CHIEFPHIL

Reliance E & H was originally formed as Clinton Engine co.

If you would like info on a new station, contact the Town of Bethel Ct [20 minute ride on 84] for the new Stony Hill Station located on Route 6. It is fairly large and you could possibly get a 737 in the bays. All ADA compliant , large offices, gym .

This is gonna become a joke. . Right now our dispatchers are giving us codes to respond to. We just had a 12 Delta 11..No one in the bus knew what it was. We have to spend hundreds of dollars to get these guides, money that was not budgeted for. So we kinda know what we are responding to. Now each responder in Ct must flip thru a 20 page flip chart to figure out what they are resppnding to. One of the worst things I have seen is that some of codes are the same as chase cars. Talk about confusing. This is what a typical dispatch will be like in CT... XYZ dept respond to a 15 Charlie 34 at 2 main st. Thats all the info you are allowed. Wait till we have to use codes to talk to the doc's over C-Med Dont get me wrong, I like the EMD program and am in favor of it. The article in the paper did no justice to the operational problems that it has started.

Actually there could be nothing wrong in each of the pictures. 1] It is a 2nd alarm, what due was this engine co ? Like a previous writer stated, usually the second alarm co's are used for manpower more then the rig. Could it be the fast engine ? It is at the hydrant for possible future use, could the MPO be doing a task near the rig ? 2] Yes this poses an different view since a crosslay has been deployed. Could the hydrant be out of service and a second engine secured a supply ? Could the fire have been small enough that the tank water did the job ? What is the tank water size ? Could this have been a one /two man engine co where they stretch a line and a second engine secures the supply ? Could this engine not have been used for suppression and used to wet down debris outside the building ? Many , many different views and thoughts can be taken from these pictures. Think about how many rigs in your dept dont hook a hydrant at a fire or how many times havs the tank water done the job. in my dept, the first due does not secure a water supply, that is the job of the second due. We also carry 1000 gallon tanks, so sometimes we are done with a room and contents before the supply line is in service. Good thought provoking question .

The tunnel we have is 36"x36", once you put in a 1"pipe thru it and add some obsticals you'll make it very narrow. Good luck on building the props. A window is the tough one. My buddy is a ff in a large CT career dept and he built tons of props for their training division that are portable [carpenter by trade] so I'm gonna get him working on this for us.

I thought it was ok, little more realistic in the portrail of the FF's. The interior search was the most realistic tv fire Iever saw, so that added a little realism to it. Better then third watch thats for sure, never got hooked on that. Better then back draft. Actually those two embarassed most ff's.

Oh, I forgot your other question, yeh all componets are portable. The tunnles are heavy and we can get all componets in 1 -8' pickup. I teach a lot so I'm always taking them with me when I do a FF1 scba class. This year we are looking into making a wall with a window. Trying to figure it out, wether we want an actual window or just a hole. Any body done a wall with a window ?

We teach them to sound out hte wall first, basically to make sure it is not sheet rock over cement. We use some old sheet rock to cover only 1/2 of the wall, the other 1/2 is open to see the studs. We teach them to do the low profile, removing one shoulder strap, loosening the waist and sticking the bottle under the shouldered arm pit. We explain to everyone that "hey if you got time do it" if not take those studs out with an ax or whatever. In the event my guys get in this position, I hope they have tools. Hopefully they will never be in that position. Twice in my 22 yrs I have had to cut thru the studs to get into another room to extinguish a fire... getting off the subject. Believe it or not we use left over garbage can holders for the tunnles. These are square built out of 2x6 pressure treated wood. They actually were like square boxes for garbage cans to be hidden on our main st. The town didnt want to be in the garbage business , so they chucked them. We picked them up and when you lay them down end to end, you get a perfect tunnle. The best home built tunnles would be get 4 -2x4 and then get 2 sheets of ply wood, cut them down the center and screw them together to the 2x4. Since you guys made a wall last night , you can do this one in less time. As for storage, since this is made out of pressure treated wood, we just keep it in the corner of the parking lot. If you make your tunnle with screws, they you can disassemble it for easy storage. Wh had a sprinkler house once and it was held together by hook, work well until some one shut the water off !

http://www.fxnetwork.com/shows/originals/r...cueme/main.html _________________

The web site has a neat little game where you pick an engine co to fight a fire .

There are several good drills when it comes to the use of SCBA's. One key thing I try to get accross , especially in my firefighter 1 classes is that you need to be comfertable with tha SCBA's use. Not to panic when that alarm goes off . FETN has a great saferty and survival tape series on SCBA use. Every year our department has a mandatory refresher on the use of SCBA's, we use them all year long, but once a year is just dedicated to the use. 1] class room setting on all the components of the scba 2] don full gear with a scba and begin a course event where they perfom the following: escape thru a wall, we have a portable wall built with studs and wires, they must become low profile and get thru 2 studs, get there profile up and then crawl to a tunnel where they must again make there profile small to crawl thru the tunnel. the tunnel is about 10 feet long and has pipes, wires and an obsticale they must manuver around, then they walk to a room that they must search for a victim. We black out the mask. All this is done on air. Then they must enter the basement and navigate there way thru with a TIC. The final station is a blacked out room where they must don a SCBA totally blinded. as a added bonus we blead each bottle down to the alarm limit. sit theguys down and let them breath until there is no air left. This is a confidence builder , as say they get pinned and cannot move, if they dont panic, this is how long your air could last. I have had people go 45 minutes on 500lbs of air. The last group I did the average was 18 minutes.

When it comes down to rear vs mid, you need to look at your particular situation.Where is it going to operate, where in the response does the rig respond , what are you using it for. Each rig has its advantages and disadvantages. People will say mid mount TL's have too much overhangand can hit cars on sharpo turns. Well, We have mid mount tower and the bucket has been replaced twice but not due to cars, but because of no dead man switch in the bucket and they vented peaked roofs with it. I agree a rear mount has a better scrub area. Rear mounts are good on long driveways where you have to nose up to a house, whereas midmounts cannot get low enough and will be too far away ro be effective. I guess the best course of acrtion is to have both !. Mid mounts are great when you have a truck equiped with a pump as the tt operator and po are together. Mid mounts have a lower center of gravity. Most of the aerial rollovers I have read about are rear mount due to the higher center of gravity. But it all comes down to the following.. department needs department limitation and response area training training training

Ken is a treat, my wife cant stand him and she has stopped watching.

Horton, we have used Hortons for over 25 years. The two rigs we have now are our 4th and 5th Hortons,going to be buying another in 18 months. I would stay away from the GM chassis and go with a Ford. that was our only mistake last time.

Although I'm just over the line in CT. I have some general info on a matter like this. If the class meets NFPA standard 1001, then the class would have reciprocity in all states but california and florida and the federal service. Usually if the class meets the criteria, then you can apply to the National Proffesional Qualification Board at NFPA and for a small fee have a National certificate issued. As of right now there is no national testing. Each state makes up their own testing based on the standard. In Ct it is both a written and a practical skills exam. If you fail the practical you cannot take the written and then have up to 12 months to pass the test or retake the entire class. California and Florida have there own academy and you must attend those and be certified before you can get appointed. If the class is following the 4th edition curriculam, then it is the curriculam that is followed today.

GK does excellent work, they have refurbed several of our Engines in Bethel Ct. there service is great. craig Palmer is the man to talk to there.

The new 61 is quite a battle wagon. The old yellow bird , as she was known when she was first delivered was a battle wagon in her day. I remeber it well when it was placed in service on N. Main st. It was bittersweet , because of the incident it was at. My dad was Lt then . Later that day he took me and my brothers to Holy Rosary to pray for everyone. That old Maxim saw some work over the years. I never got to drive it, but I do drive the LAST MAXIM ever built here is CT. good Luck new 61 !