Commanding The Box

Arriving home safe from a structure fire demands every firefighter fully understands knowing where they are located at all times relative to alpha, bravo, charlie, delta. Knowing the sides of the box, especially when that box is a residential home, is paramount for a firefighter to excel at situational awareness. But as important as it is for a firefighter to know the sides of the box, key leadership must also know the value of the other two sides, the inside and the outside. This combined knowledge sets the stage for reducing fire fighter injuries and fatalities.

The momentum of knowledge streaming in from research by the National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST) and Underwriters Laboratory, (UL) combined with such agencies as the International Society of Fire Services Instructors (ISFSI) needs no introduction. Firefighters and commanding officers everywhere have experienced what high-level technical research can now prove to us; the buildings reaction to fire in the modern box is different from that experienced by generations before us. Echo the words of one undeniably passionate instructor, Peter Van Dorpe, Chief of Training at the Chicago Fire Academy, “everything about the built environment has changed”.

A decade ago few could have envisioned the new wave of fire terminology that changes in building construction would bring to fire sciences. Words such as flow path, heat release, ventilated limited, and “the spike” were rarely heard. And, as is still the case today, were not included in the commercial fire curriculums used by most fire training academies. Modern firefighting demands everyone involved understand the knowledge behind the new terminology, and more importantly that everything that happens on every side of the box has a direct and immediate impact on the flow path and in turn - fire behavior inside the box.

As a fire commander, when you pull onto a reported fire scene and see little or nothing showing always ask yourself “at what stage of the fire are we arriving”. Know the time it takes from the moment the air brakes are set to the time your crew will have water ready to attack the fire. You might arrive post initial growth and the report of “little smoke showing” is masking a ventilation limited fire. Enter into the box of a residential fire, whether VES without immediate isolation or an aggressive attack through the front door and the result will often spawn an immediate secondary growth of a ventilation limited fire; termed by many as “the spike”. The spike occurs when a secure and ventilation limited “box”, the residential home your crew is about to enter, is violated. The air fed to the fire due to the violation, causes the ventilation limited area to flashover. Temperatures during the ventilation limited flashover caused by this second growth phase will often spike to over 1000 degrees in less than ninety seconds.

Modern commanders need to know how their commanding actions outside the box are going to impact the flow path and resulting fire conditions inside the box. Commanders must be prepared for an immediate change in fire behavior and conditions. If your crew reports “its getting extremely hot in here” order an immediate evacuation. Those words are a red flag that your crew has entered a ventilation limited area and the area will spike. Additionally, the high degree of heat release is negatively impacting the structural components of the building and global failure, usually a ceiling or floor collapse, is imminent. Study research noted by Dan Madrzykowski of NIST and Steve Kerber of UL and you’ll understand the impact of our tactics on ventilation limited fires: how to better recognize them and how to prevent firefighter death and injury due to them.

Change happens, whether a decade of research and a few definitions, or a few seconds of fire attack and a resulting flashover. Know where you and your crews are at all times, both inside and outside the box. Additionally, know at all times how you and your crews actions, both inside and outside the box, will impact the flow path, heat release rates, ventilation, and the resulting building behavior. 

View on FireChief Mutual Aid with video links:

http://firechief.com/blog/determining-fire-behavior-modern-construction-furnishings-related-video

Science to the Streets and a Message to Moms

Science to the Streets and a Message for Moms

Fire prevention week has come and gone. We've changed our clocks back for daylight savings time, and we all completed our fire safe duty and changed the batteries in our smoke detectors. Before long we'll be baking holiday goodies, burning yuletide candles, and decorating with mistletoe and fir boughs. Every night we'll snuggle in with little concern of how or if our home may burn.

As a mother it may be hard to realize that your home, especially if it was built within the last decade and is filled with modern furnishing, is built to burn. Your home is not only built to burn, it is built to burn extremely fast, and extremely hot, and in a ferocious manner that within minutes can consume everything within it; you, your family, your belongings.

Another fact to realize, is that no matter how hard we try, firefighters can not keep you safe; especially from a fire in a home built with modern materials. Safe is the total elimination of risk. Firefighters and other first responders can only work to keep you safer. We need your help, especially in rural areas or areas where fire response services have been eliminated or sharply curtailed. I ask that you take a few minutes to read what follows, take the information seriously, help spread the word, and please follow the recommendations to help keep your home and neighborhood as fire safe as possible.

As a volunteer firefighter in a small town in Western Maine, and a Fire Services Instructor for the Maine Community College System, one of my favorite classes to teach is fire behavior, and particularly fire behavior in modern construction. Modern building materials and construction methods have removed the heavier wood and other sturdier mechanisms that comprised homes built decades ago. In addition, modern insulation and furnishings, made primarily from plastic and petroleum based materials, burn with a significantly higher heat release rate. When these two facts of the modern home meet fire, the result is an immediate and violent growth of fire. This type of fire results in a consuming and complete loss of the home and everything within it. 
 

In many ways, the threat of fire and its consuming consequences for modern homes has been a tough one for the fire service to deal with. It has only been in the last few years that research, sponsored in part by funding from the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program, has scientifically and visually proven what firefighters have suspected for years: fires in homes built with modern lightweight construction and filled with modern furnishing made of plastics and foams, burn with a significantly higher heat release rate than homes built and furnished with legacy materials such as heavier wood, ceramics, glass, wools, and cottons.

Research that shows firefighters the extreme rate at which fire burns in modern homes is often termed “bringing science to the streets”. The fire service is taking this research to our firefighters through conferences, workshops, and trainings. We are learning to adjust our tactics and strategies to fight fire in modern homes with greater safety and efficiency. Our goal is not only to keep ourselves and our fellow firefighters safer but to help keep our towns and families more safe as well. This is the reason for the message to moms. We need your help from inside the home. As a mother and homeowner there are several actions you can take to make your home and family more safe from fire related death and injury. 
 

Choose products and home furnishings that are made with natural fibers such as wool, linen, or cotton. Consider heavier wood furnishings and non-combustible materials over plastic or polyester whenever possible.

Design and establish a fire safe plan for your home. Along with sprinklers, install smoke alarms and CO detectors. Design fire drills with your family and practice them three to four times a year to fully establish them as emergency exit pathways.

Close the bedroom and other doors in your home. Research has shown highly improved survivability rates for occupants in rooms when doors are closed. Firefighters also use a tactic known as Vent Enter Search (VES) that compliments search and rescue efforts when bedroom doors are closed.

Support building codes that encourage sprinklers and fire safe homes. Educated yourself on such things as passive and active fire protection systems.

Support local leaders and political activities that support and endorse sprinklers, fire safe homes, and fire wise neighborhoods.

When shopping for a home, ask your realtor for listings that have sprinklers. Fire sprinklers are the next best thing to having on-duty firefighter at your home at all times. In addition, shop and dine at small businesses that have sprinklers installed.

Residential home fires are the leading cause of fire related death and injury in the United States. An estimated 374,900 residential building fires are reported to U.S. fire departments each year. These fires cause approximately 2,630 deaths, along with 13,075 injuries and 7.6 billion in property loss. Firefighters fully agree and support the position of the United State Fire Administration in that the most effective fire prevention and reduction activity a homeowner can take is the installation and maintenance of fire sprinklers. Fire sprinklers offer the highest level of fire safety because they control the fire immediately and help prevent deadly flashover. Home sprinklers react automatically to a fire and often extinguish the fire before the fire department arrives.

For more information and to help others understand the danger of fires in homes constructed with modern materials and furnishing please take time to watch the following video from Underwriter Laboratory.

UL’s three-minute video (www.ul.com/global/eng/pages/offerings/industries/buildingmaterials/fire/fireservice/ventilation/) . This video shows what happens to a modern room and a “legacy” room, when a lit candle is placed on each sofa. The fire in the legacy room takes 29 minutes, 25 seconds to reach flashover; the fire in the modern room takes just 3 minutes and 40 seconds. This is the message firefighters are adapting their tactics and strategies when it comes to fighting fire in modern construction.

References and Additional Readings:

Residential Building Fires (2007–2009)

United States Fire Administration

http://www.usfa.fema.gov/downloads/pdf/statistics/v12i10.pdf

Residential Fire Statistics

Urban Fire Protection

http://www.urbanfire.com/firestatistics.htm

Fire Death & Injuries

Center for Disease Control

http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/fire-prevention/fires-factsheet.html

Vicki Schmidt

Hebron ME

207-890-4590

November 2012

The Badge in Your Pocket

Imagine for a moment that one day in casual passing, the firefighter, Chief, or your favorite instructor: the fire service someone you most admire, tucked a little note into your hand. Wrapped in the note was a fire department badge. The badge they’d worn for decades, and the best part of their career.

Now imagine for a moment, you are the one giving the badge.

There’s considerable talk these days about the photos in your wallet. The visual icons of the spouses, kids, significant others, and even pets, to which we vow to stay safe for and always come home to. Consider in this same fashion, not just the badge you currently wear, but the one you thought about above as it was given to you. Consider too, the badge you'd give someone; and what is it about that person that moves you to give them your most treasured badge?

As we go through our careers we make choices and are chosen. Those we choose to admire, respect, and glean knowledge from will not only mold us into the firefighters we become, they mature us into our fire service career. At the start few of us realize, between the giving and the getting, is an enormous amount of mentoring, leadership, and a variety of roll models.

Mentors give us direction and help us learn and refine valuable skills.

Leaders keep us on track and within boundaries that progress our careers

Roll models possess the complete set of core values, on and off the fire ground, that we aspire to.

The majority of firefighters most likely go through their career never identifying or considering those who influenced the establishment or growth of their career. The mentors, leaders, and roll models who impact us are dynamic. Whether we recognize them or not, they exist. Some grow and stay with us from the start, others come and go.

The challenge we most face is knowing who to watch and learn from, who to follow when and how, and most of all, knowing and honoring when we ourselves are being watched and followed. The answers come a little easier when you know who's badge you'd carry in your pocket, and who you'd be most honored to have carrying yours.