fdalumnus

Pleasantville's Daniel P Hays Engine followed by Pioneer Hook and Ladder during the Mamaroneck fire parade in 1988. Photo by Ron Frehm

This is also true of our military. We all get what we pay for. Should we let each individual pay for and make that decision for themselves ? Or is it to all our advantage to pay for the best protection, that will benefit all of us. And just like that 7.0 earthquake in Westchester, is it possible to have the same odds as a War involving the Westchester area ? Yet without question, we all pay for the BEST Protection we can get.
Yes, paying for the fire service is a roll of the dice. But if the number just happens to come up and affect our own family members, our friends, then we may ask why didn't we get that better policy. For years I paid for medical insurance. Never had to use it. Yet I paid for the best I could get. Then one day it came. I spent two days in the hospital that cost the insurance company $22,000. Just a few years prior to that I spent 16 days in the hospital due to an illness that those highly skilled, high paid doctors corrected for me. I have no idea what that hospital stay cost. But I sure am glad I had good insurance.
When there is a fire in a house or apartment, the most important factor is time and manpower. Getting there quickly with enough help to do the job. For firefighters, especially ones that have been around for awhile, they understand that. But for Mr or Mrs Citizen, they just don't understand it as well. Sometimes, the F.D. experts in the field have to think for them. Why spend a dime on fire protection. Why waste all that money on something we may never even use. There was a time when I didn't use my medical insurance either. I thought why should I pay for it. But I sure am glad I did.
We pay for education and the school system. We all pay the same in our own cities and towns. I never had any children so why should I pay for yours to go to school when I don't have any. Why don't you pay instead.
I think you can catch my drift here. In a perfect world none of us would have to pay for anything. Fires happen whether its one a year or one every 10 years. I guess it's okay as long as it's not my house. But if it was, I'd want the best to put that fire out and just maybe save my life in doing so.
I hope our military doesn't have to fight another war ever. And I'm willing to pay for that. The same way I'm willing to pay for our fire fighters whether they fight another fire or not.

Another avenue that would be interesting to explore would be the impact of more regionalized fire services.
My county (in PA) has a lot of small departments covering small districts which results in multiple departments responding to most calls. I looked up some figures a few years ago for comparison and found that PG County Maryland and Fairfax County Virginia both had an average fire station to sq. mileage ratio of around 1 station per 10 square miles. My County was around 1 station per 3 square miles.
Additionally, at the time a nearby group of 3 communities collectively had 7 fire stations and at least 14 large apparatus and 7 support vehicles. My city is slightly larger than that area, but with the same population density. We have 2 stations (down from 4 a couple decades ago), 4 large apparatus and 2 support vehicles. We run around twice as many first due calls as that group and a lot more working fires. Why do they need so much more to do less?
How much money could be saved if we consolidated into fewer stations with less duplication of apparatus? Could that create the call volume and labor pool large enough that each station could be staffed most, if not all of the time? What would be the impact of that on dispatch to on scene response times and incident outcomes compared to what they are now?

At risk of unintentionally insulting volunteers, I might ask if the FASNY study took into account how much money would be saved in property/insurance losses if a paid staffed FD was there to effect more positive outcomes sooner? Not a knock on the potential quality of work that a VFD can accomplish, but a realistic view of how much different a fire looks at minute 4 vs. minute 12. Take the same firefighters put them in the station when the call comes in nearly every time, and see how that affects the outcomes.

The use of the "Like" button has skyrocketed since JetPhoto made this post! Thanks all!

Who cares what he was doing. He was distracted and obviously didn't see a huge red fire truck with flashing lights on it Having the rig protecting the scene basically saved the brothers. This is why using the rig to block the scene is key. Rigs are replaceable the brothers aren't

Great work by DPW showed great bravery and intuition, however this event shows the continued danger of questionable apartments , a seemingly endless problem in the metro area. Further underlined by the anniversary of FDNY Black Sunday this week, which had illegal occupancies as the root cause of the tragedy and illustrated that illegal dwelling units are not only a danger to occupants but firefighters also.

To be clear I am far from defending anything, not sure where you got that from.

I went on city's website ryeny.gov and watched the Rye City Council budget workshop from Nov 16 2015 and during the discussions about personnel it was stated that there were
18 volunteer interior firefighters & 17 career interior firefighters.

"THEY'RE ESSENTIIALLY PAID DRIVERS". You are kidding right! Is that some kind of joke? Besides the fact that calling a career firefighter a " paid driver " is insulting what insight do you have in the Rye Fire Department that allows you to make that statement ?
Rye's career firefighters are quite often the first firefighters on a scene, what do you think they do when they arrive, sit in the truck and wait for someone else to show up ? In case you are wondering the answer is NO. In 2015 Rye had 12 working fires, in everyone of those fires one of the guys working was on the first line in.
In 2015 Rye started the year with 18 interior qualified volunteer firefighters by the end of 2015 that number had dropped to 14. In 2016 Rye's interior firefighter list is starting the year with 13 volunteers on it, those 13 will need to complete some very minimal training in order to remain interior qualified. Only time can tell where we will be at the end of 2016.
The average response in 2016 was 5.58 firefighters per call. Now if you want to drill that down a little. There are approximate 88 days in the year when there will be four firefighters working(due to schedule and vacation). Monday thru Friday the career lieutenant works 9 to 5 and responds to all calls. Additionally anytime there is a incident of any real significance there is a automatic recall of career staff. So that 5.58 is not even real but that is the best number there is to answer your question.
I am not trying to take anything away from the core group of volunteers we do have, they are a good group of guys that have busy lives outside the firehouse. i am not going to attempt to explain the dynamics of the membership, they are there to provide a service to the community and they do it to the best of there ability.
Needless to say when the stuff hits the fan we are severely lacking appropriate manpower. The hope would be that the Mayors group takes that into account and takes whatever action may be needed.

??? I don't understand what that means. Station 4 borders the City of New Rochelle and the City of Mt. Vernon. As well as responding on the Cross County Parkway and Hutch practically everyday. Even if it is the slowest engine in the district(600 runs?), I can bet it goes on more runs than half of these upper county engines combined. East Bum F*** to me is like South Salem or Bedford or Croton Falls.

Don't even waste your time trying to figure out logistics of who, what, when and where. No one plays nicely in the sandbox. It will be quite some time before anyone agrees on anything.

Actually it would be good if a concerted effort could be made to get a driving simulator at Valhalla to train all firefighters. It is a rare firefighter that will not drive something in his/her career. Certainly some firefighters will be driving a rig every shift.
Perhaps a combination of funding from the County, private groups and insurance carriers that write municipalities, as theymight be interested in knocking down their exposure

The secret to making a tiller man look good is a considerate driver up front, Sane speed, wide turns and backing up coordination.
It is always a good idea that the driver brings the tiller man along on the run. Many a good firehouse story revolved around this oversight not to mention rows of parked cars that were customized.

As a former member of SHAC. I remember when we would do on the average of about 5 mutal aid calls a week. We would jokingly say our motto was have ambulance, will travel. But I see now times have changed. I no longer live in the area for a while now. But to the person who said it was just an EDP. I hope to god your not a member or an EMT of a Amblance Corp, and God help us if you are an officer. That was the most disgusting and unprofessional thing to say.

These were some fun stats from todays visitors to EMTBravo, gathered by Google Analytics. Due to the infinite ways you can compile stats on the site, I may make this a regular feature featuring fun information gathered about the site. "Like" this post and if I get enough "Likes", it'll become a regular feature.
Today, we'll be looking at sessions and locations. These numbers fluctuate daily.

Total number of Sessions within the date range. A session is the period time a user is actively engaged with your website, app, etc. All usage data (Screen Views, Events, Ecommerce, etc.) is associated with a session.As of 21:46hrs today, we've had 42,348 total sessions today. As reflected, people visit EMTBravo.com from around the world. These numbers fluctuate widely daily, and if I get enough likes to this post to continue the series, I'll break down even more stats from EMTBravo members from around the world visitsTop Ten Sessions by locations:
1. United States 41,788(98.68%)
2. Germany 137(0.32%)
3. Canada 96(0.23%)
4 (not set) 52(0.12%)1
5. Mexico 48(0.11%)
6. United Kingdom 30(0.07%)
7. Brazil 16(0.04%)
8. China 15(0.04%)
9. France 12(0.03%)
10.Australia 10(0.02%)
And some who didn't make the top ten but are still interesting :
13. Japan 9(0.02%)
16. Italy 6(0.01%)
17. Russia 6(0.01%)
22. Ireland 3(0.01%)
24. Myanmar (Burma) 3(0.01%)
27. Aruba 2(0.00%)
61. Saudi Arabia 1(0.00%)
52. Jamaica 1(0.00%)
48. Croatia 1(0.00%)
34. Guatemala 2(0.00%)
25. Poland 3(0.01%)

I don't see Mount Vernon as ever being properly staffed or equipped.
A large portion of the city is rented, and the property owners don't live in the city. When a structure burns down, it's considered "urban renewal" to the City. Fire Protection has not been a priority for the city for decades. The same problems come up over and over again. When I Google'd articles about Mount Vernon Fire Department in the Journal News/Reporter Dispatch/Daily Argus and NY Times, the same problems just repeat year after year.
It's sad, because there are a lot of guys in Mount Vernon who are passionate about firefighting, and are excellent firefighters. With the right leadership (on the City level), they have enormous potential. But it seems whenever they start getting traction on an issue, something comes up. The negative publicity seems to be endless. The morale is terrible. The stations, equipment, and apparatus are in disrepair. The hiring practices don't ensure the best possible candidate, and a lot of the good ones try to transfer out, or wait patiently for retirement as soon as possible. Guys lose hope that they'll ever be promoted due to politics. With this, they lose talented guys, and the heritage of knowledge and experience that goes with it. The new generation is set up for failure from the moment they walk in the door.
The city doesn't truly care about economic development and the potential the city has, and has failed at every effort to attract real sustainable development , so they'll never have a solid tax base to pay for the aforementioned.
Even with proper funding, excellent leadership, and productive collaboration, these are issues that will take years, if not decades, to repair.

TransCare is owned by Lynn Tilton (Founder & CEO, Patriarch Partners) this is the same company that ran American LaFrance into the ground.

The bucket looks great for for master stream operations... all that room and two nozzles... Yuck! I wouldn't want to be the fireman during rescue operations and having to bail out in a hurry... you have about two linear feet of platform to jump on each side of the nozzles. How often do you expect the bucket to be 90 degrees to the structure? That makes it even more challenging. It would be nice to have angled corners because you are rarely perpendicular to the structure and at least 8" of foot hold on three sides of the bucket so you have something to step on under poor conditions. I don't even see any easy acting handles to open the bucket doors.
Pierce makes great apparatus, but their bucket to me isn't very desirable.

Some photos from Mount Vernon's multi alarm fire on W. Sanford Blvd.

I notice fewer & fewer people using the "Like This" button, now of course everyone is not going to "Like" everything but consider the contribution the person made to the topic.
As an example if a person creates an "Incident Alert" and they really take the time to put some details in the story please consider giving them some credit. I have seen some people who no longer post them because it appears no one cares.
If people post some photos of an incident and you like them let them know by hitting that "Like" button.
Good conversation started or comments you agree with in a topic give them some credit hit the button.
Just my opinion
Jim

I gave you a like, Jim, because it's definitely something that's gone to the wayside. A lot of members won't reply to posts, and then they get to the point where they read and just move on. It's like looking at Facebook all day....eventually you just see a few posts and move on. But sometimes there's a great topic and some awesome information that comes across the threads, and no one acknowledges that they were there, that they read anything! I'm just as guilty of this, as sometimes I'm just catching up on things or just reading a few threads before I have to run out the door.
But, you're right. We should be acknowledging each other a little more with that tiny blue button in the lower left corner.

I never said that departments like the ones in Fla., MD.,Va., etc are failures. Departments like those were establish due to a lack of any fire protection or not enough due to a growing community. Most were due to post WWII development, not to consolidate existing departments. They were able to plan and construct fire stations in ideal locations for timely responses to the entire area. These were areas that had little or no community services to start with so the counties were providing most of these services so the tax rates were equal across the board. In Westchester there are communities that have been around (providing services) for over 100 years. It would be easy to do what those other counties are doing if Westchester was a new developing county. Palm Beach County F.D. (Fla) was organized in the mid 1980's due to massive development in Palm Beach County west of I-95 where there was little or no fire protection. Fairfax County F.D. (Va) was organized in 1949 to assist the existing vol. depts. and didn't really grow until the post WWII development exploded in the late 1950's and it wasn't until the 1970's that they built new stations to handle the growth of the county.
The Pace study on consolidation talks about how to consolidate and how many personal are needed, but they have not done a comprehensive financial study to see who pays what. That question has been asked on these forums many times without any answers.
My point to my previous post was asking 61MACKBR1 why he is so worried about what is going on in Westchester. He seems to have a dog in this fight. And I say the same to you from Derry, N.H., It seems more out of county people on here have a strong opinions how Westchester should be run. When you can tell me that you were part of a new county consolidation program in YOUR state, and it worked, then please jump in and gives us some insight as to how we can make it work. Not just jump on these forums and say CONSOLIDATE IS THE BEST.

had issues with the nut in the front right seat.