Roof Collapses on firefighter!!!

[wellingcountry]

Roof Collapses on firefighter while wearing a Helmet Cam

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWfjTPU2tIA

I am not trying to pass a judgment on the firefighter here but how many of you believe this should have been a mayday situation. From watching the video a few times it seems as though they loose track of a crew member. I may have missed him calling a mayday however I never hear one called. For training purposes how many of you would have called a mayday in this situation??

[firstin312]

Watching this video makes me wonder, what the hell was he thinking. I did not here a MAYDAY at all. He climbed out the one window and called command and declared the roof has collapsed evacuate the building, then goes around to the front and says Rick might still be in there, still no one ever called a MAYDAY. Let the RIT team go in, and you continue to fight the fire to protect your fellow firefighter. Instead they all seem to go back in the front door after calling for an evacuation. Yes a MAYDAY should have been called by the lost firefighter if he was able, or the Officer that was with him that went out the window. Tell command you have a MAYDAY and a lost firefighter and that the roof has collapsed. Makes you wonder why he decided not to make that MAYDAY call? Should have been done ASAP so the RIT team could have done their job!!!!

[papacheese]

This video is a prime example of why Mayday training is still ineffective. Even if the firefighter could self-extricate, he should have called a Mayday if for no other reason that to inform Command that something bad happened that could impact operations.

Why is Mayday training ineffective?

1) Because firefighters associate it's use with being trapped, pinned, or immobile....only those specific situations when they can't rescue themselves. We need to expand the boundaries a little, then teach them, over and over again.

2) Our egos are far too fragile to call a Mayday, which to some would be tantamount to announcing they like attending the ballet. I can easily picture some of these Titans of Testosterone being pinned by heavy beams while mentally weighing the danger of dying against the amount and intensity of ball-busting they'll get afterwards. As sad as this is to type, we all know a few like that.

3) Why does Great Britain enjoy such a low rate of LODD's compared to us? Because they don't tolerate wacky, suicidal behavior by firefighters. Did you miss an air check? Then plan on missing a paycheck. Left the building with your low-air alarm ringing? Have a nice thirty day suspension/vacation. Chest-Beating 101 isn't part of their training curriculum.

4) Watching the video, I couldn't help but marvel at the sheer intensity of the camera-wearing firefighter, mindlessly jumping out of the truck and fearlessly zooming through that front door WITH HARDLY A GLANCE AT WHAT THE #$^&*%$ WAS BURNING. Hey, call me picky, but I like to at least SEE the cliff before I jump off it.

5) In the time it took to yell "Rick" over and over again, he could have called a Mayday and gotten five more firefighters looking for Rick. What's scary to me is that Rick doesn't answer. Here's how I imagine the mental conversation going:

"Hey, maybe something bad happened to Rick...that's a pretty important piece of information...how can I tell everybody that something bad may have happened to Rick? Hmm....."

Don't mind me...it's a Monday.

[canman]

close but i do not believe it should have been a mayday just yet. he was able to self extricate himself and did not need the full mayday. "emergent traffic" should have been called to command and have it broadcasted to everyone on the fire grounds that a structure failure acured. he was able to evacuate and so was his partner. they went two different ways but a P.A.R. must be done. another thing i see isi that if he were to have called the mayday it would have put a rit team in service. our parameters for mayday say that if you can self exticate within 15 to 30 seconds and you have enough air in you cylinder you don't need the mayday called. i think emergent traffic should most deffinately have been broadcasted with a PAR - just my thoughts.

[firstin312]

I am sorry but yes a MAYDAY should have been called waiting only 15-30 seconds could mean a world of difference in a rescue situation. You loose a member of your team and stand there yelling RICK, RICK after having the roof collapse on you should automatically started a MAYDAY if your partner is not with you. He proceeded around the house to the front door and told the others Rick may still be in there, that is the job of the RIT Team to find out, I would rather put the RIT TEAM INTO SERVICE AND FIND OUT LATER THE FIREFIGHTER WAS OK. They were still looking for him and did not see him until later on the video, the job of the rest of the firefighters on scene is to continue to fight the fire not to look for RICK, you have to keep on doing the job at hand which is fire suppression, so it does not get to the possible downed firefighter. Call the MAYDAY and then if you find out you have par thats ok, but call it don't be a dead hero, and wait!!! BETTER SAFE THEN SORRY!

[thelurker]

No sense to call a MAYDAY...what you couldn't hear is that Rick answered him. Rick was on the other side of the collapse, and not trapped. This guy was cut off from his crew, but he had a means of egress. So not a mayday, but definately a priority radio transmission. I am not going to MMQ these guys tactics, but they all got out, and it looked like there was a bunch of them in there. Read the back story below the video in the attached link.

www.firefighterspot.com/2008/03/firefighter-close-call-video-helmet.html

Come on guys do some research before we crucify someone for their actions in a fire while we sit at our computers.

[canman]

i guess i should have justified myself much better because i did do some reading into this incident and read the narative written by the individual wearing the camera, that is why i said what i said. PLEASE DON'T THINK I AM TRYING TO BE A HERO BY SAYING I WOULDN'T CALL THE MAYDAY. i know the parameters for a mayday and that is why i say what was my opinion and would stay with what i wrote above, sorry i don't conform to your opinion.

[papacheese]

I think some of this conversation is being driven by the fact that we all know the guy self-extricated and everything turned out OK...nothing succeeds quite like success, right?

My personal opinion is that if you have to think about it, then call it. Time has a way of compressing in situations like that, and our response to unexpected events such as a collapse has to be almost subconscious. If you call it, then self-extricate, no harm no foul....the only negative logic path (to me) is the one that involves waiting, delaying, or assuming that we don't need any help, until of course, it's too late. Every legitimate study and benchmarking points towards a longer than expected time for RIT deployment, location, and removal....you can always ramp them back down again if need be.

I agree with canman's point about trying for 15 to 30 seconds before calling it...provided that doesn't turn into 2 or 3 minutes.

The choice between "Mayday or Emergency Traffic" makes no never mind to me...use either one depending on the circumstances confronting you...just let someone know there's a problem so things can be set in motion sooner rather than later.

[firstin312]

canman said:

i guess i should have justified myself much better because i did do some reading into this incident and read the narative written by the individual wearing the camera, that is why i said what i said. PLEASE DON'T THINK I AM TRYING TO BE A HERO BY SAYING I WOULDN'T CALL THE MAYDAY. i know the parameters for a mayday and that is why i say what was my opinion and would stay with what i wrote above, sorry i don't conform to your opinion.

Hey don't apologize, but if that Officer says he heard Rick on the other side of the collapse he is just covering his a@@, why then did he evacuate the dwelling out the window, call for an evacuation of firefighters from the dwelling because of the collapse and then proceed to the front off the dwelling and proceed to say I think Rick still might be in there! But you comment was, wait 15-20 seconds, and that could be a life time for a trapped or down firefighter. Just giving you my thoughts on your comments. We tend to be hero's instead of being smart when it comes to a mayday, if that was me inside call it and then I will thank you later and say I was OK but I did not know if you were, I should have a radio as well and once I heard the call I could then respond I was OK and call it off.. Be smart and safe.

[FirstDue312]

Good point Cap. Just like we as a fire service say to our "customers" in any district for bull $hit alarms, it's better to be safe than sorry. We can always be recalled.

[smiley]

I didn't see anyone else say this, but what they teach in a MAYDAY training theres a lot of reasons. One of the ones up high, If you become lost or disoriented from your crew. I mean i would've called a MAYDAY. I'd rather have my balls busted for making a call that could turn up fine. Then dealing with the loss of a brother firefighter. You can't always tell if he/she is gonna be ok.

[papacheese]

"Come on guys do some research before we crucify someone for their actions in a fire while we sit at our computers."

Lurker makes an excellent point; after all, none of us were there to see/hear/experience the event as it unfolded. Hindsight, as the saying goes, is always 20/20.

Yet if there is to be any kind of sustainable value drawn from this occurance, or for that matter, any near-miss or fatal event, it must be that the lessons that were learned be passed along so that hopefully they are never repeated. While it may seem like Monday morning quarterbacking, in reality the chief motivation for my post is more fear-based than it is assigning blame to any individual or organization. More than anyone else, I know that Shit Happens...it's practically a part of our job description. Avoiding fatalities and/or severe injuries is, at best, an impossible task in many regards....as I've said before, we'll never know everything we need to know to keep the scene 100% safe.

I believe strongly that knowledge is the ultimate power...if you know something exists, understand how it happens and what the consequences can be, then you can make a prudent and well-thought out decision based on the circumstances. In my earlier posting I mentioned that the firefighter practically sprinted into the burning house with just the merest glance at what the situation was. That, to me, is a classic example of NTS that needs to addressed. Personally, I don't care if Jesus H. Christ himself ordered me into that building, I'd at least take a gander at what I was walking into before doing so. Maybe - just maybe - he would have noticed something amiss or possibly about to happen - the roof leaning or joists spreading, and passed that along before darting inside. Maybe there was nothing to see or any inkling of what was about to happen....

A lot of what we do, or more accurately try to do here, is going to be viewed as second-guessing; that's unfortunately part of the process. If a piece of information is published afterwards that further clarifies the situation, an honest person would acknowledge that and change their opinion. To me the most important thing is this: Learn from other people's experiences as well as your own. Don't assign blame, find solutions that work, then pass them along so we don't continually make the same mistakes over and over again.

Does everyone know the story about lemmings?