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putting air mask on while on the truck
I want to know how many people put their air mask on before you get off the truck. Because at my station we wait until we are at the front door about to enter the fire.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Don Catenacci on
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If people fumble in the heat of the moment they need stress induced timed training with repetition and zero tolerance for error. Because whenever we respond and it is an actual working incident, it is ALWAYS the heat of the moment. That is what perfection based repetitive training is all about. Not doing it til you get it right, doing it until yourepetitively don't get it wrong.
No, I would not don my facepiece before arrival even if I know it is a working house fire with entrapment. I can don my mask pretty damn quickly and the ability to work unencumbered by the facepiece up until entry, in my mind anyways, far outweighs the seconds you believe you save by donning it en route.
By the way, if fogging is not ever an issue you obviously do not live or work in a climate where the temperature ever goes below 40 degrees or even worse below zero. I don't care what make of SCBA you use, in those conditions you will experience fogging, some worse than others.
Again, I really don't care how you guys that mask up en route operate. If that is normal for your FD then so be it. I don't agree that it is beneficial and thankfully none of the FDs I am affiliated with have that as an SOP. Further I don't see any of them changing to that mode.
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Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on
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Nick,
The issue with wearing your mask while in the rig is that, once on scene you are mentally driven to concentrate on going in (since that's the reason you're giving for masking up in the rig). As such your attention is more about stretching the line to the front door than taking in what's going on around you. You can't just take a fleeting glimpse at the smoke and know immediately what it can tell you. Is it all coming from one window, or is it coming evenly from all the eaves? Looking up does the smoke appear gray or is that just fog on the upper part of your face piece? More importantly is your officer taking the time to observe or is he too making a mad dash for the door?
I can appreciate that you follow your SOPs but, being directed to (always) mask up essentially requires you to limit your Situational Awareness. And how can you always know what your assignment is going to be? What if your engine is assigned to hook the hydrant? Now you're working with your mask on and it will fog.
Also, as a volunteer department your staffing can vary and with that variability how can you have riding assignments? One working fire you may have 3 people, another 2, another still 4 or 5. It would seem to me that IC would want to know crew sizes and on arrival start assigning crews tasks and maybe establish a manpower pool.
I get that your SOPs dictate how you respond but maybe it's time to put forth an argument to your department to reconsider it. Requiring you to mask up on the rig IS going to limit your field of vision and situational awareness and you are more likely to confront tripping hazards.
You state that your department trains often and regularly and that's great, but it does also sound like your department may have a balls-to-the-wall cowboy mentality. Being an 'aggressive' department is one thing, being 'reckless' is a whole 'nother matter.
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Permalink Reply by 3us8225bsp2fp on
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You have valid points. I am not saying that in every situation we always mask up in our rig. If we know it is a working fire and we know our assignment we do. And generally we know our assignment a couple minutes before we arrive. If we are second due engine the person grabbing the hydrant gets out (usually a junior) and hits the hydrant. The two that will be grabbing the back up line generally are the ones who would mask up before arrival. Like I said earlier we train constantly with our mutual aid departments so that we generally know who is to do what on a house fire switching out roles constantly.
We are a more aggressive department but we are not reckless at all. We are not the type to do stupid things. We do hustle and try to get the job done in the safest manner possible as well as the quickest.
And Don I do live in a colder place (PA) and we use MSA and I honestly have not had my mask fog up yet while I was wearing it. Maybe I am just weird.
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Permalink Reply by ashfire on
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I was riding back step in the 70s to the 80s and we had 15 min sling packs either laid on the hose bed or stuffed in a spot so it could be grabed. If there was 3 to 4 on the step one would remove their helmet while one man would cover from behind and they sling the tank strap over their head and put their helmet back on grab the face mask and hang it on the regulator. The crew in the jump seats would back into the 30 min packs strap up and hang the face mask on the regulator. When we got on the scene the crew would mask up at the door.
When we started riding in the cabs, those that had 30 min packs would put them on and hang the mask on the regulators. Get to the door mask up.
When the mask got redesigned to have the regulator on the face mask some had to get mask bags for their mask since everyone now had to be sized for their own mask. I wear glasses so I had to get glasses for my mask. I had to remove my regular glasses and put them in a hard case in a inside pocket in my coat so I ended up masking up in the cab so I could see.
I haven't ridden in over 10 years so I still own my mask but it won't fit the new air packs the county bought since then.
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Nick,
Seriously, are you saying you have juniors responding emergency on first due fire apparatus?
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Permalink Reply by Derek J Sinesi on
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Our SOG"S suggested operating guideline is just that. If a guy puts on his mask in the rig he is not going to get in trouble for it we just as soon not have you do so. Our guys on the first due rig know who's grabbing the line and ect. I'm not sure about your departments but in mine 2 chiefs are farmers and one of them also drives a school bus and the other works out of town. So most of the time we do not have a chief on the scene right away and a line officer riding a rig has to make the size up and give the orders when he arrives on the scene. Because i carry my gear with me and a lot of our calls are my way i will be the first officer on the scene and because our radio system sucks a portable wont hit a tower and can't communicate with the first due truck until its 1/2 mile away its hard to give orders till on scene.
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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on
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That being said our company SOP is that if we are going to a working fire we are to come off of the rigs masked up
Once again, a stupid SOP/G to have. Why is it stupid? Because such a policy thus ties a member to something where there are countless variables that can be easily missed by having a facepiece on. Such policies or guidelines mandating such actions thus eliminates the fireground size up and other fireground tasks....thus creating potential safety issues for personnel, and puts personnel, potential victims, and property owners at risk.
Truthfully if a dept has such a policy or guideline like this in place, it should be addressed and elimintaed because it binds personnel to a blanket policy on a vastly variable emergency scene.
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If we are second due engine the person grabbing the hydrant gets out (usually a junior) and hits the hydrant
Yeah, to echo Don here, are you saying juniors are responding and your dept is actually utilizing them? Before you answer......seriously take a look at past discussions involving juniors.....this is NOT a can or worms you would want to open. A junior's place on a fireground is and should be observation only.....I could care less about your dept and how they do it and what works for them.....because quite honestly, if you are utilizing juniors.....your dept is doing it wrong.
Knowing your assignment and so forth ahead of time still does not necessitate masking up prior to arrival. Each and every FF should be doing a size up and accounting for the bigger picture.....as opposed to (how Jack mentions) having a pre-disposed mindset and not sizing up your surroundings.
Even grabbing lines and so forth can hinder a FF if they are already masked up.....visibility is limited, there can be fogging issues (most likely ....I could care less what one says....I experienced fogging on several different SCBAs...it happens).
Really, there is no good reason to mask up prior to arrival while on a rig. There has not been a single case made by such proponents that have not been easily debunked and shown to be a bad idea. The ONLY thing such proponents have going for them is a time saving aspect.....yet even that has been sufficiently debunked.
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I agree that is way we don't practice donning your face piece till at the door. Bottom line is to much responsibility for all those in charge and opens up for the possibility of someone getting hurt. But if your SOPS state that is how you operate then that is how you have to operate till someone changes them.
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But if your SOPS state that is how you operate then that is how you have to operate till someone changes them.
Exactly why such a discussion is applicable....if for anything to address such issues. Such a concept of masking up enroute and making this an SOP/G is stupid and binds personnel and thus placing their safety and citizen safety in jeopardy. Yes, such SOP/Gs should be questioned and SOP/Gs should be reviewed for applicity in current times.
As such, which is why I am not a proponent of SOPs....at least a SOG (guideline) offers some flexibilty whereas an SOP doesn't. When it comes to a fireground.....we know science, technology, and the fire service is ever changing......any archaic policy or guidleine such as this should be tossed....it has NO place in today's fire service. Any SOP/G even saying that a truck company will go to the roof etc is archaic, or any SOP/G dictating variable tactics and size up.
So yeah, instead of people coming on here and touting their operations and their SOP/Gs "because it works for them" is not looking at the broader picture. Yes, I am bluntly saying that if a dept has such a SOP/G....get them changed, as opposed to trying to justify some outdated BS.
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Permalink Reply by capcityff on
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In addition to that if your department is a very small and rural department(like I'm guessing if juniors have that job) then I doubt you're as aggressive as your say. That means the majority of fires you respond to are probably well off already and you just sit outside for a defensive attack. In that case, is the 15 seconds you save masking up enroute even worth it?
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Permalink Reply by Shareef Abdu Nur on
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We do not encourage our members to mask up en route. I know some people says that it saves time. That's BS! If you really want to save time then learn how to don your mask with your gloves on or is that to much to ask.
Our members understand that scene size up is everyone's job and that arriving on scene is when alot of this happens. Honestly, the 5-8 seconds that it takes to don our masks is precisely the amount of time we need to "slow" ourselves down, take a deep breathe, and notice some things that we might miss through a fogged up SCBA mask.
With a SCBA mask on, we are "zeroed" in on whatever the given task may be and we are not looking up at the building for size up clues or down at the grown for trip hazards. Our perifieral vision is completely lost so we do not notice anything other than what is directly in front of us.
As far as snatching the line from a member while he/she is masking up, if we do that who is doing our job? We do not have the luxury of enough manpower to allow freelancing. Every member has a specific job that he/she is accountable for in order to ensure operational efficiency. If I throw my tools down to steal the line who's going to vent? If my crew is fighting over the nozzle, who's doing the search?
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