Houston Texas LODD--NIOSH Report Released

[RalphSafety]

The NIOSH report into the death of a Houston Fire Dept captain has been released. The report can be found at the attached link.

http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/face200509.html

[MrYuk]

Thanks for the post. Will check it out.

[kfactor]

From my first read of the report, it seems as though this was not only a single FF LODD, but near-miss multiple LODD of what looks like an additional 2 to 4 FFs. Very discouraging to see this unnecessary loss of life. RITs, fancy SCBAs, accountability systems and whatever are not ever going to make up for appropriate risk decisions and each FD and FF understanding their limitations. From the report, there appears to be nothing suprising about the fire. We've got to ratchet up our degree of caution. And it could have happended many other places, it hits a Houston because of the shear number of incidents vs. smaller depts.
It's very sad, the loss of a FF and the impact on his family, friends, for just a piece of property that essentially had no real value or legitimate use to anyone.

[MrYuk]

Station 46 where this Captain came from is very used to fighting these small "crack house" fires. I agree that a little more caution should have been used, but I was not there so I do not want to say that 46's should not have made an offensive attack. That night, I remember hearing them dispatched to several box alarms, many were working fires. We were amazed how many they were getting that night. The next morning when I woke up at the end of my shift, someone told me there was a LODD and it was from 46's. My heart sunk. I listened to their radio traffic all night long and remember thinking how tired these poor crews were.

Weather or not they should have entered that structure is not my place to say, but I do hope this will make people think again before entering an abondoned home. God Bless the family of Captain Burke and his Brothers at Station 46.