Textbook Style Tactics
FIRE REPORT
(Photo by Joe Hoffman)
Basic operations at a routine fire in Philadelphia resulted in a spectacular success.
When a Philadelphia Fire Department engine company rolled to an early-morning alarm last May 16, fire was threatening five people trapped inside a two-story, unattached dwelling. But in short order, two civilians would be removed, three others rescued, and the fire extinguished.
So why the story? Success. Success rooted in the basics. Textbook-style tactics supported an aggressive, offensive, interior strategy-aimed at confining the fire and rescuing the threatened.
The smoke rolling out the front and rear of the structure was the first indication to the engine company’s members that they had a worker—probably in the center rooms. Hysterical and injured civilians were all around the property, and two adults were leaning out the top-floor windows.
The company officer completed initial size-up and chose an aggressive, offensive attack. The firefighters immediately stretched enough l4-inch hose for both floors to the front door, while a quick radio report upgraded the assignment to include more fire units and emergency medical teams.
An interior size-up indicated the fire was on the second floor. The engine crew climbed the main staircase, guiding the attack line up through the gap created by the winding stairs. Taking the hose straight up instead of around each turn kept the stretch shorter and, more important, kept the hose off the stair treads. That left the stair passage unobstructed.
The landing felt like an inferno. Fire in the bedrooms at the center (between front and back) of the building was threatening to extend toward the occupied front room. Realizing that the engine company was raising portable ladders to the civilians trapped there, the nozzleman knew his primary objective was to cut off the fire by positioning a straight stream of water between it and the most severe life exposure—those two adults at the windows. This halted the fire’s rapid spread in the oven-like hall.
As the hallway cooled and the heat and smoke were directed away from the front rooms, the handline was advanced through the narrow corridor toward the heavily involved center rooms.
(Photos by Joe Hoffman)
SEARCH
At the same time, the first-arriving truck company began laddering the dwelling. Firefighters placed the first two ladders at the second-floor window ledges to remove the civilians who were trapped there. By placing the tips of the ladders at or below the sill, they made it easier for the occupants to get out of the burning property and onto the rungs.
Once the occupants were guided to safety, the firefighters climbed the ladders again to complete horizontal ventilation of the front windows bv removing glass, framing, curtains, and blinds. Then these firefighters could hear the interior search team in the room. They stayed at the top of the ladders to communicate with the inside team and guide its members to an alternative way out if one were needed.
Ladders were also raised to the roof, the only available access for beginning the vertical ventilation that would relieve conditions below. For ventilation, entry, and search operations, still more ladders were placed to the side and rear windows of the second floor.
Inside, firefighters equipped with self-contained breathing apparatus had begun a primary search. Staying low because of the intense heat, one firefighter crawled over the operating handline and hugged the wall that would guide his search pattern. He found the open door to the front bedrooms and entered. Knowing that the single handline was his onlv protection, he closed the door behind him to isolate him from the extending fire and give him an extra measure of safety. This tactic, coupled with the ventilation efforts going on outside, would also reduce the heat and smoke and improve visibility.
The firefighter’s search pattern brought him to the still form of an adult. He also heard a faint cry from a far corner of the room. Instinctively, he followed the sound that confirmed that at least one of the two victims was still alive. A small child, barely conscious, was lying on a bed. The searcher grasped the youngster and moved toward the sound of firefighters venting the front windows. He turned the child over to them and told them that he needed help with a second victim.
Back with the unconscious adult, the searcher took a calculated risk and placed his SCBA facepiece on the victim, sharing his air supply as he awaited help. When it arrived, the firefighters decided to remove the woman through the building by way of the stairs, which had been left passable when the hose was stretched through the center well of the staircase.
Firefighters entering the side window located a fifth victim, unconscious and badly burned, in the rear bedroom. He was swiftly removed down a portable ladder.
The primary search was completed and a secondary search begun, but the last of the victims was already out; all civilians were accounted for.
As the spring day began to come alive, 19 occupants had been displaced, and 5 adults and 4 children had been hospitalized. One firefighter, the nozzleman, suffered third-degree burns on his right knee and less severe ones on the face, ears, and neck. (One ladder unit at the scene was equipped with new bunker pants, and this may have protected that company from similar injuries.)
Later, a routine critique of the fire found plenty to commend: tactics carried out in textbook fashion to accomplish a successful strategy. The firefighter who made the two rescues, Gerry Smink, has been chosen for the department’s highest award, and the nozzleman, Bruce Gross, has been chosen for the second-highest.
The training they and the other crew members had received before the fire was the key to the operation’s success. Firefighters can do only a limited number of tasks on arrival, and priorities must be assessed based on the conditions found. That can happen only if all the basic options are understood and firefighters are trained so thoroughly they can perform those tasks in a systematic and coordinated manner. Only then are the odds in favor of success.
