On February 14, 2007, at 6:35 PM, the
temperature in Basking Ridge was 23 degrees. The wind was
gusting up to 20mph, which put the wind chill right around
zero. It was a great night for sitting in front of a warm fire
with your Valentine sweetheart, and a bad night to be shoveling
snow. It was an even worse night, however, for fighting a fire
near the center of Basking Ridge. About a dozen members of the
Basking Ridge Fire Company did just that. But they did it the
next night, in the warmth and comfort of the classroom in their
firehouse basement.
A Table-Top Drill
A "typical drill" for the fire company
takes place outside, using real equipment to imprint critical
tasks into muscle memory. This table-top exercise in cold
weather operations, though, was all about brains, not brawn.
The scenario was laid out by chief officers: A third-party 911
call reported smoke coming from a neighbor’s two-and-a-half
story frame house on a dead-end street near downtown Basking
Ridge. The scenario was sketched on a whiteboard as all
participants took copious notes. The first fire engine arrives
shortly after the call goes out with a Captain, a driver, and
three firefighters. A minute later, an ambulance arrives on
scene carrying one EMT and one EMS officer. Over the next few
minutes, a second fire truck arrives, then a rescue truck and
then a second ambulance. Within ten minutes of the phone call,
the little street is clogged with two fire engines, two
ambulances, a rescue truck and 13 fire and 5 EMS personnel. How
can such a mob coordinate to fight a fire?
The problem is getting more complex. Two
cars are in the driveway – is anyone home? A neighbor reports
that an elderly female lives on the top floor of the house, and
she is usually home this time of day, but no one has seen her
recently. As the equipment arrives, snow flurries start to
fall. In the middle of this crisis, another 911 call reports
chest pain on the other side of town, and a Fire Fighter reports
to rehabilitation with exposed skin that is bright red. What
should everyone do? At this point, the dozen volunteers break
into four teams of three people each, and spend fifteen minutes
in skull sessions, sketching out their next steps.
Fighting the Fire
Three of the teams at the table-top
exercise are composed of firefighters. They begin by
considering the first fire engine. As it arrives, the first
thing the crew notices is grey smoke coming out of the eaves of
the home. This probably indicates a room and contents fire (as
opposed to the black smoke produced by the structural timbers of
the house). They park their apparatus in the driveway to
support attacking the fire, and the Captain walks around the
house with a thermal imaging camera to survey the scene. Two
firefighters pull a hose from the engine and dash in to search
for victims and locate and attack the seat of the fire. Within
minutes of arriving at the scene, Incident Command has been
established and the company is inside the house, putting the wet
stuff on the hot stuff.
When the second truck arrives, it
immediately connects to a fire hydrant and stretches water
supply hose to the first truck. Placement of the vehicles is
critical, with dozens of constraints: How will the various
hoses be laid? What about the ladder truck that will arrive
shortly? What if a hydrant is frozen shut? Where are the power
lines? Is the ice threatening to bring down power lines near
the fire crews? When the rescue truck arrives, it too is placed
appropriately, and its crew immediately extends a light atop a
30-foot tower to illuminate the scene. The crews are moving
with all deliberate speed: if they move fast enough, they can
knock down a small fire before it gets big. If they move too
fast, they endanger themselves and their fellow firefighters.
While every small job is being accomplished
by the crews, the Incident Commander is playing a
three-dimensional chess game that would baffle Mr. Spock. He
requests mutual aid from neighboring fire companies – he
probably won’t need them, but they are on their way just in
case. He continues to plan the placement of additional vehicles
in the warren of vehicles and hoses and workers in the nascent
blizzard. And while one eye is on the big picture, his other
eye and his heart are concentrating on the safety of the
citizens and his crews.
EMS Support
The fourth team at the exercise consists of
EMTs, who study the incident from their perspective. As the
first ambulance arrives, the EMTs inside review the multitude of
problems that they may soon face. Residents might be in the
house right now, suffering from burns or smoke inhalation, or
they might be standing outside in shirt sleeves, exposed to the
elements. firefighters will be going in shortly, exposing
themselves to a little outpost of Hell. Other firefighters
will be standing still outside, monitoring the engines that are
pumping water; with a wind chill of zero and snow blowing right
through their clothing, hypothermia is a major concern.
With these thoughts in mind, the first
thing the EMS officer does is establish EMS command. The
ambulance is parked on a neighbor’s lawn to serve as a
rehabilitation center near the fire. This ambulance won’t be
going anywhere until the scene is secured – it is blocked in by
hoses and fire trucks. The heat is turned up and the cot is
moved outside to allow six people to sit in the warmth when they
need it. The crew starts organizing and checking all the
supplies that they might soon need: water for rehydration,
oxygen for smoke inhalation, burn kits and a dozen other tools.
When the second ambulance arrives, it is
parked further from the scene as a “go rig” – if anyone is
injured, they will be quickly transported to a hospital. The
call for chest pain is more than we can handle right now, so a
neighbor First Aid Squad is dispatched to render mutual aid.
One EMT helps out as the firefighters change their air packs
after knocking down the blaze (about 20 minutes after they
entered the house). For this crew, the EMT is keeping an eye
out for heat exhaustion – the fire has raised the temperature
inside the house to over 120 degrees, and the firefighters are
carrying heavy equipment up stairs while wearing thick turnout
gear. When the crews break after finishing their second air
bottle, though, they have been moving slowly in a fully
ventilated house in which the temperature is now around 20
degrees, so all eyes are open for hypothermia.
Wrapping up the Exercise
The four teams spend about forty minutes
presenting their solutions. Each team hit all the important
issues, but each team learned a little from the others. More
importantly, every participant learned how his brothers and
sisters in the company think about a fire scene. When we put
ourselves in harm’s way to serve the community, we go in as a
team and we come out as a team.
This Thursday night drill started at 7:00,
but many of the members skipped dinner to respond to an alarm
for a brush fire at 5:34. So when the drill finished at 9:00,
all participants took at least a few minutes to sit down to
indulge in the hot pizza that had just been delivered, and to
talk about how it was back in the day, and to prepare for the
next big one in Basking Ridge.
The Basking Ridge Fire Company is
constantly preparing to respond to any disaster that might
strike our town. We always need more firefighters and EMTs
who are willing to contribute their time, brawn and brains to
helping their neighbors. For more information on becoming an
EMT, click here. And if you
don’t have time to become an EMT yourself, you can still
contribute through your financial support
here.
