fjp326

"...and who cares?..." Lots of us do, apparently. In the fire service response times are crucial. That is why they are tracked and recorded. It's simply not good enough to say, "we do the best we can", or "these times aren't exact", "what's the big deal?", etc. It is a big deal. SECONDS COUNT. If we can improve response times, we will save lives and property. What is more important than that, someone's feelings?? QTIP.

OK, I know the IA times aren't always exact however I have a question regarding the Banksville Fire based on what was reported in the IA.
1615 initial alarm?
1623 MA Tanker requested?
1627 Banksville Tanker responding?
It would appear from reading this that the first due tanker didn't get out of the barn until 12 minutes after the alarm came in...since I don't know squat about this area or tankers maybe someone can enlighten me...how many Firefighters are necessary to get the tanker on the road, isn't it only one? I assume this area has no hydrants? If the IA times are correct, why did it take so long to get the tanker responding, especially on a Saturday afternoon when I would assume would be the most ideal time to hope for an adequate response from volunteer Firefighters?
PS, How far in miles is the closest firehouse from this home?
Thanks!

As I have indicated on here in other threads, I do not live in Westchester and am not affiliated with any of the agencies which have had the misfortune of experiencing a structure fire in the past few months that were the topic of IA's, nor do I have any acquaintances in any of these departments. I am as far removed from these incidents as can be, so it doesn't "hit close to home" for me or make me feel uncomfortable (according to Mapquest, the Banksville firehouse, for instance, is 50 miles away). I am also not trying to "brush this problem under the rug".
There may well be a response issue in Westchester, there may well be a need for consolidation and regionalization. I don't know. I asked in a post a week or so ago to cite any publicly available information from any source in the way of a study or position paper that addressed the issue so that we could all be better informed. Never heard a word in reply. Does one exist? Does anyone at the County level agree that there is a problem? Has the County Executive or any public official (town, city or otherwise)made any comments or taken any action to at least identify the issue? I don't know, give us some real information instead of insinuation, conjecture and speculation based on unreliable information in an internet posting forum.
Please, chief, understand the difference between the "issue", and the methodology with which one pursues that issue. There may be a valid point in terms of staffing and response times, but that issue and the pursuit of a solution is diminished when the pursuit is based on conjecture and less than factual information. If you have facts, then fine, share them with us. If you don't, then get some. You must have access to some form of records, as dispatch records must be public information available with a FOIL request. Get the dispatch records for the last month. Stucture fires in Banksville, Croton Falls, Somers, and Mohegan Lake come to mind. Wouldn't be a lot of work to get information on 6-8 incidents. Put some facts together in an organized, analytic way that proves your position. Do that, demonstrate the problem that you say exists based on IA's from anyone with a computer, and I'll be a believer. Until then, it's all conjecture, rumor and hearsay.
One last point, which I'll put in a separate paragraph in case Seth and the boys feel the need to edit it out. Read your last paragraph. "...you are easily upset...", "...you very uncomfortable...", "You are blaming..." and "...puts you in a small minority". Let' keep the discussion about the issue, and not a personal attack the minute someone disagrees with you.

If two people disagree on something and you don't care who's right, wouldn't that infer that you don't care about the issue at all?
You mention that you are not happy certain things becoming "two or three page threads on here"...if something becomes a two or three page thread, wouldn't that infer that it is a topic of interest to at least several people?
Please show me where in my comments i "opined on what should have been done"??
Who made an "endless barrage of criticism over every single incident"??
I have questioned response times a few times in structure fire IA's and I have done so for a reason. To establish whether or not there is a real systemic problem, we need to investigate whether or not there is a pattern, and not just one or two isolated incidents. I'll tell you what...as soon as I feel comfortable that the fire service in Westchester County on a whole recogjnizes and begins to deal with this serious problem in a healthy way, I'll stop occassionally asking questions about response times and manning levels at certain incidents.
I have not opined on much on here, I ask questions or state facts usually. I will opine, however, that you are easily upset over the issue because it hits close to home and shines a light on something that makes you very uncomfortable. You are blaming the messenger and your desire to brush this problem under the rug puts you in a small minority on this site apparently (and thankfully).

Thanks Mike. I was pretty confident that the times were exact but I was waiting for you to confirm it. So....could someone please explain why the Banksville tanker was not enroute for a Banksville structure fire until 12 minutes after the initial alarm? None of this makes sense to me. Is this the norm???

QTIP

Speaking of traditions, don't forget good old fashioned ball breaking. To many thin skins these days.

Chris, great post...it's funny, after I made my earlier post I was out to dinner and me, being the buff that I am, couldn't stop thinking about this whole discussion. I also thought about the vacant building analogy and I was thinking too that most of us on this forum really can't make a judgement at all about how much risk was actually involved in this incident as, obviously, most of us have no real training or experience is helicopter or swiftwater ops. Much like outside observers may feel that it doesn't make any sense for us to make agressive interior attacks at vacant building fires because they don't have the same training or experience levels as we do, maybe we would look at this swiftwater operation in LA and think that it was actually riskier than it really was because we are not looking at it through the eyes of people highly experienced in this area.
I was also thinking that maybe I was overly simplistic thinking in my first post. We actually do take calculated risks to save PROPERTY all the time, even when we know there is no life in danger. The old analogy, risk a little to save a little, risk a lot to save a lot, risk nothing to save nothing...So, maybe it would be rational to take a calculated risk to save an animal.
As to the vacant buiding analogy, an area where I do have some training and experience...we don't make interior attacks in vacant buildings just because there COULD be someone in the building. Oftentimes, we complete our primary search and we continue to conduct interior operations, sometimes aggressive interior operations. The reasons we would do this are several...many times, vacant buildings are exposing nearby occupied buildings and the best way to protect the exposures is to agressively extinguish the fire in the vacant. Or, the vacant may still have some value and we do take some risks to save property. Last, it is usually a lot quicker to push in and put the fire out then to stand around all night and "surround and drown", which ties up fire department resources causing longer response times to other incidents. Of course, if the volume of fire or the condition of the building dictates an exterior attack / defensive operation, that is what we do, regardless.

I'm sorry you feel this way but glad most others do not.
Yes, there is an agenda behind the question. I will again beat the drum here...I, and many others, believe that there is a serious problem in most parts of Westchester County with inadequate Fire and EMS coverage. For the most part, the public has no idea of this problem. I believe the problems can be solved through consolidation and regionalization. However, to solve this problem, we first need to educate both the public and many members of the Fire Service here in Westchester that there is in fact a serious problem. Questioning response times and manpower levels is part of this process. It is not personal, it is business. I do not "get my jollies from this", nor do I feel that I or my own department is perfect. I do realize that there are many (not most) who read this forum who are just chomping at the bit for an opportunity to criticize me personally or my department. Eventually you will have your opportunity I am sure. We all make mistakes and we all have areas in which we can improve.
SO, go for it when your opportunity arises...I won't cry, I promise...

The Westchester Special Operations Task Force (WSOTF) consists of 10 departments operating a Technical rescue, Hazmat unit and 6 squad companies. The squads are from Yonkers, New Rochelle, Mt Vernon, White Plains, Eastchester & Scarsdale, and Greenville/Fairview/Hartsdale. All squads are trained and equipped for in Hazmat/WMD and Confined Space, all are trained for trench & building collapse, but only 4 of the squads are equiped for that. We train together, we would like to train together more, but sometimes funding is funneled elsewhere and not to WSOTF ($400,000 from a WSTOF major collapse drill went far north). If you wanted the services of WSOTF they can be requested thru 60 Control, but you have to ask for them, if you want WSOTF otherwise they will send the team they feel is "best".
Yonkers, Greenville and New Rochelle responded to Hawthorne for a building collapse after a tornado strike (about 2 years ago). 18 minutes after dispatch we had approximatly 56 technical rescue techs onscene which included 3 collapse units and 2 heavy rescue units. This was on a weekday afternoon.
Is it a duplication to have the Westchester TRT? what kind of response can they provide? Last weekend Valhalla FD had a vehicle into a building and they requested the WTRT to respond. The onscene time was 20 minutes from time of dispatach. How many members arrived in 20 minutes?
WSOTF was able to get 56 fully trained members to Hawthorne in the same time it tok WTRT to respond to Valhalla with "X" number of responders. Note: as of last summer they had approx 25 members who had completed the states building collapse course.
New Rochelle (and others) have responded M/A to other counties and even north to the Canadian Border. When we were trying to establish a county wide system (years before the WTRT) we traveled north a number of times to show volunteer depts that we wanted their participation.

Don't worry chief it takes more than a bunch of caps to offend me (lol). If an elevator can actually snap a haligan, probably not, but this is what was told to us by the mechanic who knows alot more than I do about elevators. At least I hope he does.
I am very familiar with the counterweight pulley system. Stuck occupied elevators calls are daily in Yonkers. As the chief has stated when the brakes are released the car moves upwards slowly.
Thanks for the info on the switch Mike, that is good to know. If you are trying to learn about elevator rescue and there is a free course available, it sounds like a no brainer. Mike any info on when the course will be offered again? Good luck with training all and stay safe.....

Don't worry chief it takes more than a bunch of caps to offend me (lol). If an elevator can actually snap a haligan, probably not, but this is what was told to us by the mechanic who knows alot more than I do about elevators. At least I hope he does.
I am very familiar with the counterweight pulley system. Stuck occupied elevators calls are daily in Yonkers. As the chief has stated when the brakes are released the car moves upwards slowly.
Thanks for the info on the switch Mike, that is good to know. If you are trying to learn about elevator rescue and there is a free course available, it sounds like a no brainer. Mike any info on when the course will be offered again? Good luck with training all and stay safe.....

A lot of elevator cars have a power switch located on the top of the car. If you go to the floor above the car and open the door, you can reach the switch with a pole or broom handle. Its nice because it disables the motor but keeps the lights on in the car so any trapped occupants aren't freaked out any more than they already are.
I have heard of the haligan in the pulley trick but not to sure about its usefulness.We questioned an elevator mechanic on scene one day and he told us that if the brakes were to let go it would snap the tool like it was a toothpick.

Fire Departments and there response times do not "hurt the community we protect". More often than not, our communities are served be either paid emergency services or volunteer services or some combination of the two. Most communities outside of the larger cities utilize volunteer services because the call volume, and type of response required by the emergency has not waranted the incremental spending that would be required by a paid organization. Financially, a volunteer organization operates at a fraction of the cost of a paid organization and the majority of calls that most volunteer organizations respond to, do not include a life hazard or significant property dammage threat. Therefore if a politician were to employ a risk/benefit assesment to the situation, they would not find much documentation that an a quicker response time would have altered the outcome of the situation. There are, however, some exceptions and should a situation arise that response time significantly altered the outcome of the situation, the community and the politicians would have to re-evaluate the existing services. The key question to ask is would a homeowner in a bedroom community be willing to have their fire tax increase from a few hundred dollars a year to a few thousand dollars a year? Right or wrong, I don't see it happening. We all serve at the pleaseure of our communities.
Just my two cents!!

This is true in the northeast, but in many portions of the country county or regional depts. are career or combination. Often because it is cheaper when it is done on a regional bases. While the volume may be lower in bedroom communities, the type of response is based on the emergency, not the type of community (if the house is burning, the fire des not care if its in a city or out in the country). The spending difference that you speak of would be based on trying to fully staff a volunteer dept in Westchester with career personnel. When you look at the southern regional models (GA, SC & FLA, etc.) most stations with the call volumes seen in many Westchester depts. would only require an engine (and a tanker if no muni water system). Its amazing that they send less for career depts then we spend and meet national standards for response.
Clearly the overall budget is less in a volunteer dept., career depts. are established with larger populations than those found in most bedroom communities. Either a city or county/region. When covering a larger population the costs per family (or per tax payer). As an example I compared the per capita cost of my city FD with that of a number of VFD's in notrthern westchester and we average about $100 less per capita. The key is regionialization.
Even more amazing would be the amount of money that could be saved in the volunteer communities in Westchester if they would become a regional dept. The only one who would not save money is the apparatus dealers.
If life hazard or significant property dammage threat is not an issue then why does every dept in westchester need all the apparatus it has? Based on that statement alone, do we need all of the FD's (and stations and rigs) we have?
If politician did a risk/benefit assesment they would figure we would be better in some communities with no FD and pay the next dept over to come to the 1 call every few days. Politicians do risk/benefit assesments for there career, not for the safety of the community. If they think funding a new tower ladder in a VFD that does not need one will get them reelected then they will get a new TL.
If you ask that way, of course they will never go for it. One County in S.C. showed that going county wide and career dropped the ISO rating from a 9 to a 5, saving each property about $800/yr in fire insurance while increasing the fire tax by $300, they put it to a vote and everyone is saving money today.
You are right it wont happen here, because we will fight to keep our depts. seperate, even if we can not meet the needs, because we are way to proud of the "great" job we are doing.
The reason taxes are #1 in Westchester is because the pleasure of our communities is to do it this way, because they do not understand that the rest of the country does it for a fraction of the cost (this is mostly school tax, but every tax contributes).