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Permalink Reply by Ben "Batman" Barry on
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As an explorer I do agree, that should not have happened. No explorer should be any where near the danger zone. I want to know what those explorers were thinking when doing such a stupid unsafe thing at a fire.
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Ok, I'll take a swing:
So that 15 year old kid over there who is begging and pleading to let him go with you Is your best bet. That exactly there is the problem. I can't believe that you would have a problem with a 15 y/o on EMS but think it's fine and dandy to drag a 15 y/o into a structure fire!
Contrary to what you may believe (or choose to believe) I doubt very much that there are people lining up to join a VFD. Maybe one or two but from my understanding it's a nationwide problem getting new people to join.
But if a department is so short-staffed that they would even consider taking in a 15 or 16 y/o then what they need to do is either merge with another neighbor department, regionalize, work out a mutual aid response or shut the doors, because going to work with children is obscene, illegal, immoral and just damn stupid. But that's just my opinion.
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