Raz

Raz I'm on your side. Im just saying what he said holds true. The career staff in some of the other dept such a Peekskill,Mohegan ect wont get to do as much Firefighting as lets say a New Rochelle FF gets to do. Im not saying they are just drivers,they do plenty, and without them most of those dept would fail. but they dont get to do as much firefighting because they are understaffed and volley's tend to boss them around. I agree with what your saying. I agree with both of you. I wouldnt want some punk kid who volly's bossing me around at my JOB. That would grind my gears!

In that case, please accept my apologies. Have a Merry Christmas.

Im 100% with you on this.

And I think that the two of you should take a second to reflect on your storied exploits in the fire service in the scant few years since you've been 18. You know, the ones that allow you to call academy graduates who are 25 years into their career "just drivers." Perhaps those guys transferred because they were sick of 20 year old kids fresh out of FF1 who, in a mockery of the service, wear captain's bars, passing judgment on their profession.

I give Mohegan VAC tremendous credit. To go from 100% volunteer to having a paid crew is a huge step that most departments won't take even though they need to.

. What about the reliable, available, trained and ready EMS services that are now guaranteed to be provided to this district.

I think the membership of Mohegan realized the time had come to augment their volunteer staffing and a logical choice was made to contract out to one of several local commercial agencies that have experience in contracting VAC's.

Before this thread spirals down into a back and forth argument (that deserves to be heard), we should all be clear on a point. Mohegan VAC has been augmented for years by The Cortlandt Regional Paramedics, The Peekskill FD Medics, and The LMFD career guys. They haven't been 100% volunteer for as far as I can remember. That's not a mark against them, it's just a fact that should be included when we're making our points in this discussion. From my short time working in that area, I remember an awful lot of grunt work being done by guys from agencies that had no affiliation with the VAC, but they were depended on all the same, and this changeover would've come years ago if they hadn't been there to take up the slack.

driver needs to be belted in and they will open the door to check.

They will open the door of a moving vehicle to check for safety. Yes, someone found logic in this.

From the first 2 pictures in the original post, it appears that the Ladder was even further out initially than in your drawing. The picture shows it at the base of the exposure D's driveway which would put them on the far side of that big a** tree. That being said, It definitely was a reach for them to even get to the roof at all. They made the best of what they had until they could reposition closer.

You're right. I was trying to hastily illustrate the differences in the "before and after" positioning, but I seem to have overlooked the tree. Good thing I'm not working on the Zapruder film.

If my "Google-Foo" and HS geometry doesn't fail me, it looks like a 95-100 aerial anywhere on the street beyond "the tree" would have allowed for access to the peak of the roof. I know it seems easy to say on the computer from miles away, but I like to see a large empty spot where a ladder should be regardless if you own one or have one on your first due assignment. It's just good practice to always be thinking "I need to leave room for a ladder". So, not to pick apart any one, we should all look at the pictures and think could this happen to us if our first due ladder was OOS or delayed? I know one of our crews blocked out a mutual aid ladder just last week, while ours was OOS, excrement happens. I also know it will not happen again on that shift!

As stated a few times already Try to remember to leave room for the Truck if at all possible. Been There Done That......

I think there's a larger discussion to be had here. We've all beaten "leave room for the truck" into our heads since probie school, but here's an example where "leave room for the truck" might be a mutually exclusive idea as opposed to "put water on the fire." Now, Hartsdale is a rather proactive department when it comes to mapping and testing the flows of their hydrants. The officer on the first rig probably knew that there was a hydrant in front of the house, he also probably knew that (being on a dead end and up a hill), that he might only be able to flow one or two 1 3/4" lines (again, I point you to the size of the building and the potential fire load). The second or third due engine was going to have to grab a water source from a pretty far distance and stretch LDH. You need this water source to mount any kind of meaningful attack on the fire. Do you, as an officer, delay the attack to wait for a truck that is not even an optimal piece of equipment for the situation? I'm genuinely asking, not trying to defend anyone.

Was this roof fully sheathed or skip sheathed?

The roof was fully sheathed.

Bail-Out Systems:

This is actually just a simple question and I am looking for people that are more informed then myself on the latest ideas, theories and ideas on the subject (maybe some chiefs or instructors can chime in on this one)

It has been said to me that the growing consensus and best procedures for 'bailing out' is to simply ditch and disgard your air pack prior to the bailing out. In simple words..take off your air pack and then proceed to go out the window and lower yourself with your required department 'bail-out' system.

Some background and my idea....There is currently a debate in our department on which type of system to purchase for the required bailout systems. (yes I know we are far behind the ball on this) 1) the harness system you wear on your bunker pants or 2) an intergrated system that is 'in' and part of your air pack

Now I am not married to either so I figure as long as it gets me out of trouble I dont care..but being a in upper management now cost, training ease, implementation, maintence, accountability are all factors....It was told to me that the current consesus and idea being progressively pushed in the fire service is, as stated above, to ditch and disgard your pack prior to bailing...Is this the case?

I took firefighting essentials 14 years ago, I have taken a few safety and survival seminars and classes and I dont remember this being the case. Even as recent as this summer watching my people go through some bail-out evolutions they did not seem to take this approach. I have always beleived and been taught that our air pack is our life and you hold on to it for dear life.

So any ideas and or has anyone heard more about this or read articles and is this what we should be leaning towards?

Sorry for the rambling and any thoughts on these subjects is greatly appreciated

Mike

I've never had to bail out, and hopefully never will, but if things are so bad that I have to consider jumping out of a window and sliding down a rope...then things are probably bad enough that I wouldn't take the time to doff my airpack in the process. For what it's worth, I've used the Petzl and RIT systems. Go with Petzl.

No doubt sometimes the cards just don't deal in our favor. It certainly looks like this went as well as could have been "played".

Is there a chance that the OOS TL would have been in sooner to get a better position if it had been in service? It looks like it would have taken getting in the driveway to eat up some of that setback? I assume your lawns are like our right now and wouldn't allow a truck off the pavement? This begs another question: can or could you put the aerial on the lawn if that's what it took? Some FD's do not allow this, others seem to do this with relative frequency.

It doesn't come across in the Google map overhead view, but the driveway is at an incline. Coupled with the retaining wall between the driveway and the front yard, and the guardrail at the end of the street, it would be a tight fit. I'm not saying it couldn't be done, I'm just not sure. A lot of guys' boots were sinking into the lawn while going back and forth from the rigs to the house, so if it couldn't support 200 lbs, I'm sure 60,000 lbs wasn't an option.

No doubt the TL could've helped with this. Regardless of the response time question, I feel this is a prime example of a house (slate roof, steep pitch, elevated master streams needed) that would benefit from having a tower ladder in operation. White Plains did have a bucket on scene, but attempting to put it to work would've proven a logistical impossibility, as it would've needed to get past 4 rigs, 3 of which were actively engaged in fire suppression; as well as roughly 500 feet of LDH.

Thanks. Any info on what part of the house the fire started and how the fire spread through the roof ( ballon type, stairwell ) . And are there any more pic's . Also what is greenburg civil defence.

I wasn't there for the first hour or so of the incident, so unfortunately I can't answer some of those questions, and I'm not going to speculate as to the origin. I will say that the building, while obviously type III construction, was pretty unique in layout. The width of space between the stone exterior walls or slate roof, and wood/sheetrock interior walls was much larger than usual. At many spots, finish carpentry was used to install cabinets, closets, and rather deep shelving recessed into this void space. It is possible that the fire spread rather quickly throughout these voids. This would correlate with the description I was given by guys on the first attack lines.

So I'm an idiot, I drew in 171 instead of 174. Substitute accordingly.

To better demonstrate my answer about the ladder positioning:

This is the positioning in the posted pictures. They were taken relatively early on in the course of the incident.

This is the positioning I was referring to in my response. The MPO's (and many spotters) made use of every square inch of asphalt to position L4's turntable almost directly in front of the building (I still refuse to call that thing a "house"). The was literally not an inch of road to spare at the end of it. Webbing was used to slide LDH into positions that that allowed the rigs better access.

Also, I'd like to second the thank you to Scarsdale FD for the ground ladders. That's textbook Fast work.

Not to be the wet blanket, but it doesn't look like L4 got a very good spot to me? Looks like it's well off the incoming corner and the pics look as if the aerial wasn't able to place the FFer's where they needed to be to effect any real vent? Maybe there's some time missing in the pics where the aerial went closer to the ridge and the vent is part of what's burning in later shots?

Ladder 4 looked like it was in place before the fire came through the roof, then it seems to be gone. Did it relocate to another side of the house somehow or did it stow the ladder and retract the outriggers? Hard to tell from the pic's.

That's pretty much what happened. At the beginning of the incident, L4 made the best spot they could under the circumstances. They had two engines in front of them, and multiple LDH lines, on a very narrow street that reached a dead end directly in front of the fire building. Later in the incident, rigs and lines were repositioned and L4 was able to get to a more viable position. I'm still amazed at how the MPO's operated three rigs in such a tight space.

Thanks Raz, had a total brain f*rt on that. I was having ALF flashbacks with the swing down front jack that was always a pleasure to lay in the snow and deploy...

A rig this size could never have manual jacks...doy.

You're not alone, I thought the same thing when I first saw it. Especially because the jacks have to be manually pinned in place after they're dropped. I had never worked with a ladder like that, and assumed that they had to be manually dropped.

Feiner is an idiot. But the people of Greenburgh who keep voting for him are the bigger idiots. These are the same people who think Andy Spano was doing the right thing for the taxpayers of this county.

I'm not sure that there has even been another name on the ballot in some of the elections that he's won. Also, I find it funny that he continually talks about abolishing this or that government entity, yet never talks about getting rid of his own job.

So he's going from saying you need no county government...to merging 2 counties. Oh yeah that will work and save money too.

Shows you how much politicians honestly know about the finer details of how some things work. Particularly with emergency services and how the layers of response work.

Feiner has continually showed that he has next to no understanding of how emergency services actually work. As far as his governance in other areas, he continually passes the buck, blaming everyone but himself for the shortcomings of government. This is par for the course for him, unfortunately.

When members are out for vaca/sick, where does that manpower get taken from? Just my opinion, but I'd much rather have a two man truck. At least you can depend on a two-man entry/search team going interior, or an immediate exterior life rescue using the aerial platform or ground ladder/s.

Manpower is allowed to drop to 6 (between the two engines and the ladder) before OT is used to fill vacancies.

Apparatus operation: How does one man safely back up a behemoth like this TL? Cameras are supposed to supplement actual eyes behind the rig no? Must be a joy backing it into the bay.

Someone is always supposed to be present to help the driver back up the rig. Whether that person is a rider on the truck, or a firefighter from another rig, will vary.

Rig itself: Those manual front jacks must be a pain, possible delays deploying the aerial? Always liked that type of outriggers on the sides though (never had them on my job, mostly had Seagrave sticks, then also an ALF/LTI).

The front and rear jacks, like the outriggers, are hydraulically powered.

When it's working properly, it must have pretty good strength. What is the lift capacity at full extension? 1000 lbs or more?

It does have a lot of strength, but I couldn't tell you any specifics and be confident about the numbers.

Depending on the tour commander, TL-15 has either one or two firefighters assigned to it. The staffing level of a given tour doesn't fluctuate, it's just left to the tour commander's discretion as to how he wants the men assigned. Some commanders like three FF's on Engine 169, with one on the ladder; some like the two and two approach. Regardless of the staffing configuration between E169 and TL15, E170 always has three FF's and an officer. These numbers assume that no one is out sick/injured/on vacation.

Fairview has been covering while the ladder is OOS, with Scarsdale covering while Fairview's own ladder was down shortly. Greenville already provides automatic mutual aid in the form of an engine, therefore their ladder wasn't factored in as a viable coverage apparatus.

Are you going to be wearing your new Cowboy boots with your Class A?

All jokes aside, this actually brings up a valid point. Don't wear your class A to Peekskill, it's an informal parade.

some of these funds are gathered through re-location of money from benefits and such. The vol. FD I used to belong to before I became paid had a contract with the town as do a lot of vol. FDs these days (i think?) through this contract the dept was given a budget and this money went to two sides: Line and civil. the Civil side paid for the booze

My apologies, that was a sarcastic question posed to the poster who claimed that all FD's use "private money" to pay for certain things. Your situation is exactly what I was referencing. Just because it's "private funding" now, doesn't mean it wasn't tax money before someone moved it to the another page on the ledger. Though I'm glad that you spelled that out, as you would have a greater understanding than most in this thread. I'm guessing that you vollied for a municipal fire dept, and not a fire district like many people that posted (JimmyPFD being the other exception).

It all goes back to the fact that 1) this happens all the time for events much less deserving of public monetary backing, and 2) a contract is a contract.

From what I read it's about 200 hours:

Fairfield Fire School

That's Firefighter 1 & 2, plus Haz Mat Ops Awareness. Not Firefighter 1, as the article said. Thanks for posting that, I was wondering how they were coming up with double the hours of the class.

Only one mistake in the article

Another one would be the part where it states that Firefighter 1 can be considered a 200 hour course.

^^^Excellent post, really sums everything up perfectly.

OK, its class time:

Most volly departments operate under a set of by-laws for a social organization, much like the elks lodge or loins club. They, however, supply the man power for the fire district (which is the taxing entity) to operate its equipment and preform it duties on calls. The fire district and the fire company are two totally and completely separate entities.

When a department holds a boot drive or any other fund raising event, and the signs out front say support [insert taxing name here], the money raised will go to the taxing entity. If however the sign says [insert social organization here], then the money goes to the members of the social organization and they can do what they want with the money.

Yes, it's class time on EMTBravo, which always seems to be given by the members who are eager to share the wealth of knowledge from their 3 years in the volunteer fire service.

You can argue semantics all you want, but at the end of the day, fire departments are funded by tax money (and EMS billing if they're savvy/sketchy enough to split that portion off into a separate entity like some districts). If you honestly believe that every single non-firematic expense of a district, professional or volunteer, is paid for solely through 2% money or fundraising, then you're being purposefully obtuse.

Furthermore, I would argue that an overwhelming majority of the public has absolutely no idea of the differences implied by signs that read "Support X Fire District", versus "Support X Fire Company." You can argue that that's not your problem, but then it veers into the murky area of misleading the public.

Either way, this is a simple contract dispute that will be settled by a grievance, and rather quickly.

This is not a valid response. Volunteer Fire Departments use private funds that the fire company controls not the department.

Private funds that magically appear from where?

Think before you attack...makes for a better thread.

Not editing your posts after the fact also makes for a better thread.

We all know just how may people show up for the "Big Game" Especially in the FD. You can have a residential alarm and have 7 people show up then get a fire 20 minutes later and have 40 people show up..."Big Games" draw big crowds.

I never understood how people can say this out loud and think that it sounds like a logical argument in defense of their position. I'd rather be without the extra yahoos that show up for the "big game" as they generally tend to:

-Get in the way of people who are properly trained and practiced.

-Make the situation worse by making the wrong decisions.

-Use resources that would be put to better use in more capable hands.

-Complicate the chain and scope of command.

I'm not denying that big games draw big crowds, but to hear people put that forth as a positive thing is ridiculous. Give me a small army over a large armed mob anyday.

That's actually not what mutual aid plans are drawn up for, at all.

This guy is his own worst enemy when it comes to being taken seriously. "Firefighting attracts a lot of immature people, who feel they don't need to grow up." OK, that's fair. Hell, I might even be inclined to agree. Then he goes on to list a few examples that back up his point, but what's with the rest of that list? A fill the boot to benefit Muscular Dystrophy? It sounds like conditions might not have been optimal (where I live, excessive fill the boot events caused the city to put an end to them altogether), but to count that as a "childish act?" Really? Also, that "loose change" that's "shaken down from motorists" adds up. I think my union cleared 5 figures for a few hours worth of effort.

As for some of the other examples, they're despicable acts that go way beyond immaturity. This guy needs to go back to journalism school.