The course covers building construction hazards, collapse potential, and recognizing building features that will be useful to firefighters and fire officers who are operating as the incident commander or operations officer. Topics include firefighter fatality statistics, recognizing the type of construction, the building materials used in each types of construction and how these material react to fire, identifying the fire spread and collapse potential of a building, the importance of identifying the floor levels in buildings with multiple stories and buildings that have a change in grade around the perimeter of the building, and the importance of recognizing typical and non-typical floor layouts in buildings and recognizing what construction features will help the command officer’s ability to conduct an proper and on-going size-up. Exterior wall construction will be reviewed in detail--how the wall construction may limit access to the building’s interior and how to overcome the obstacles presented by the materials used in the wall construction. Several fire incident reports will be studied to help command officers chose the best strategy and tactics based on the construction, floor arrangement, and floor plan of the building. The course will review how the contents of a building may complicate fireground operations.
