The Social Network & Community JUST for Firefighters
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?
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Bob Callahan on
-
In most cases, i disagree.
Are there communities that have the potential to provide significant additional funding to their fire department, but chooses not to to keep the tax rates low? Sure there are. That being said I would say that most departments that operate with a minimum of funding do so because of the size of the community, the community has no significant commercial or industrial tax base or because the community is poor and simply cannot reasonably afford to provide significant additional funding.
Either way, these departments are running on very limited funds, which hampers not only their training in terms of both the ability to send members to classes and build training facilities, such as burn buildings and other props, but also limits the quality of their PPE, apparatus and equipment.
In addition, they likely only run a few structure fires per year. As an example, my volunteer department ran a total of 1 structure fire per year. Even my combo department only ran a total of 5 working structure fires (as defined by the need of a fire department hoseline to extinguish). Confidence to operate interior requires experience, and without a burn building, it's difficult to gain that experience running a handful of structure fire calls per year.
All this being said, a department must operate within the operational limits that it, and it's personnel are comfortable in. Some departments have a very high comfort zone, in part due to their call volume and resulting experience, their interior training and the confidence they have in their apparatus and equipment. Other departments have a lower level of comfort, primarily because they lack all of the elements previously mentioned. For them, an exterior window attack is a reasonable fit. To expect otherwise,is simply unrealistic, and if you try to force them beyond that, it's highly likely there will be a cost, in both injuries, and possibly death, to their personnel.
-
Permalink Reply by Don Catenacci on
-
Bobbie,
My #1 POC FD protects a village of just over 700 people. We are funded primaily by the village, but do various fundraisers over the year. The fundraisers so far have paid the matching funds for our 2005 AFG engine, and paid half the cost of the 1985 engine we bought to replace our 1974 engine. The village paid for our tanker(tender) and brush truck.
We have NFPA approved PPE. including SCBA, and I would put the inventory of firefighting equipment we have up against almost anyone, including my career FD. Although I will say my career FD kicks my POC FDs butt when it comes to specialized rescue and haz-mat equipment.
We have one major industry in town and that is a cheese factory and a half a dozen small businesses. By far the largest employer in town is the county and they pay nothing for fire protection being government buildings.
I don't disagree that there are places where funding MAY not be available due to finacial circumstances. But I will also counter that by saying there are places where the FD has always been thought of as a bastard child and NEVER been funded appropriately when it easily could have been. Or where the chief has never gone into a public meeting and said clearly, concisely, and to the point, that if the community wants REAL fire protection then the community better start funding it. Because with the equipment and training we have and can afford this is what you will be getting: 1) no interior firefighting 2) no rescue attempts inside burning buildings 3) no assurance that every fire will not mean a total loss of the building and the deaths of anyone inside. Is that harsh and playing hardball? Certainly, but if you don't say it OUTLOUD at a public meeting where it has to go on the record, what have you as chief done to effect change?
Lack of fires is pretty much a national trend, with exceptions in some urban areas that seem to love to continue to burn down. Training is the only answer. Look, I undestand limitations in budgets and time. We all have that to some extent. I can't tell you how many classes I went to that I paid for by myself, and the expenses to get there and meals too. But we may have to make sacrifices if we really want to be a firefighter. Set a weekend drill at a neighboring FDs burn tower, go to the fire colleges campus and use their facility. Renting them for a day is far cheaper than building your own. There are answers to all of these questions it just depends on how badly you want to find them.
-
-
Thanks for calling me by my first name. I feel like we have a real relationship now.
I certainly don't mean for this to become an on-going battle, but i do sense that you and I do have very different perspectives on the risks that fire department should take during the course of normal operations. If that is in fact the case, so be it.
Again, I don't disagree that there are communities that could provide additional funding for the fire department, and don't. In fact, give me 30 seconds and I could probably name off half a dozen just in the areas in which I have volunteered or currently volunteer. I also know of communities where both the government through taxes, and the population through fundraisers and donations, have supported the fire department well beyond what would have been expected.
That being said the areas in which most volunteer departments or single-paid firefighter combination departments operate in north LA are very poor with a minimum, if any commercial or industrial activity. In many of these communities the funding simply does not exist for anything but a bare-bones operation, which often barely covers the costs associatted with keeping the doors open and the the trucks running. While my current VFD is not in that bad of a situation, our budget does limit us to the replacement 3-4 sets of turnout gear per year and the purchase some new small tools and equipment. That being said, we still operate with 100% steel bottles on every SCBA we own, which by the way are all at least 10 years old and most are 15-20. We would love to be able to purchase a TIC, but that's not happening anytime soon. We would love to run vehicle extrication but simply don't have, and won't have, in the foreseeable future, money to purchase tools. We still run with 2 1/2" supply hose on 3 of our 5 engines because the funds simple aren't there to purchase even replacement 3" much less 4" like our other 3 engines. Our fleet includes 3 engines and a tanker purchased with a bond in 2007, however, our other 3 engines are a 1977 E-One,(first-out @ ST4), a 1966 Mack, and a recently donated 1992 Ford (first-out @ST3), and our second tanker is on a 1972 Mack chassis. And we are probably the first or second best funded volunteer department (there is one combo department w/ 15 paid staff) in the parish. Dispite all of that, and a very limited roster of only 16 members, we do go interior on our one or two structure fires a year when conditions permit.
It's important to note that I'm not making excuses for those departments that may choose to make exterior attacks as they honestly do not need an "excuse", but I am simply stating the facts in regards to many departments delivering rural fire protection and the tools they can afford to do the job. In any discussion regarding tactics, there are posters who state what a department "should" do in terms of interior v. exterior operations who seem not to recognize these limitations, that often cannot be controlled by the departments themselves. These posters may be in far better situations in terms of staffing, response times, apparatus, equipment asnd mutual aid response, are quite frankly, "should" not be stating what other other department should and should not be doing until they have operated in thier situations.
As far as training, while my VFD does not have a burn building, we are just down the road from one of only 2 LSU training facilities in the state, and we do make use of thier burn facilities at least once every other month. Unfortuantly, there are some pretty vast areas of the state where there may not be a another department's or parish's burn facility for 600-800 square miles, so unlike us, and most of the departments in my volunteer parish, that resource is a good hour away, if not far more, and is certainly not readily accessable. I guess if your answer is a 2 hour drive each way to burn facility, so be it.
I fully understand that fires are down (My combo department ran 24 working fires 5 years ago - last year we ran 5), and I also fully understand that the decrease means that firefighters and officers are less experienced, especially in slower rural VFDs, which may, in great part contribute to some slower departments relying on more exterior and fewer interior operations. Even assuming that department has access to burn facilities, let's be very honest here. The simple fact is that under the restrictions imposed by NFPA 1403 on both burn building operations and acquired structure burns, even in the best of circumstances, it has become almost impossible to even come close to replecating today's plactic and hydrocarbon loaded residental fire conditions. While we could probably discuss the good and the bad of these restrictions (and yes, I fully grasp the hazards of using "non-predictable" burn materials and the reasons for 1403) alone for several pages, the fact that training fires have become far less realistic, IMO does very little to prepare today's firefighters for "the show". There will be those that argue that "I've seen some pretty hot hay or pallet fires", and yes, I have gotten a burn room pretty charged with these materials as well, the fact remains that they are nothing like the real deal. Again, the lack of realistic training may play into the decsion to go primarily exterior, and I personnally have no problem with a department relaizing it's training limitations, and adjusting tactics accordingly. Again, there are those who post the "shoulds" here that have access to good training facilities, and forget that there are thousands of small departments that don't even come close to that luxury. They seem to forget that when making blnaket statements about what a fire department "should" be able to do in terms of interior fire attack operations.
The simple fact is that how a department operates needs to be based on one simple fact - what they have in terms of resources, training and experience. it should not be based on how the next door department fights fire. Or how the departments in Firehouse of Fire Engineering fights fire. Or how the posters at Firefighter Nation or Firehouse say they should fight fire. It is a department decsion that needs to be based on what they can bring to the table,, and not go interior,. And that is all it should be based on. And nobody beyond that department should even come close to questioning it.
Quite honestly, I would much prefer to see a department under evaluate their skills rather than over-evaluate them and get into trouble because of it.
-
Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on
-
Bob,
I'll stick (for the most part) with your admonition not to say what a fire department "should" do. Other than to agree with Don regarding his comment about what a Chief "should" say.
Show me a police department anywhere that subsists solely on voluntary community support, e.g. fund raisers for the most basic of items to perform their duty.
Show me a school system wherein all (or most) of its operating expenses come primarily, or exclusively, from fund raisers, spaghetti dinners and cow shit bingo.
She me a Public Works Department staffed solely by volunteers who all kick in to pay for process and hot or cold patch to maintain the roads and keep their dump trucks and snow plows running with duct tape and wire.
Besides VFDs it seems the only thing fully funded by the community are their local places of worship. And I may be mistaken -and some may actually operate out of (literally) store front windows- but it seems that churches are very typically large, spacious structures, often offering religious education and daycare (and often for a fee). A person can save their soul without all the hoopla that big churches offer, but the same can't be said about saving themselves without a decently funded fire department.
I'm not saying that VFDs should cease to exist, staffing a department with vollies is really, for many communities their only option, due exactly to limited funding. But that should never be an excuse for any community to not kick in (and through taxes, NOT cow shit bingo and fill-the-boot campaigns) to ensure that the people who volunteer to provide fire protection are at least afforded the equipment and training to do so safely.
In the history of rental cars I'll bet no one has ever washed one. And in the history of volunteer firefighting, how many communities have stepped up and said, "Hey, let us fund you through taxes so you can have the equipment, apparatus and training you need, to do what you so selflessly have volunteered to do?" Really, why buy the cow when you get the milk for free?
And how many VFDs out there refuse to go to their community and demand the necessary (full) funding simply because they don't want to give up their *fierce independence*?
I really think the issue is that, should a Chief go to the community and tell it like it is, they are afraid the town will decide to go to a paid department and do away (or mostly so) with the whole volunteer thing. Volunteer fire departments would rather keep a low profile, beg for money and hand outs and maintain their independence rather than risk losing their hobby. And I'm being particularly exact in using the word 'hobby' because if it was anything else other than one, they would be demanding everything they need to do the job safely and professionally.
And in an ironic twist (as evidenced by comments in here in previous discussions about 'too many requirements being put on volunteers,' how many vollies actually, really want to take and maintain the necessary skill set to be an effective firefighter? The NVFC and IAFC have even come out suggesting that perhaps some of the requirements put forth by the NFPA may be putting too much of a burden on present day vollies.
In my neck of the woods there are VFDs (I've been told) that are rather accomplished at saving foundations, while there are VFD's (I've seen) that are as good as any small to medium-size paid department. I don't know if bad departments go unfunded because they are bad or if they've become bad because they are unfunded, but I haven't run across a good VFD that wasn't fully supported by their community.
I can start to understand the madness called subscription service for fire protection. If you're willing to put your ass on the line, then you should be doing it for people who not just appreciate it but understand that it needs to be paid for so as not to see people killed trying to save their cheap ass.
As for sticking a nozzle through a window, if that's the best they can do, that's the best that's going to get done. And in most cases they are probably going to exacerbate the incident because the only thing they know is 'water put fire out.'
-
-
Not going to disagree that there are departments that have not, and likely never will, go to the town for money in order to remain independant. That being said, how many town governments will not attempt to micro-manage department operations if the department goes to them for funding? While this topic could be a whole seperate discussion, there are certainly costs that come with going to the town coffers for funding. In some towns, where those in government actually understand that the fire department knows best how to run a fire department, those costs are fairly small. However, in other towns where there is a history of micro-management, there may be very legtimate fears within the fire department about town government mucking up department operations.Should that prevent them from trying to access tax funding? I guess in my mind, that is a decsion that only they can make, as they understand thier own local world, and have a much better idea of having the town now bwecome a part of their operations than I ever will.
In my experiences, I have seen that type of thing work out for the good, and for the bad.
One example of a compromise was the system used by my previous VFD. the department was a non-profit corporation. We negotiated with the town every 5 years, and received funding to provide fire protection. It was enough to purchase just about everything we needed, including financing apparatus and a station expansion. The system worked well. There were several departments in our area that used that type of a contract-system.
And yes, there are very good VFDs, a lot of VFDs someplace in the middle and yes, some very bad VFDs. And there are VFDs that train quite a bit, many that train some, and some that train very little. It's really not much different than the performance spectrum of combination and career departments.
As far as north LA, and in fact, most of LA, just about every rural VFD operates within a fire district, which sets fire tax rates which must be approved by the voters every 10 years. The cities are funded through the municipal budgets. These communities range from some very populated departments in south LA, especially in the New Orleans area, to some very poor, sparsley populated areas with essentailly no significant tax base. Like it or not, these departments collect very little, and are forced to operate on the very little that they collect. Yes, the departments have the opportunity every 10 years to increase the milage request, but the final decsion on that is in the hands of the voters, that muct approve the increase.The sad fact is that given the poverty in many of these palces, the residents cannot afford to pay more for fire protection than waht they are paying. And the tax base simply does not exist to expand the burden.
Is that the case everyplace? No. But I do know that I have served many places in VT where the tax base didn't exist for the department to significantly increase revenues. And I know odf some departments where thr residents supported the department quite well through both taxes and supporting fundraisers.
All that being said, we still get back to the fact that in many places, an exterior attack through an open window or door is till a very acceptable form of fire attack given the lack of resources, manpower, training and/or experience. There are also situations in even the most well-staffed departments where for whatever reasons (multiple calls, extended response times for second due or mutual aid companies, multiple priorities such as a critical patienet requiring care by suppression until EMS arrives, etc) that utilizing a hoseline through a door or window to knock down the fire until more troops arrive is perfectly accepatable and quite applicable. yes, we are there top protect civilians, but we do come first, and if the situation forces us to use this technique to reduce firefighter risk either on a regualr basis, or on a very rare occasion, depending oon the department, I have no issues with it.,
-
-
Hey Don .....
Nice seeing here too buddy.
-
-
My #1 POC FD is funded through the village board. We do not get micromanaged by them for our day to day operations. Their concerns are simple, our spending is fiscally sound, and that we provide good sevice to the community. Both of which we do and do quite well thank you vey much.
If a fire department is underfunded and afraid to go to their governing body because of some real or imagined fea of additional oversight, I would say they have lost sight of the mission all for the power of being solely in control of the FD. Which is smarter? Complete control and inadequate funding, or give up some control to get better funding, better equipment and better training? The answer seems obvious to me.
Again, to me, if the chief and the fire department is not PUBLICLY announcing at a local board meeting that they will not be going inside any building ever for fire suppression, or rescue attempts, then they are lieing to their community and giving a false sense of security to the citizens they are supposedly protecting. And don't tell me the citizens know, because if they haven't been told they don't know. It is really that simple.
-
-
You are lucky as it sounds like you do have a good situation with your town government, and I know of other VFDs that work off the town budget that also have a very good working relationship with the town. That being said, I also know of several situations where the VFD is micro-managed by the town, and honestly, are much worse off now in terms of both operations and morale, and concequently staffing (due to many older members quitting), than they were before taking budget $$$$ for operations.
I do agree that there are some departments that should, if not funded through a fire district, should go to the town for funding. Is it a cure all? I guess it depends. I know of one department in my volunteer parish that made a deal with the town many years ago to receive $2 from every water bill. At the time, it provided adequate funding. Now, it doesn't even come close to meeting their needs and the town simply refuses to change the agreement and either supplement it with tax revenue or switch the funding mechanism to tax revenue. So yes, working as part of town gov't can work out very well. It can also work out very bad.
As I said, the vast majority of the rural departments here work off dedicated tax funding through a fire district. For some districts, that have a good strong commercial base or high-vlaue homes, it works out very well. For the districts with little commercial property and primarily mobile homes and shotgun shacks, it provides them with very little funding.
As far as the debate about the Chief telling the residents his department's limits, I guess around here the population in the district does very much understand what the department's limits are. Should they be public about it? maybe, but honestly, in this part of the state, even he he made such a statement I highly doubt it would change very much.
-
-
Bobbie,
Thanks, I have been here for awhile, this is just the first time we have come across each other.
What you are missing in the public declaration of service capability is the Chief and the FD covering their asses.
You say people know the FDs true capabilities, maybe they do, maybe they don't. I guarantee you that in my part of the country if you call the fire department you expect they will at least attempt to go inside to fight the fire AND make rescues, if possible. Standing outside would not be acceptable.
Perhaps that public statement would change nothing, but just maybe it would open some eyes. Maybe it would force the local government to take the FD just a little bit more seriously and actually fund them adequately.
If you don't try you will never know will you?
-
-
Maybe.
As I said, it's pretty much common knowledge in most rural areas about what the capabilities of the fire districts are. The communities are small and word travels when there's a fire about what the department did and didn't do. Just about everybody knows a couple of fireman, and yes, for good or bad, makes judgements about the abilities of the department based off what they know about that person. And they know that both the LE and EMS services are often distant and often limited compared to the cities, so yes, they know.
Should the Chief state it publicly? I think some have..
Here in LA it's a little different though as there are a very limited number of "local" governments. For the majority of the state, with the exception of the areas around New Orleans, and to a limited extent, Baton Rouge, the only local governments are in the incorporated cities. The vast majority of the land is in the unincorporated parish, which has no local governments, with the only government being at the parish (or county) level, managed only by the Police Jury (basically County Commissioners). The parishes do not run the fire departments and contribute no funding to their operations. They are all broken up into fire districts that have the power to tax for fire protection.. There are some parishes that have parish wide fire districts but most are broken up into multiple smaller fire districts.
The milage is set by the districts and then voted on by the residents every 10 years. It cannot be voted on at any other time by state law. The fire district can choose to keep the same rate and simply ask for a renewal of the milage, or can ask the residents to vote on an increase, That is what my volunteer district did 4 years ago and it was approved, They also voted on a bond to purchase 3 engines, a tanker and 5" supply line, which they approved as well. The increase in the milage rate brought our yearly budget from about 90K to about 147K (milage rate went from 9 mils to 13). As I said, most of the other districts in the parish run about 10 mils, which is fairly typical for rural districts statewide. My combo department runs at 19 mils and there are districts as high as 23 mils in my combo parish, which would simply not be acceptable in most rural parishes. Even if many, if not most of these districts could convince the residents to say go to 15 or even 17 mils, which would be high for a rural district, it's unlikely the increase in revenue would be significant as quite frankly, there is little in the way of a tax base in many of these districts.
That being said there are some rural districts that are well funded. there are some that are fairly well staffed with volunteers. And there are some that are well trained when you consider the training resources they have available to them. Are they as well trained as my combo department with 2 burn buildings, 3 flammable gas props and plenty of funding available to send members to outside classes? No, and they never will come close, but given their resources and proximity to burn facilities or LSU FETI facilities, they do fairly well.
Again, at least in my experiences, most rural communities do know the capabilities of the fire department better than you may think.
-
-
well Bobbie,
That's it then, isn't it? There is no answer to the pitiful funding for fire protection in most of LA. So the people there should just accept sub-par fire protection for ever.
I guess if you want to settle for that situation fine, as for me, my Dad, and a few friends, we helped turn our village's POC FD around about 25 years ago. Sitting on our hands and going "Well, it is what it is and we can't change it" just isn't MY style.
-
-
"As I said, it's pretty much common knowledge in most rural areas about what the capabilities of the fire districts are."
That may indeed be true; of course if all you've ever known is Bubba and Billy Bob showing up, half-in-the-bag and wetting down your foundation (or chassis) then your metric for fire protection is the degree of drunkenness (or sobriety) of Bubba and Billy Bob.
If your local doctor killed more patients than he helped, would you just accept that level of service because you only had to pay the doctor a chicken?
And the greatest mystery of all: How are Police Departments, Public Works Departments and Schools funded? Or is it just that, once the streets are safe, paved and filled with buses heading to school, the idea of protecting all of that from fire is considered unnecessary or nonessential?
© 2024 Created by Firefighter Nation WebChief.
Powered by
