Predator or Prey?

By:  Christopher Brennan

Why should it matter if you think like a Warrior?  There are plenty of ways to view our trade but I really believe that the Warrior Mindset will have a much greater impact on reducing preventable line of duty injuries and fatalities; ultimately that is my goal.  A reasonable question for someone to ask is, “Why do you think that, Chris?”  I hope to give you an answer.

I feel that there are two key mindsets that we see all living creatures come back to when they are placed in life and limb threatening situations.  They react as predators, 100% present in the moment with laser like focus on success, or they react as prey, blissful unaware of what is occurring until it reaches out an kills them.  So, let me ask you, are you a predator, or are you prey? 

I don’t think this analogy is a stretch.  The reality is that under the most threatening of scenarios your Sympathetic Nervous System will drive you to act like prey: you may irrationally fight or flee, you may freeze, you may submit.  What does a dog do when it feels like it has been bested?  It rolls on its back and sticks its belly in the air.  That is a sign of submission.  It is an acceptance that the other animal has won.  What does the predator do though, even when it is on the loosing end of the engagement?  It will continually fight to find a way to win, or it disengages in a way that will allow it to come in again to bring down its prey.  Lt. Col. Dave Grossman writes of “Wolves, Sheep, and Sheep Dogs” to illustrate the differences between criminals, the normal person, and the Warriors who stand between the sheep and the wolves.  That is a great way of recognizing the relationship that exists, but when it comes to the underlying reaction to stress, the Predator mindset is present in both the Wolf and the Sheepdog.  The difference is that that Sheepdog chooses to become a predator of the wolf’s. 

That is the Warrior mindset.  It is the choice to become like a predator to kill a predator.  It is the choice to accept the possibility of death or injury, not because you have been subjected to it, but because you want to protect others.  The Warrior mindset then becomes the motivator for the thoughts, actions, and belief systems that guide you as you prepare for the battle.

Are you the soldier on the left, or the Warrior on the right?   

Which one looks like prey?

So, take some time this week and think about how you view yourself.  Self-awareness is a critical skill in developing our 4^th Dimensional Firefighting model, where our understanding of self becomes and asset in preparing to thrive on the fireground.  What role do you choose to play?  I’m serious about this one, give it some deep thought.  Figure out in what life circumstances do you act like a self directed Warrior out to protect society and when do you act like one of the lazy masses.  When do you put your belly in the air?  Once you can honestly know those skills, situations, and moments in life that make you want to submit, to quit, then you can begin training to beat them.

Monday Means It's Video Day

Quick Video Blog about some of the projects that are in the works here.

New Adventure

Tonight Fire Engineering is launching their new BlogTalkRadio series.  Nightly starting at 7:30PM Eastern Time various members of the Fire Engineering Community will be hosting regular radio shows at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/fireengineeringtalkradio ... including ME. 

I will be on the show this evening talking about my show, "A Combat Position."  We will be talking about all of the aspects of being Combat Ready.  Check out the show tonight and call in if you want to talk with Bobby Halton, Mike Dugan, Rick Lasky, John Salka, or even me.  Cheers.

Video Blog Episode 13

Episode 13 of our Video Blog is all about Visualization.  Visualization is a powerful tool, especially when used along with meditation.  Watch the Video all the way through the first time, then use it as part of a guided meditation to work on programing positive mental actions if you find yourself in a MAYDAY situation.

Video Blog Episode 12

Here is Episode 12 of the video blog.



Remember that meditation is a skill that can be learned.  I highly recommend finding a workshop or teacher to learn from if you have never practiced meditation before.  For those of you with some exposure to the practice a guided meditation CD/Podcast/Video is an effective way to work on the skill.

This is NOT an April Fools Post.

I want to take up the topic of exploring the ideas I brought up in my article Four Dimensional Firefighting.  We are forging a Fire Service Warrior culture through this website, and I hope through those people who read, study, and apply the work I did in The Combat Position: Achieving Firefighter Readiness.  I am going to be 100% honest with my readers and say that these posts are about trying to learn how to articulate a very personal process that has been part of my life since I was right out of high school.  Nearly two decades later I feel like I have a deep enough understanding to begin expressing it.  I'm not sure exactly how to teach you how to practice these skills, but I hope we will discover that together along the way.

Ultimately the objective of looking at Four Dimensional Firefighting is to improve the capacity of the individual Fire Service Warrior to operate on the fire ground.  It is about embracing our duty as a spiritual quest as much as anything else.  I've looked at Western Culture and Eastern Culture for a long time.  I've read hundreds of philosophical essays and I've read tens of thousands of pages on both Fire Department Strategy and Tactics and Military Strategy and Tactics.  What I have found is this: those cultures (regardless of their hemisphere of origin) that have embraced the spiritual elements of success in combat speak about doctrine and guidelines; cultures that ignore the spiritual talk about technology and procedures.

Procedures are rote skills that we expect our people to accomplish.  Task A must be completed using steps 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8.  Guidelines on the other had are more general descriptors of what End State we want to reach and allow the individual Warrior to accomplish it has he or she sees fit.

Let's use the donning of an SCBA as an example.  When we take new candidates into our recruit academies we give them a Skill Sheet, a Procedure, to follow.  Step 1, turn the cylinder valve on; Step 2, grasp the back plate of the SCBA and lift; Step 3, allow the SCBA to slide over your arms and into position on your back.  The Procedure is important to Teach a Skill that we want to Measure the students ability to achieve.  With the guideline however we give the Warrior an End State we want achieved. "In 30 seconds be fully encapsulated and ready to go 'on air' to enter the fire building."  We don't have to say How to accomplish the task.

I have been trying to figure out WHY despite the decline in structure fire responses our Line Of Duty Death and perhaps more significantly our Fireground Injury rates are not declining.  I realized that key problem the other day looking at an inflatable shelter system covered in signs saying "Command", "Safety", "Rehab", and "Accountability".  We have totally lost the Spiritual side of the American Fire Service.  We invest in technology; we invest in signs, vests, and accountability systems.  We fail to invest in the Warrior though who will go into harms way.  Far too many departments will gladly drop hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy the newest, prettiest: Engine, SCBA, Turnout Gear, etc.  Yet I see those same departments cutting their Training budget as an acceptable way to "do more with less."

We need to embrace a long held view of the United States Special Operations forces: "Equip the man; Do not man the equipment".  We have been putting our energy in the wrong place.  We have focused on manning the equipment.  Far too often our selection and assessment tools that determine if an individual has the ability to learn this trade are focused on meeting an arbitrary standard.  We spend our finite budget on technological solutions and on procedures because they are easy to grasp.

That is why I keep exploring this Fire Service Warrior ideal.   We have to start "Equipping the man".  We must hire the best and brightest, who have drive and clarity of vision about their duty, and then train them until they CANNOT FAIL.  Look at what members of the United States Special Operations Command do all over the globe: with minimum support, minimal oversight, and at times using indigenous weapons and equipment they DOMINATE on the modern battlefield.  Why?  Because they only select into the fold those who will make the selfless choices, who will train not until they get it right but until they cannot get it wrong, who will be guided by their mission and their ethos.

The time has come for the American Fire Service to return to its roots, to our sense of DUTY, but to add in a cultivated, tangible Spiritual Essence if we are going to improve.  Those who want to learn and excel will.  Those who are afraid of these ideas will express hatred and dismay at the very idea.  If you are sitting at your desk, at the kitchen table, or in the recliner reading this know that our time is now.  Ignore the naysayers, do not allow the fearful to dissuade you from striving EVERYDAY for excellence

Monday we are going to talk about Meditation and a means of practicing it.  Cheers

Live! From FDIC

Here is Episode 10 of the Video Blog.



Things have been exciting today. I got handed the first "real" copy of my book, The Combat Position: Achieving Firefighter Readiness, Fire Engineering has launched on blogtalkradio.com and I was a guest today of Bobby Halton's. You can hear that here:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/fireengineeringtalkradio/2011/03/21/episode-2--live-monday-from-fdic


Also, the folks at Fire Engineering online stopped into my Workshop session today and at this to say.

I will be tweeting all week from FDIC using the hastag #FDIC2011, so check out www.twitter.com/ChrisFSW and let me know how your FDIC is going too. Cheers

Are You?

I had a phone conversation with a Brother a few weeks back and he asked me, "Do you consider yourself a Warrior?"  I paused and considered it for a second and said that I did.  He said he didn't feel like he was because there were still holes in his game: he didn't know EVERY sprinkler hook up in his first due, things like that.  That conversation and a follow-up email got me thinking and I feel like I need to define more clearly just what it is to be a Fire Service Warrior.

I think being a Fire Service Warrior is a state of mind, a sense of purpose, rather than a piece of paper that hangs on the wall that says you have learned some defined set of technical skills.  Being a Fire Service Warrior is a living thing, you have to feed it an nurture it for it to continue.  Maybe you have reached an elite level of fitness and wear you SCBA all the time, but if you start to slack off you are not embracing the dedication that it take to be a Fire Service Warrior.

So, I think if you take an honest look at yourself and say, "I am doing my best everyday," then you are on that Warrior path.  We all falter at times.  We all have days were our get up and go has got up and went.  One of the challenges is when you are trying to follow a warrior lifestyle alone.  We are communal creatures.  We perform better when we are encouraged and validated by our peers, and ultimately we work harder when we don't want to let down another member of the team.  This is why its motivating to have a partner that you workout with or study with.  You push each other.

So, that brings me to the new project that we are undertaking through Spartan Concepts, Inc. The Fire Service Warrior Apprenticeship. 

The Fire Service Warrior Apprenticeship is an educational path that promotes and develops critical knowledge, skills, and abilities which improve the individual firefighter’s ability to thrive on the fireground.  The Apprenticeship program includes formal courses in fire service topics, development of elite levels of functional fitness, development of intuitive decision making and mindfulness skills, and development of resiliency and endurance for the physical, mental, and emotional challenges faced by the Fire Service Warrior.

Apprentices are guided in their training by the Ethos of the Fire Service Warrior.

·         Fire Service Warriors accept the duty to stand between their neighbors and unrestrained fire.

·         Fire Service Warriors acknowledge the dangers of their vocation and do everything possible to minimize those dangers except shirk our duty.

·         Fire Service Warriors believe that all human life has value and will do everything possible to save a human life.

·         Fire Service Warriors know that buildings do not spontaneously combust; if we aren't 100% sure the building is vacant WE SEARCH.

·         Fire Service Warriors acknowledge that to reduce the risk of Cardiac Compromise they will maintain an elite level of fitness.

·         Fire Service Warriors wear seat belts, helmet straps, SCBA, and all PPE.

·         Fire Service Warriors train EVERYDAY.

·         Fire Service Warriors own their responsibility to their Brothers and Sisters.

·         Fire Service Warriors honor our fallen by learning everything possible from their deaths and from the injuries and near misses of our compatriots.

·         Fire Service Warriors acknowledge the reputation of the fire service was earned by those who came before us, often at the cost of their lives, and strive to never tarnish that reputation.

The Apprenticeship includes daily fitness and self-study training, weekly group sessions for the presentation of topics and group physical training, open communication with Instructors and fellow students, and the Agoge.  The Agoge is a 52 hour workshop presented over a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday where Apprentices receive mentoring and are tested for the skills of physical, mental, and emotional resiliency and endurance.  The objective of the Agoge is to have each apprentice demonstrate the capacity to perform under simulated emergency response conditions for a 48-hour period.  Each Apprentice MUST successfully complete the Agoge to be eligible for graduation from the Apprenticeship and elevation to the Journeyman level.

Individuals interested in participating in the Apprenticeship:

1.     Must be an active member of a Fire Department

2.     Must be certified to the Firefighter II/Basic Operations Firefighter Level or equivalent

3.     Submit a written letter of interest to info@spartan-concepts.com including a current resume, list of all education and certifications held, and an essay describing your goals as a firefighter and your reason for wanting to attend the apprenticeship.

More information is available for those interested in participating in the Apprenticeship program.  The first Apprentice class will commence in the Fall of 2011.  Those interested should submit a resume and essay as required through Spartan Concepts.

See you at FDIC.

Grace Under Pressure

The fire service lost a great Officer, Instructor, and Warrior yesterday with the passing of Ray Hoff, retired Chicago Fire Department Battalion Chief, former Chief of the Topinabee (Michigan) Fire Department, and Field Staff Instructor for the Illinois Fire Service Institute.

Ray was a professional in every sense of the word, a Truckie to the core, and he set an example of grace under pressure.  Ray was the first Truck Officer on the scene of the Paxton Hotel Fire, March 23, 1993, as the Captain of Tower Ladder 10.  He directed the Rescue Triage of the building, he chose who would live and die.  I was an Instructor at some of the classes Ray was but I wont say I ever "Taught with him," I was as much a student as any of the candidates we had in those classes.

Ray's experience formed the basis of the "Paxton Drill" that I have participated in dozens of times.  Too many victims, too few rescuers: make decisions and execute.  At least 19 people perished at the Paxton Hotel (exact numbers are not available because some victims were believed to have been completely incinerated).

Rescues at the Paxton


Ray was also a very reflective man.  In my files someplace I have a couple of very short memoir like essays that he wrote about his experience in the City as a firefighter.  He speaks of his challenges and having to deal with the very real stress of working in communities with heavy fire duty and the fire deaths and injuries he dealt with.  While my philosophy of the Fire Service Warrior is drawn from many sources it is Ray Hoff who get's the credit for the phrase, "Controlling the Door" of your emotions.

My thoughts and prayers are with Ray's family.  His brother Bob is current Commissioner of the Chicago Fire Department, his nephew Andy is a fellow instructor and firefighter.  He was a great instrucotor and a good man.  I'm proud to have known him, and honored to have learned from him.  God Speed and Following Winds, Chief.

Speaking of Culture Change

So, because of some technical difficulties I did not get to shoot a FSW Video Blog this week.  Sorry, but I will be back with one next week (once my new Laptop arrives).

For today I thought I would take up the discussion of Culture Change we here so much about these days.  It is the first point in the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation Life Safety Initiatives, we see blogs and articles demanding this need on a regular basis.  I've said before my issue with that statement is that it is vague.  It is an amorphous blob of an idea that can swallow up and tactic, technique, or procedure that people want to label as unsafe, hazardous, or inappropriate.  So I'm going to ask you the read, of the two following videos, which one shows a culture we should be changing in the American (the World?) fire service.

Option 1


Option 2



You be the judge.  I bet you can all guess which one I think needs changing.

Four Dimensional Firefighting

Since this is my 100th blog post I've decided to take up a bit of a heavier topic.  I'm going to ask you to indulge me.  Read the whole post.  Yes, some of the suggestions and ideas might strike you as "out there", others might be downright unbelievable.  This fact is true though, like all the other elements I have researched, explored, and studied; I have done my homework.

Warriors have a unique ability to understand their place on the battlefield with a depth that exceeds the typical combatant.  The combatant who has received a basic level of skill training will stand ready to go into combat and engage in battle with direct supervision and within very confined parameters.  Warriors have been seen as different from the ordinary combatant because of the Warrior's ability to think with greater independence and anticipate the unfolding battle.

In the fire service we have begun recognizing the importance of having that deeper understanding of the unfolding dynamic that is the fire ground.  The current buzz-words to find favor in describing this capacity is Situational Awareness.  Situational Awareness is an evolutionary step forward from what we have traditionally done with Size-Up.    If we look at how we have taught size-up it has involved a checklist of items to recognize.  Topics like Building Constructing and Occupancy have logically been examined together, and occasionally we have added in Fire Behavior.  We have not always done a good job of explaining how components like Auxiliary Systems and Fire Behavior are interrelated though.  Why not?

Size-up ignores a critical component of Situational Awareness - Prediction.  Situational Awareness is a three part cognitive process: Perceive, Comprehend, Predict.  It is Observing and Understanding conditions certainly, which can be seen as the underlying focus of Size-Up, however we must also have a deeper understanding of how the dynamic of the fireground will CHANGE.  It is only once we are able to predict what happens next that we can successfully use Dr. Klein's ideas of Recognition Primed Decision Making. 

Traditionally in the fire service it has required years of experience in fire ground operations to develop this capacity.  The reasons are simple: to be able to synthesize an understanding of the whole from disparate elements requires a deep level of intuitive understanding about what occurring on the fireground.  This requires the individual to process literally hundreds of observed and implied inputs each second.  For the new firefighter the mass of data is overwhelming.  For the experienced firefighter, or fire ground commander, who has been striving to amass the Patterns that Dr. Klein wrote about it becomes easier - they have experience; they have seen it before.

If we jump into the world of education for a moment we can refer to Bloom's Taxonomy, a classification of objectives in education based on the level (depth if you will)y of understanding.  We progress from the Basic Skills Application phase through more advanced applications of skills.  At the top of the affective domains is the ability to CREATE.  When we begin to really examine how to improve our cognition in the highly dynamic modern fireground we have to be able to CREATE (or Synthesize) an understanding of the whole of the fireground.

The Fire, The Building, Your Location and Situation, The Location and Impact of Others (everyone else on the fireground) on the Situation.

While Standard Operating Guidelines, Engine and Truck Company Policies and Procedures, and the ability to use fundamental skills is critical we must begin to go beyond these tasks.  The aforementioned elements, coupled with an understanding of the skill of maintaining Situational Awareness will give each of our firefighters a significantly improved chance of safely navigating the modern fireground.  However if we truly want to unlock the ability to be fully-developed, self-actualized, Fire Service Warriors we have to take another step.

Embracing the Fourth Dimension 
 A study of Warriors going back centuries will show that some of the best Warrior groups (the Spartans, the Samurai, etc.) in addition be being well trained combatants were also deeply spiritual and philosophical men.  It was with the exploration of non-combatant skills that the individual was able to attain previously unheard of levels of battlefield prowess and cognition.  It is time we begin teaching our Fire Service Warriors skills like meditation, visualization, and mindfulness.  This is a blog post and not a book, so I'm going to just touch on these ideas.  Go and try them, investigate, read, and see how these skills will work for you.

Mediation is a critical starting point.  Meditation is about finding serenity.  Serenity is being free from unpleasant change, being utterly calm and at unaffected by circumstances.  The quintessential example of the serene person is probably the image of the Buddhist monk, Thich Quang Duc, who sat without moving as he was immolated alive after lighting himself on fire during a protest in Saigon in 1963.

Photo Copyright Malcome Browne - from the interweb

The first question to ask oneself is, "How is this possible?"  How could someone be consumed by fire and not react?  Quang Duchad put himself into a deeply meditative state that allowed him to disconnect from the normal nervous system response.

This example is extreme.  It is NOT a state of detachment that most people would be capable of attaining.  However it is an example of what one can endure if his or her mind is at peace and a true and lasting Serenity has become the primary Personal Condition.

Take 10 minutes a day, 20 minutes a day, ideally an hour a day and meditate.  Find a place to sit or lie down comfortably.  Shut off the phone, the TV, ignore the day to day hustle and bustle.  Quiet your mind and focus on the sound of your breathing.  You will find serenity.  It doesn't happen overnight; it is not easy; however once you have developed the capacity to meditate you will find that it is infinitely easier to endure whatever life throws at you without becoming disturbed.

Visualization is a proactive ability to see in your mind how things will unfold.  Tiger Woods is in a slump right now because despite millions of perfect repetitions of swinging a golf club his ability to visualize success is not there.  Visualization becomes easier when you are in a state of Serenity.  Why? Simple: the mind likes to scream out, I'm bored! Pay attention to me! It fills the quiet times with distracting images and thoughts.  That's why when you are sitting in church you find you are suddenly thinking about your grocery list.  It isn't that you don't want to embrace the message of the celebrant it's that the Ego, the "I Want", piece of your consciousness hasn't been put in time out.

Once you have become adept at achieving a serene state through mediation begin to visualize the fireground, visualize your role, visualize what others will be doing.  Use a few minutes of that 10 or 20 minutes a day and visualize the act of pulling the line, masking up at the door, entering the building, and advancing to the seat of the fire.  Visualize how the smoke will behave, where the other first due companies on the fire ground will be operating, "feel" the heat, "hear" the radio transmissions and the sound of water striking the ceiling and floors, "see" how ventilation effects the path of the fire, the viability, and the heat conditions.  Regardless of the fireground role you are preparing for spend time visualizing what other companies will be doing. Visualization IS Mental Rehearsal.  

Mindfulness is the ability to bring a state of perpetual calm, a state of Serenity, on when you are actively engaged in combat.  Your capacity to operate on the fireground has been improved by the efforts into meditation and visualization that you have practiced.  It is a reality that many of our members have "accidentally" developed the ability to be mindful on the fireground.  They have done so through experience and recognition of the need to remain calm.  I've seen this ability in many of the firefighters I've worked with.  I know from spending time listening to them that it has come about because they litterally have THOUSANDS of fireground repetitions.   There was not choice but to become adept on the fireground or quit.  There is no member who will develop this capacity accidentally in the 21st century fire house.  Why not? We don't go to that many fires.  We wont see 50 working structure fires a year for twenty years.  We will not get the sets and reps for Mindfulness to be an accidental adaptation.

Practicing the skills of Meditation and Visualization can help in the quest to develop Mindfulness.  We must also develop our ability to Endure.  This requires learning how to detach the consciousness, the cognitive process, from the physical.  One way of developing the capacity to endure is through difficult physical fitness training.  It is a fact that if you are working out hard enough to develop maximal physical capacity that you are engaged in painful and difficult work.  Your mind will scream at you to Stop!  You develop your ability to endure by ignoring the voice that says Stop by not quitting when the work hurts.  On the fireground you will engage in physical tasks that hurt; your physical body will be tormented, you must be able to still synthesize the whole of the fireground operation even though you are taxed to the maximum level of physical performance.

While there are many contemporary Warriors around the globe using these ideas I think it is worth noting that I am not the first in the fire service to see the value of this concept.  The legendary Paddy Brown, Captain FDNY, who lost his life on 9/11 was a black belt in Karate and an avid practitioner of yoga, a discipline dedicated to achieving mindfulness. There is a video here where Paddy speaks about his Yoga.  Some stellar informatinon on this brave and thoughtful Warrior's life can be found at the website for the Captain Patrick K. Brown Memorial Foundation.  Paddy Brown first gained national fame for directing the rope rescue of a man from the burning building.  He lead his company, Ladder 3 up to the 40th floor of the North Tower on 9/11.  He was among the 343 brothers who perished that day.

The Next Steps
For some of you readers the idea behind meditating, visualizing, and achieving mindfulness may be new.  If you have a background in the martial arts, or have experienced a deeply spiritual experience maybe these ideas will be more familiar.  Go out and do some reading for yourself.  Look at things like The Intuitive Warrior by Michael Jaco, The Rhythm of Life by Matthew Kelly, The Art of Happiness by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Warrior Mindset by Dr.Michael Asken, Dave Grossman, and Loren Christensen, and  The Mental Edge - Revised by Loren Christensen.  Visit the SEALFit website and look at Mark Divine's ideas into Warrior Yoga.  Go watch the DVD or listen to the audio CD of Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers, "The Hero's Journey", from The Power of Myth.

As for the work here at the Fire Service Warrior site... well I'm going to start delving into these ideas more.  I'm going to start talking about ways of achieving Mindfulness.  Don't worry, we will still spend time looking at the basics of improving our fireground capabilities and capacities; we will look at videos and talk about gaining experience from the actions of others; we will continue to develop the Fire Service Warrior ethos.  We will also talk about ways of developing ourselves into self-actualized Fire Service Warriors.  I hope you enjoy the journey as much as I do.

Here's Episode 8 of our Video Blog. 



Remember you can follow www.twitter.com/ChrisFSW and participate in the discussion of #FSWFitness and #FSWTraining.

This is my 99th post on here.  I'm not sure yet what post number 100 will bring, so if you have thoughts or suggestions please send them my way.  Also if you aren't already please "like" our Facebook page facebook.com/FireServiceWarrior

The other day I added to our "Here's Why We Search" page with some information I got about a rescue that was made in Charlotte, North Carolina.  An 11 year-old boy was rescued from the second floor of his burning home by Charlotte Firefighters; his parents and older brother had escaped.  Kevin Boardman did what many other 11 year-olds would have done: when he realized that the house was on fire he went back in to try and save his animals.

Companies from the CFD arrived on scene and heard that Kevin was inside.  It was just before 5:30 in the morning; a family gathered on the front lawn telling the crews that their younger son was inside; the building was deteriorating rapidly.  The fire was burning up the basement stairs and spreading up the stairwell. The crew of a Rescue Company committed the search the second floor while an Engine Crew dug in the protect the stairwell.  Conditions were bad: visibility was close to zero; heat was banking down to the floor; the signs of rollover were present in the smoke pushing up the stairwell.  The firefighters searching knew that flashover was a real possibility.  The Engine crew knew that if they did not hold the fire in check for the searching members from the Rescue that things would go very badly.  The efforts of these warriors resulted in Kevin being pulled from the building.  He was injured, but alive.  He was rushed to the hospital and then flown to a burn center.

Kevin died from his injuries.  He fought for awhile: from early Thursday morning February 3rd, until the evening of Saturday the 5th Kevin (and a team of Doctors and Nurses) fought for life.  He ultimately succumbed to his injuries. My thoughts are with Kevin's family.

I bring this story up to continue the debate we started back with my post "%$#@ Victim Survivability Profiling... Do Your Primary Search."  Based on the criteria that Captain Marsar published in his Fire Engineering articles those crews should not have committed to the search.  The smoke conditions were such that CO and HCN were present in abundance.  The likelihood of a viable victim being rescued was slight based on the studies he has referenced.  However, the fact remains that the brave men and women of the Charlotte Fire Department committed to a very marginal set of conditions and managed to rescue a victim.  There are those who might say, "But he died," as if that were evidence that the choice to search bordered on reckless.

I will pose this question.  Would you have wanted another thirty hours with your 11 year-old before he died?  That's what those warriors did; they crawled into a hell that easily could have killed or maimed any of them and in doing so they gave those parents, and Kevin's older brother, the chance to see him, to say good bye.  To have a memory of holding his hand one last time, not one of a sudden and surreal loss.  When Kurt Vonnegut spoke of the Fire Engine and a symbol of man's humanity to man it was that kind of Courage and sense of Duty he was speaking of. 

Video Blog Episode 6

Here is this week's installment of the Fire Service Warrior Video Blog! Tell your friends.



Be sure to check back here Monday to see the cover and read a bit about my book The Combat Position.

A Dead German's View of Courage

I was getting ready to go to bed the other night and didn't have a book in particular that I wanted to read, so I went trolling the book shelves and pulled out Essays and Aphorisms a Penguin Classics edition of Arthur Schopenhauer's work.  Schopenhauer was a German (of Dutch decent) philosopher born in 1788.   (I know, I know, German philosophy and a taste for fine wine tends to confuse people when they hear I'm a fireman, but my life is equally filled with Jameson and Irish Rebel Music, get over it.)  Schopenhauer is best know for his work, The World as Will and Representation.

Essays and Aphorisms is a collection of shorter works of philosophy.  So, I grabbed it from the shelf and thumbed through the table of contents to find a piece I had not read before.  I chose, "On Ethics".  I was enjoying myself when I reached the Eureka! moment (which I seem to find in anything I read).

"Courage however implies that one is willing to face a present evil so as to prevent greater evil in the future, while cowardice does the reverse."

I suppose that may be a core supporting idea to the Fire Service Warrior concept.  We race into burning buildings because in doing so we prevent a greater evil... that of our neighbors suffering the loss of their lives or property.  Perhaps, even more so is that we prevent them losing their sense of humanity.  We race into those buildings because we have accepted as our duty to protect our neighbors from fire.  Kurt Vonnegut said, "I can think of no more stirring symbol of man's humanity to his fellow man than a fire Engine."  That attitude would not be there if we did not risk of ourselves to protect others.

Maybe it is off topic but firefighters and fire departments across the county have come under attack of late.  We are seen as being a drain on municipal resources.  We cost valuable dollars, but like an insurance policy we are not valued until we are needed.  The result has been lay-offs, and brownouts, and reductions in services across the country.  We saw the City of Camden layoff 70 firefighters, the City of Gary 40, and countless municipalities lay off line firefighters as a means of saving money.

At issue is the perception that we, the firefighters are to blame.  There is an effort on the part of politicians to cast us as overpaid dilettantes.  There is very little understanding about what we do.  There is zero acknowledgment of the risks we face.  I think every politician should watch the video of the Houston Fire Department Mayday from 2007.





The DVD of this MAYDAY is available from the guys over at The Bravest. It is a heck of a thing to listen to the sound of a brother taking what could have been his last breaths.

We must make it clear what we will and will not do.  That is my entire point about the importance of defining missions.

Just a few thoughts.  Cheers.

The Art of the Nozzle Team

I keep a copy of Tom Brennan's Random Thoughts in close proximity when I find myself with some quick reading time.  For those who didn't read Fire Engineering before December of 2006 Tom Brennan (no relation), a retired FDNY Captain and former Editor-in-Chief of Fire Engineering, wrote a column that appeared just inside the back cover from January 1988 to December of 2006 called "Random Thoughts".  In 2007 PennWell, the publisher of Fire Engineering, collected those column's as a book titled... Tom Brennan's Random Thoughts.

I sat down with a few minutes to spare and opened to an article Tom had written originally for the April 2004 issue of Fire Engineering.  The article was titled "Safety On This Job?" and as I was reading I was struck by one point in particular.  "The use of nozzles dialed to a wide pattern inside fire buildings during interior firefighting operations causes injuries. Period. Sure, they make the nozzle team really comfortable, but who said the nozzle team has a right to be comfortable?"  Who said the nozzle team has a right to be comfortable?  May whatever God or gods look out for warriors and small animals help me, but I love it!

I believe deep in my soul that if we can put the fire out all of our other problems go away.  Putting the fire out is the job of the Nozzle Team.  It isn't always easy, and it is rarely comfortable.  I've talked before about the fact that the Nozzle Team MUST push through one of the most untenable places on the face of the earth when they advance down a hallway and have to Make the Turn to get water on the seat of the fire.  During that push you are crawling into the belly of a dragon (figuratively... you aren't literally crawling into a dragon unless you are in The Fantasy World of Firefighting).  You will have to push through heat, low or zero visibility conditions, and the immense desire to make like a sheep herder and get the flock out of there, to get water onto the seat of the fire.  We know this is a difficult process, but I think those of us who do not, or have not, had to do it often forget just how challenging it can be.  We aren't getting many Sets and Reps as members of a Nozzle Team unless we are on one of the handful of busy companies serving depressed, inner-city type neighborhoods. How many guys and gals actually are getting to do that?

So, what do we have to do?  We have to TRAIN to thrive in that environment.

I've been developing a Hands On Training (HOT) class called "The Art of the Nozzle" for about six months now.   The focus of the class is developing the skill, confidence, and competency of two and three member nozzle teams.  I define the nozzle team as the firefighter with the Nozzle (the Pipe in Chicagoese), the Back-Up Firefighter (Heel), and the Officer.  While staffing in cities like Chicago and New York may allow for the Door/Control position to be staffed as well, for most departments four person companies are a luxury and three person companies are the norm.  With that reality our training should be focused on getting water on the fire with a two or three person team (after all someone has to be outside running the pump panel).

"The Art of the Nozzle" is a 14 hour course that gives each student nine sets of live fire evolutions.  That's right, you get to crawl into a burning building... nine times.  You function as the Nozzle, the Back-Up, and the Officer.  You will be shown techniques for fires in dwellings at grade, above grade, and below grade.  Our bread and butter fire happens in 1000 to 2000 square foot homes and this class is geared to that operating environment.

There is a good chance that you will get more quality fireground evolutions in this class than most folks get in a year or more.  The best part, I think, is that we will be using helmet cams to record the evolutions and between stations you will go over the video with instructors to see what went well and what you can learn.

The pilot of the class is going to be run in this Spring and it will be available to take on the road starting this summer.  Contact info@spartan-concepts.com to look into booking the class.  Classes are limited to 15 students per session to maximize the  Hands-On experience for each student.

If you haven't been checking out the video blogs... START.  If you have, please shoot me a comment or an email and let me know what you think.  Please keep referring folks to the site and make sure you stop by and Visit me at FDIC in March.

Too Long for YouTube!

So I sat down and put together the fourth episode of the Fire Service Warrior Video Blog.  Problem is it was 5 minutes too long for YouTube.  So it is up on GoDaddy.

Hope you enjoy the discussion of points 3 and 4 in our Ethos Statement.


Make sure you check out Gabriel Angemi's blog for some great photos and discussion about inner-city firefighting.

Also, make sure you get registered for FDIC coming up in March.

Cheers and have a great weekend.

Achieving Relative Safety

Well, it comes to Friday and time for another video blog.  Today I tackle the second point in our ethos statement:  Fire Service Warriors acknowledge the dangers of their vocation and do everything possible to minimize those dangers except shirk our duty.

Check it out.  Check out the guys over at Forged Clothing (whose shirts I wear each week).  Tell your friends to visit us.

Frank Brannigan Was Wrong...

Bold words from some random guy blogging, I know but I think I am onto something here.  Francis Brannigan, a Fire Protection Engineer who many of us know from his writing on building construction and his classic text Building Construction for the Fire Service, used to say, "The Building is your enemy; know your enemy!"  He was wrong.  The Building is the battleground, it is the terrain in which we and the enemy do battle.



Fire is the enemy and fire behavior is a predictiable indication of how the enemy will behave.  If we look at line of duty death and injury statistics we see far too many of our brothers and sisters being injured or killed because of fire development.  Just last week Mark Falkenhan-FF/Medic, Lutherville Volunteer Fire Company, Baltimore County FD was killed after being trapped in what sounds like flashover conditions. On Sunday a woman and three firefighters were injured at a building fire in Springfield, Virgina.

The video below show us the progression of the fireground.  Dave Statter has some good comments about this over at his blog.



We can get into a debate (I suppose) about exactly what fire behavior we are seeing.  It is not a backdraft.  It is not a smoke explosion.  This is a rapid spread of fire because of (probably) ineffective ventilation techniques. I'm not going to launch into some Tactics diatribe here because I do not know exactly what occurred at this fire.  I don't know if this was a townhouse type building where the second floor was a different occupancy.  I don't know if they pulled up with a two person Engine and one person on the Truck.  Something different did have to occur for that fire to be vented in a way that prevented the spread of fire over the heads of the attack team.

What we can talk about is the fire progression and why the fire spread was predicable.

Look at the smoke conditions at the start of the video.  This entire building is heavily charged.  The structure of the building is involved.  The fire is deep seated.  Based on info from http://www.wunderground.com the temperature was in the low 20's(F).  The somewhat "lazy" nature of the smoke once it is outside the building is due to the temperature. The key factors though should be the volume of dense smoke we see and the color.  We have to recognize that if it was 65 degrees outside this smoke would push away from the building with great velocity.  In this case it is "pushing" out pretty hard but then hanging more than we would normally expect from a hot fire.  WHY?  Because the "fluid" that is unburned products of combustion carried by heat contracts and slows when it hits that cold air.

Something worth considering is the inherent relationship between temperature and pressure.

How well do your firefighters understand Boyle's Law and Charles's law of fluid dynamics?  I know, I know, that's HazMat... right?  Maybe I'm biased to looking at this through a lens of Chemical and Physical properties because I just got back from a validating committee for a HazMat Technician Text Book.

Charles's Law simple says that as temperature increases so does pressure in a closed container.  Boyle's Law tells us that if you keep temperatue constant as pressure doubles volume halves/ as volume doubles pressure is halved.  In other words if you give a fluid more space the pressure is lessened, if you give it less space pressure increases.  Here is where they come together. As temperature is building because of unrestrained fire the pressure in the building begins to increase.  If the building was perfectly sealed that increase in pressure would eventually smother the fire by consuming oxygen.  If it cools off the fire goes out and all the unburnned products of combustion just congeal on surfaces.

However, once we allow the building to ventilate (in any manner) we create a place for that "fluid" to go.  However because it is a small opening relative to the amount of product temperature and pressure continue to build.  The exiting "fluid" is heated but to rich to burn (I know, more HazMat).

At the 1:45 mark you can see flame in the C/D corner window on the D side (if you call the front door side of the building where the truck is parked A).  In 15 seconds heavy fire is venting out the window.  30 seconds after the flame is viable we can see through the A/D corner window the fire is extending.  Three seconds later (2:14) the unburned fuel that is exiting the front lights up.  Once it lights up you will notice that the smoke is moving a lot faster up and away.  That's because the heat is now outside and overcoming the slowing/contracting effect of the ambient temperature.

We MUST study these fires and understand what is happening in the building.  I was in Tulsa over the weekend and spent a few minutes talking with Ed Hartin who teaches extensively about Compartment Fire Behavior Training  Ed is a Fire Behavior guy.  We talked about how it is the lack of knowledge about Fire Behavior that is getting us hurt and killed on the fireground.  While fire behavior may not be predictable with 100% accuracy I venture to say if you are a student of this trade we can get close to 95%.  We don't know until we are inside the compartment what effect the layout may have on fire growth and spread.  However we should understand intuitively what the smoke conditions are telling us about the growth, stage, and location of the fire.

The building is the battleground, and warriors going back as far as Sun Tzu have taught us how important it is to understand the terrain. The ENEMY though is the fire.  You can know all you want about the terrain but if you do not know what the ENEMY is going to do you will still end up killed.  The Fire is Your Enemy, Know You Enemy; The Building is the Battleground, Know the Terrain.