SAN DIEGO – One of the signature themes of this year’s Firehouse World conference is the emphasis on international education and guest speakers from different parts of the globe who have presented programs.
A showcase for six world-class fire service leaders was a moderated panel discussion on “Fire Dynamics and Modern Firegrounds: US/International Perspective.” Firehouse Editor-in-Chief Tim Sendelbach served as the moderator for the session and asked probing questions to spark discussions.
A particularly hot topic seems to be whether transitional attacks, putting water on a fire from the outside of a fire building, is an effective and safe method of firefighting.
And it seems to be while the United States has some reticence about the tactic, it’s been common practice in other parts of the world for decades.
“I don’t quite understand it, but firefighters in the U.S. seem to be more afraid of steam than they are of fire,” said Lars Ågerstand, Battalion Chief, Varnamo Fire & Rescue, Sweden. “Firefighters might get lobstered by steam, but they are not going to get killed by it.”
Dave Payton, Instructor, West Midlands Fire Service, Birmingham, UK, had a similar perspective.
“It’s very common practice for us to apply water from the outside,” Payton said, noting that unlike firefighters in the United States, he considers himself lucky to get 133 gpm from a hydrant, so effective use of water is critical to his operation.
Ågerstand said that sometimes less is more in his operations and 500-gpm fire flows, which are not uncommon in the U.S. but are almost unheard of in Sweden.
“We know that sometimes less is more,” Ågerstand said, noting his country uses ultra-high-pressure pumps to achieve pump pressures of about 4,000 psi and create small water droplets for cooling.
One of the panelists, Steve Kerber, Director, Underwriters Laboratories -Firefighter Safety Research Institute, said it is his jobs to investigate and research fire science and techniques to determine their validity.
“We take questions that need to be explored and make them research projects,” Kerber said, noting that the projects are often funded with federal Assistance to Firefighter Grants.
From there, teams of 25 people with expertise and vested interest in the question are assembled to do the research, Kerber said, noting that members can come from large or small departments.
“We often find conclusions that are contrary to what we thought,” Kerber said. “We often find ourselves asking we have fought millions of fires, why are we surprised by the research.”
That’s when the research really comes in to play, to find why certain things are happening so firefighters can determine how to make them happen, Kerber said.
Vertical and horizontal ventilation, transitional fire attack, high pressure water, water enhancers were just a few of the topics covered in the hour and a half the panel had to discuss in a free flowing conversation.
A panelist from the U.S., Derek Alkonis, and Assistant Fire Chief with the Los Angeles County Fire Department, said it is important for fire departments to look at some of the new techniques and incorporate them in to their SOGs.
“If you are not, you’re crazy,” Alkonis said. “There is a responsibility to look at all the research. … It’s one thing to tell people how to fight fire sitting on a stage, but it has to be followed up with research and validation.”
Panelist Ed Hartin, Fire Chief, Central Whidbey Island, Wash., Fire & Rescue, said he works for a very rural fire department protecting about 8,500 people. He said he’s done “backyard” fire science studies to prove the effectiveness of transitional attacks.
He said he has heard about putting water into windows and actually put himself inside to see what would happen during live fire training.
“I did that because I couldn’t get anyone else to do it,” Hartin said, to a ballroom of firefighters.
Hartin said the transitional attack is a good plan for him because his department requires at least five firefighters on the scene before any interior fire attack can happen. A from the yard attack might darken the fire a bit and cool the building for fire crews entering the building later.
If the fire is on the Charlie side of the building, Hartin said his engineer will likely stretch a second line to the front door for interior attack crews to use later.
“It might be the first due crew, or it might be the second due crew,” Hartin said of who might be using the second line stretched.
“My firefighters know that the right answer to almost all questions is ‘it depends,’” Hartin said. “We want them to make good decisions and not be locked in.”
UK’s Payton said it is a typical procedure for firefighters in his country to use water through the window to cool a fire before interior attack.
“It makes it a damn site better for the crews going in, that’s for certain,” Payton said.
Door control was also a topic of discussion for the panelist.
Panelist Ian Bolton, Firefighter/Program Director, District of North Vancouver, Canada, Fire and Rescue Services said his department puts experienced firefighters at the doors to control access and oxygen flow. It’s the door person’s duty to help advance hose line, and to facilitate communications between interior crews and the incident commanders.
“It’s an important job, one that we don’t leave to probies,” Bolton said.
Unlike Bolton, Payton said fire departments in the UK do not assign door control to a particular person, but do control doors. The focus on the door of the room of origin.
Kerber said UL has study and continues to study door control and its effect on fire.
“It’s the fire triangle,” Kerber said. “You let more air in the fire gets bigger,” he said, noting that it’s the same principal for vertical fire ventilation in attic fires.
Ågerstand said in Sweden, firefighters liked to cut holes in roofs, too. But now they often use a system called a Cobra, a high-pressure water system, instead. By piercing through the roof with 20 gpm of tiny water droplets, it creates steam, cools the fire and puts it out.
“We used to cut holes in roofs to get the bad stuff out; now we put water in instead,” Ågerstand said.
Bolton said his department doesn’t do vertical ventilations for attic fires because they believe it’s easier to put out a vent limited fire.
“We want to cool the fire before we open anything up,” Bolton said, noting they use piercing nozzles to get water into attic fire and others with limited ventilation.
And Hartin, said his department uses an eve attack to put out attic fires. Officers who do the 360 degree walk will take note of whether there are soffits on the eves and, if there are, they will be pulled and water applied through those openings. Hartin said he also likes the Swedish piercing nozzles and if it’s not possible to get the soffits off, that’s what his department uses.
Alkonis said his department doesn’t have a strict policy regarding vertical roof ventilation, but it is used often when needed.
The session could have gone on for many hours with wide ranging topics and questions from the audience, but with time short, Sendelbach said firefighters should be looking for the best practices globally and always searching for the “hows and whys” of firefighting.
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- FHWorld16: Fireground Air Management - A US/UK Perspective
- FHWorld16: Building a Robust Fire Dynamics Training Program
- FHWorld16: The Halligan Is a Valuable Tool on the Fireground
- FHWorld16: Sendelbach Poses Challenge to Fire Service
- FHWorld16: Chief Hood Says It's 'Time to Own It'
- FHWorld16: Leading Health Risks on the Modern Fireground
- FHWorld16: An International Look at Firefighting
