EXPERIENCE
Does the fire service experience more or less fires today as compared to yesterday? The obvious answer is- – - – - – - -LESS! Just as sprinklers, smoke detectors, and other similar factors have collectively reduced the number of fires, the experience level of personnel has also been reduced. Therefore, when a modern firefighter arrives at a typical one-room fire in a single-family dwelling (which NFPA indicates is 60-70% of our fires), the excitement level can be abnormally high, creating an environment that can result in personnel forgetting a few basics, thereby reducing fireground safety and increasing the potential of injury or death. At this point, you are thinking that a lack of experience can be enhanced or substituted with training. Although this can be accomplished, I would ask the following question, “has the level of training in your department increased or decreased in the area of fireground operations”?

Now, lets combine the preceding four areas of consideration and summarize their impact (or change) on the modern fireground. Just a few years ago and in the absence of SCBA and hoods, personnel were taught to stay low, use the oxygen around the water being discharged from a spray nozzle, monitor the environment with the ears/back of hands, and position personnel with a nozzle to the side of the entrance opening when applying water to the seat of a fire. Under these conditions, personnel unknowingly often enjoyed the benefits of a structure that was slow to collapse and an environment (thermal layer) that was also slow to flashover (as compared to the structures and environments of today). However, with the advent of progress (change), attack personnel were able to use their modern protective equipment to rapidly advance to the seat of a fire. Unfortunately, this has increased the inherent hazards of the three following fireground considerations:

• A decreased level of experience and confidence can easily foster an increased level of excitement, dull the fine art of the decision making process, and enhance the ability of personnel to “forget the basics”.
• An increased ability of modern lightweight buildings to offer minimal fireground time.
• The increased number of flashovers in the modern fireground environment. Stated from another perspective, the lower ignition temperature of modern building contents and fireground thermal layers has enhanced the chance of a flashover in a typical one-room fire that is so often encountered in a single family dwelling.

Therefore, when the firefighter of today enters a fireground environment, it is imperative that appropriate time is set aside to evaluate the following considerations:

• Initially, make a mental note of the conditions that are encountered. This will allow you to formulate a baseline that can be used to compare (or evaluate) against conditions that are encountered as you advance into a hazardous environment.
• Are you encountering smoke with heat, or smoke with no heat. Smoke with heat is an excellent indicator of a fire which has the potential to create an environmental problem (i.e., flashover).
• Can you find your way out of the structure in an acceptable period of time? If you are going to extend yourself, be able to find your way out of the structure in a timely manner.
• While you are in the structure, constantly evaluate the environment against the baseline you developed as you entered the structure. Are conditions improving or not improving? If conditions are improving, there is a good chance that suppression efforts are being effective. If conditions have not improved or are degrading, evaluate your degree of commitment.
• A growing concern in the modern fire service is the need to rest firefighters that have exhausted one, or at the maximum, two bottles of compressed air in a hot-working environment. It is a fact that a fully encapsulated body will not effectively ventilate itself, and increase the chance of dehydration (as a result of sweat-wetting) while simultaneously reducing the effectiveness of a persons decision making ability. Therefore, when personnel expend considerable energy in full protective clothing in a hot-working environment, evaluate the need for appropriate rest and rehydration.
• Does horizontal ventilation significantly reduce the hazards associated with flashovers or thermal layers? The answer can best be answered by the popular phrase, “probably not”. Can horizontal ventilation provide effective ventilation to a hazardous environment? Absolutely! However, does opening a window or door ventilate that portion of a room (ceiling) that needs it the most? Although creating an opening in a window will ventilate that portion of the area around the window, it can little effect at the top of a room, which is also where a flashover normally begins or originates from. Although horizontal ventilation is the most popular form of ventilation, its use for improving thermal layers and reducing the chance of a flashover can be questionable. Always evaluate the limitations and advantages of horizontal, vertical, and/or pressurized ventilation operations.

In summary, do not allow your protective equipment in concert with the increased hostility of the modern fireground environment to lure you into a false sense of security. As the rate of fireground flashovers and resultant firefighter death and injury is increasing, the modern firefighter should constantly evaluate the fireground environment, and, use protective equipment as a defensive weapon instead of an offensive weapon. Technically, the advantages of protective equipment should be used to increase your window of safety, as opposed to using protective equipment to take you to the seat of the fire in “record time”. Practically, you should not use your protective equipment to advance you any farther into a hazardous environment than the firefighter of a few short years ago, but use your protective equipment to increase your window of safety. Have the modern changes in protective equipment and building construction been beneficial to the modern firefighter? It all depends on your use of the tools and conditions that are commonly encountered that you often take for granted!

This entry was posted on Friday, August 21st, 2009 at 12:41 pm and is filed under FD Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.