Did anyone attend the H.O.T. classes at FDIC? I went through the Heavy Vehicles and the Advanced course. Kind of interested to see what others thought. The heavy vehicle class was good. Although kind of basic, it covered everything well and would leave someone whom had not been through before a good baseline.
The advanced was lacking. I thought it might be different from a few years ago, but not. Seems to me they might get a new set of instructors from another part of the country. All that was shown was the "oyster cracker" which cracks me up, and "florida floor jack". These guys invented them (yea right). They were dead set on using battery tools from Hurst, but could not get through without killing batteries and the cutters would not cut most of the frames. The tunneling project was very unrealistic. With no regard given to patient location, the students were allowed to walk and crawl all over the inside of the vehicle. Also, instead of completing the tunneling and removing the seat backs, the roof was flapped forward, kind of mixing the two evolutions.
Also, I saw TNT break two sets of blades and was told one other broke, all on the same tunnelling project. On the same project the bottom end of TNT cutter ruptured somehow it was quickly wisked away to a trailer with the other carnage.
The salesman said on each occasion "that's what a lifetime warranty is for" I heard more that one other student expressing that it did not matter at 2am when you tool is broken and you can't finish an extrication.