Maiden, North Carolina fire officials say their live-fire training drill last month was not a surprise for inexperienced members, as previously reported to Firehouse.com.
The article, submitted by a member of the department, said the December 28 drill was designed to use less experienced firefighters and that "they had no idea that they were going to be dispatched to a working structure fire."
The article sparked an onslaught of criticism on the Firehouse.com forums from firefighters concerned that the element of surprise would be at odds with NFPA 1403 live-fire training standards and that it would lower the quality of the training.
Assistant Fire Chief Karry Poovey said there is no need for concern, because the article was incorrect.
"This was not a surprise drill," he said. "I don't know why the article came out the way it did."
He said he does not know why the drill was misinterpreted by the writer as a surprise. He declined to comment on any action taken at the department as a result of the article.
Poovey said the exercise only simulated a real fire call. "Our firemen were standing beside the trucks at our station when this event took place. They were sitting there waiting on it," he said.
He said the membership had officially been notified of the burn plans on December 7.
"That's well documented in our planning session," he said. The department scheduled the date of December 28 so that a new pump operator and new tanker operator could both be trained.
Poovey clarified that those firefighters were not "inexperienced" firefighters; they were trained members of the department who needed hands-on training on certain equipment. In addition, those firefighters had trained personnel beside them throughout the drill. "They were closely supervised from A to Z," Poovey said.
He also noted that the department did not use the structure for other forms of training prior to the burn for good reason.
"When we did the initial inspection on it, we found very quickly that we could not do any other training on it besides it being, quote, a torch job," Poovey said.
The structure could not be entered safely due to dry rot, he said, ruling out activities such as search and rescue or roof ventilation. He added that the structure was at least 350 feet away from any other structures.
"This was a torch job," he said. "There was nothing else we could do with the house safely."
He said the department went over the plans in detail on the day of the event. "We went over all the scenarios, all the guidelines, all the things we were going to do and all the things we were not going do," he said.
The instructions specified that there would be no interior operations.
"We didn't let anyone even close to that structure," Poovey said. "Everything was exterior. It was water supplies, it was hose streams, and appliances. Everything was from a distance."
He said the department did their best to follow NFPA standards.
There were 15 firefighters participating in the drill.
They responded to the structure fire with lights and sirens, but had notified area public safety officials in advance. EMS was staged at the scene, as well as a mutual aid department that participated in the drill with a back up pumper and a new tanker, the Bandys Crossroads VFD, Poovey said. Bandys fire officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
Poovey said the department posted additional information about the drill in the Firehouse.com forums under the user name wimp1017.
According to the post, "The only thing unplanned was that the house number of the residence was not given. But they knew the exact location of the incident, and the size of fire was to remain unknown."
The post added that all firefighters and personnel involved in the operations had at least five years of experience with the department, except for one rookie whose assignment was to drag hose.
In addition, an instructor and safety officer were on site and the ICS was in operation before any ignition took place, the post says.
The Maiden Fire Department is a municipal volunteer department with 35 members and one paid employee, serving a population of about 2,800 with three class A pumpers, a tanker, equipment truck and a brush truck.
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