Even though I am a huge supporter of improved fire service technology and increased use, there is just a touch of old-school firefighter left in me that says, all technology will fail, and probably at the worst time. Many of the things we rely on have multiple redundancies, failsafe devices and even self-restoration features to help minimize failures, but at the end of the day, they all have their limitations. The question then becomes: what will you do when it fails? A real concern for any fire service leader is what happens when everything goes wrong, which is why many of my early career drills include aspects of Murphy’s law.

When it comes to technology, our society has become super reliant on it to the point where you read stories of people putting themselves in danger just because the GPS directions told them to. The newest generation of firefighters may have never looked at a map book, much less tried to commit to memory every hydrant in their first-due area because most of us have technology that removes the need.

Thermal imagers and other technology have drastically improved search times and victim survivability, but can a crew function without it anymore? These are the other side of the proverbial coin when it comes to pushing a department to adopt and rely on technology. I guess the next logical question is, what can you do to prepare for failure?

Backup plans need to be exercised

I have no doubt that nearly every fire department and/or dispatch center has a dusty book of contingency plans or continuity-of-operations that clearly explains how they will function should a massive failure occur. To be honest, they mean nothing if they remain theoretical and potentially fictional fantasies about how things are going to go on the worst day on the job.

Considering the technology that we rely on to do our jobs; have you ever had a “CAD down” exercise where turn-by-turn directions and online information cease to exist? Have you ever worked through the plan of what will happen if the entire radio network crashes? Have you practiced, or even considered, what you would do if a solar flare took out all your internet-based tech?

I am guessing that in some regions, they are well versed with this, as they have lived with complete system failures after a hurricane has knocked out power for more days than their generator could support, due to the inability to get more fuel, or have had fires large enough to cause smoke and ash to plague a neighboring state. However, most live in the happy bubble of “it won’t happen here.” If your plan collects dust, it is useless. One of the best regions I worked in had drills where they had to relocate their entire dispatch operations and still required drivers to know their first-due areas without GPS assistance. The assumptions in the plan were continually tested and validated to ensure we could still function if the tech we relied on failed.

Imperfect practice makes perfect

My junior ROTC instructor drilled it into our heads that practice did not make perfect, perfect practice made perfect. Practicing the wrong way only reinforced the wrong outcome, and no matter how much you practiced, you would never get better.

In the world of technology, I must disagree with this premise because we must practice with the imperfections that will inevitably arise, so we can perform perfectly. Some call it stress inoculation, others call it Murphy law training, but the foundation is that we must practice for when things go wrong.

Jumping on the training soapbox for a moment, it always comes back to the basics. Can you properly don your equipment or complete a left-hand search pattern? Can you properly foot a ladder and VEIS a room? Sure, there are all sorts of options for technology along the way, but can you do it without the tech?

As training officers, we would focus on doing it without the tech, then add the tech to show its capabilities, limitations and drawbacks. If you can perform the job without any assistance, then it suddenly becomes infinitely easier when the technology is added and works. Always consider the repercussions of a tech failure at an inopportune time.

For example, when teaching people to use a thermal imager, it was common practice to never lose touch with a point of reference and to always double-check areas before blindly trusting the image on the screen. In other scenarios, crews would start out with thermal imagers and have them powered off mid-drill, especially if they forgot to maintain situational awareness. The point of my example is that technology can easily become a crutch that gets you into a situation you are not prepared to get out of, so you must avoid becoming complacent and completely reliant on something that can fail.

Risk-profiling our advancements

I am often amazed at how well we can go through our communities and create comprehensive risk assessments, yet in our own operations, most overlook internal risk profiling, especially when it comes to technology adoption. With every technology purchase, leaders should consider two points:

What will happen if this is successful and what will happen if it fails?

If the technology will greatly improve outcomes if it succeeds but would be completely detrimental to operations if it fails, you need to put some risk management in place before moving forward. On the flip side, tech that only marginally improves performance but has no failure-related drawbacks may end up being the best solution. It will boil down to risk tolerance, operational culture and the ability to apply internal risk management principles. In short, do your homework, know where things can and will fail and build contingencies that are exercised and tested. 

Conclusion

This comes back to historical examples like the Titanic, where the ship was thought to be unsinkable, so they did not have the proper equipment for all passengers. In our line of work, we cannot be naïve to the fact that things can and will go wrong. Building plans and exercising those plans, implementing imperfect practice and turning our risk-profiling minds inward are all ways to help avoid a catastrophic failure. It may seem counterintuitive based on the old saying that failing to plan is planning to fail, but in a line of work where human lives are factored into the cost of failure, we must plan to fail.