firechief

Its sad to say but I am seeing a full volunteer fire department a thing of the past. Here in Canton, moving towards the Ambulance side, we now have a paid ALS provider for our ambulances between 6AM-4PM Monday through Friday, and have been relying on volunteers to drive. All other hours of the day is solely volunteer ran both BLS and ALS. This worked for a while but during the regular work day it can be hard to get drivers and people who can volunteer their time for an hour and a half, praying that there will not be another call right before you get back in service that you will get forced into taking. Now as a department, we are talking about hiring a paid driver during the day and to be all volunteer during the evenings.

We need to start looking into consolidation between departments, using money that we will save in rig costs as well as other budget cuts, to cover larger fire district with paid adequate manpower during the day. One can make the argument of "well you aren't going to get there faster." What is better, having a fully staffed rig and taking a little longer to get there, or having a half staffed rig exceeding what they can initially handle. After the work day ends, let volunteers come and volunteer within their community that they are proud of serving.

Thoughts?

GBFD 111,

I don't think that response times will be affected negatively at all. Most volunteer fire departments take 5-10 minutes just for the members to get to the firehouse, gear-up, wait for a driver, and go. So the rig doesn't even get on the road for a solid 5-10 minutes after the initial dispatch. AND this is on a good day! 5-10 minutes is the delay in response time in the event that the fire department gets out on the first dispatch...we all know of a number of departments that require more than one dispatch to get a rig on the road (many of them were the ones that I was talking about in my initial post). So, in theory, if we spaced firehouses 5 minutes further apart than they currently are and staffed them with full time firefighters, it seems to me that they would have the same response times that volunteer fire departments currently have on a good day (allowing them a 2 minute window to gear up and get on the road). I even think we could space those fire departments even further apart and still improve the average response times of many departments in certain regions.

I am basing these estimates on response times for an actual piece of fire apparatus...NOT A CHIEF CAR. I know that response times are gauged by the time it takes for the first unit to respond and get on scene and Chief units greatly improve these numbers. I am talking about the time that it takes to get an engine, ladder, rescue etc. with a crew on the scene. And, I don't consider the rig going to the scene and 5 people meeting the truck in their POVs adequate either. That is not a coordinated fire response...it is a friggin' mess. If you are considering this approach in response times, then you would have to add 5 extra minutes on the back end of the response after the rig gets there to find out who is there (and where), gather all of your freelancers, give out assignments, and put them in order so that they can actually stretch a line, vent the roof and perform a search. Anyone who considers this a professional fire department response most certainly has a different definition of professional than I do. No REASONABLE fire department on the planet would consider this method an organized, professional, effective fire department response.

It's disconcerning to me to read your post referring to any department that has there members respond directly to the fireground. I am the chief in a department that covers 28 square miles of first due district out of one firehouse located in one corner of that response area. It would not be practical from a response time standpoint to have our rigs wait for full crews before they respond. With proper training and management we are able to provide an organized, professional, and effective fire department response. And not only does this include stretching a line, performing searches, and venting the roof (if needed) but also securing a water source and managing any mutual aid resources that were requested. If it hasn't worked for your department I am sorry for that but we have been able to do it in my department for at least the 26 years I have ben a member without it being a "friggin" mess.

You have no option other than to use a standard pressurized hydrant because you need the valve so you can hook up and you will have freezing problems in winter months without the hydrant draining. We have one identical setup in my town and it works fine. The only problem we've seen is that it needs regular flushing.