wmurpht

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About wmurpht

  • Birthday 12/06/1975

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  • Website URL http://www.geocities.com/mr_bill22

Profile Information

  • Location Tarrytown
  • Agency Tarrytown Fire Department
  1. Tower Ladder 78 was the second apparatus designed by Washington Engine, beginning in the late 90's. The first being an engine, to replace the existing engine at the time (which would've fit in to the Kaldenberg firehouse). The Village administration directed Washington Engine to design Tower Ladder 78 after an evaluation regarding Village wide fire coverage from an insurance standpoint. The timing between the original engine design and the directive from the Village was happenstance. It was known by all parties from the beginning of designing Tower Ladder 78 that a new firehouse would be needed to house it. To find out what happened afterwards and how the Village arrived at a cost savings based on 2 new firehouses instead of 1, you'll have to ask the people who were in office and made those decisions.
  2. True, below a certain temperature the reaction will stop and the concrete will retain its chemical properties, as in the case when this was done at Chernobyl. Back to some humor: A guy designs a heavy-water moderated reactor using natural-enrichment fuel, and takes it to the NRC to get it approved. The NRC shakes its head, saying, "No CANDU."
  3. Under severe accidents involving molten nuclear fuel, core-concrete interaction will melt and spall concrete and off-gas hydrogen, producing fire and explosion risks.
  4. I have been in the fire service as a volunteer for 16 years, and am also a member of your so called 'toothless' Westchester County Rescue Team. And for the fact I have earned pretty much every qualification that all your super paid guys have (feel free to verify). So have many of the dedicated members of the tech rescue team. It seems that when we train with paid instructors or paid firemen there is quite a large amount of amity and respect for each other, but on this board there is little support between the two groups. Maybe if the Yonkers guys trained with some of the their volunteer brethren on occasion, they would see that there are a number of good, qualified, and experienced volunteer firefighters in Westchester. Instead of criticizing the training and experience of fellow firemen which you have never verified, I think it would be much more productive to actually support and foster the efforts of everyone who serves in the fire service. So maybe one day, if the tech rescue team does get called out to support the citizens and community they live in, we could actually work together without any nagging suspicions of some lack of respect and understanding between each other. In the mean time I will be trained and ready to respond to whatever I am called to do, and I will do it well when called upon.
  5. It was supposed to be Co. 2 for Washington and Co. 1 for Consolidated. But somewhere between the politicians, architect, and contractors it ended up coming out wrong. Two houses were built instead of 1 because the politicians somehow justified it would be cheaper to build 2 than 1.
  6. Tower Ladder 78 is our truck. Our company is Washington Engine Co. 2. When we switched from an engine (Engine 78) to a ladder (Tower Ladder 78) we did not change our charter to reflect this. "Why two stations? Wouldn't it be more effective to have the engine and truck in one house? Just asking." Originally there were plans that were near being finalized for a two company house, but the politicians decided that two separate houses were a more beneficial solution.
  7. Washington Engine new quarters, Tower Ladder 78.
  8. "I'm the enemy because I like to think. I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech and freedom of choice. I'm the kind of guy that could sit in a greasy spoon and wonder, gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecue ribs or the side order of gravy fries? I want high cholesterol. I would eat bacon and butter and buckets of cheese. Okay? I want to smoke Cuban cigars the size of Cincinnati in the nonsmoking section. I want to run through the streets naked with green Jell-O all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I might suddenly feel the need to. Okay, pal?" United States is turning into a nanny-state nightmare, all because of stuff like this.
  9. so now people are going to have to learn spanish to communicate in a fire?
  10. bridge maintenance would have to scale the fence to do their work also. fence simple idea, but not as easy as said.
  11. I train plenty at the County, with lots of records to prove, and also in my company. Don't question my dedication. I am just stating there are already strains on peoples time and requiring more and more from volunteers is going to cause it eventually fade into extinction. I come from a very training intensive career, so I know the importance of it, but it is also something I am paid to do. As for FF1 I think it needs to stress basics, hose ops, searching, venting, etc in a very hands on manner. There is alot of training out there that a regular guy who is gonna maybe see a few house fires here and there in Hudson river villages that probably won't need all the specialized stuff that is out there. Keep training yourself and stop worrying about everyone else's business. That seems to be a big issue on this board.
  12. Continuing training is great, but there is alot being asked of people to do, especially for a volunteer organization. There is a lack of balance regarding what a volunteer should have in terms of training and what people can realitiscally give with jobs, family, other commitiments, etc. Should volunteers take 12 weeks of training like paid guys? Not in my opinion, at tleast all at once. They should have the ability to get all the training that paid guys get, but at a pace and under requirments that don't suck every minute of free time from an increasingly busy world.
  13. How much more training are you going to require? There is only so much time one can dedicate to these activities. Society is going to have to start paying volunteers for their time. More and more the fire service is asking people to do more with less time and on a volunteer basis, it is almost like having a second job. The amount of time required to fulfill basic training these days has deifitnitely had an effect on member recruitment and retention.
  14. The new outigger designs do not need to be pinned, according to an ALF rep that I had spoken to. It came up in discussion with the rep regarding TL78 and operating the ladder while the outriggers are pinned.
  15. health care is not guarunteed in our society. move to a socialist country if you want reasonable health care costs. and not having reasonable health care costs is as much a fault of lawyers and the insurance system, not just the the inabaility to 'avoid' injuries through personal actions. i agree as americans their should be consequence of infringing on other peoples rights, but driving without a seatbelt doesn't infringe on anyone's rights. and it especially doesn't warrant significant jail time. but we could just become a draconian nation like some 3rd world country and just kill a person for harmless agressions. whatever, there is such a lack of balanced judgement and common sense on this site it is unbelieveable.