Command function

I would like to comment on “SOP for Command Function #1” (Bruno: “Unplugged,” May 2010) and Chief Todd Harms’ FDIC 2010 presentation “Tactical Considerations for the First-Arriving Battalion Chief.” The thing that irks me about these presentations is their absoluteness. This is how it is done. It is done this way all the time. No exceptions.

There are more than 30,000 fire departments in the United States with different problems, resources, communications, sizes, and structures. Fire departments range in size from one apparatus to hundreds of apparatus. In New York City, there are 100 active fire companies operating on one dispatch frequency and two boroughs sharing another frequency, because no additional frequencies are available. I can’t envision the chaos created by companies going through “the standard initial radio report” every time they arrive at an alarm. At busy times, alarms for a given borough are transmitted every few seconds. We use box numbers to separate one alarm from another. We don’t have to create Broadway Command and some other command each time a company arrives at an alarm.

The first-in officers are the initial commanders. They determine the following:

1. If it will be an offensive or a defensive attack.

2. Where to position the apparatus.

3. What size line to stretch.

4. Where to take the line.

5. What water source to use.

6. Any other resources needed that are not assigned.

7. Any special instructions not covered by our standard operating procedures (SOPs) for incoming units.

The first-in unit officer has been functioning as the initial incident commander (IC) in the Fire Department of New York (FDNY) for 150 years. We don’t have to have a formal ceremony every time an initial unit arrives at an alarm and sets up command. This would have to be done 500,000 times a year. The unit officer hits the “10-84” button on his apparatus computer, and responding units, fire communications, and headquarters know the unit is on the scene and in command. If there is anything unusual, like a working fire, the officer will then announce it. Even Chief Alan Brunacini has lectured and written many times about unnecessary radio talk. To me, this is unnecessary radio talk. In a department doing a few alarms a day, it might not be a big deal, but every second of air time has to be efficiently managed in a busy department.

In FDNY, and I am sure in other well-managed fire departments, the first-alarm assignment should be able to self-deploy according to department SOPs in most situations. Initial responding units shouldn’t need specific instructions from the IC.

I don’t want to be absolute and say every department can operate this way. I realize there are departments where the first-alarm assignment is made up of units from other departments that use different SOPs, if they have any SOPs at all; use different radio frequencies; and maybe don’t talk to each other on a regular basis.

The article and presentation on which I am commenting did not mention how fast a chief officer is going to arrive on the scene. It makes a big difference if the chief officer is 20 seconds behind the first unit or 20 minutes behind. If the chief officer is 20 minutes behind the first-due unit, the initial IC will have to take on a more involved incident command role.

If the chief arrives a few seconds after the first unit and there is a change-of-command ceremony, does the initial IC/company officer have to spend a few minutes telling the later-arriving IC/chief officer all that happened in the 20 seconds before arrival? Again, it is quite different when a chief arrives 20 minutes into the incident rather than 20 seconds, but this is never mentioned.

Chief Brunacini also states: “The system should establish a stationary remote IC inside a command post as quickly as possible.” This may be easy for Phoenix to do, but what should we do in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and so on when we can’t get the chief’s vehicle within two blocks of the fire? If this is the case, why not direct the fire remotely from headquarters?

Chief Harms spent a good deal of time explaining that the initial battalion chief is the IC. Later-arriving more senior officers are only advisers. You can call anything you want what you want. If you want to call cats “dogs” and dogs “cats,” you have a right to do so. But when you go to court, they are going to call cats “cats” and dogs “dogs.” If I am the senior officer at an incident and something goes wrong, the court doesn’t want to know that I wasn’t the IC, that Joe Blow, the acting battalion chief, was the IC. I will be going to jail. And if I am going to jail, then I am the IC. Phoenix can call it anything it wants, but the senior member is the IC. And, if the senior person doesn’t want to be the IC and go to jail—don’t be there.

I spent the final 15 years of my 42-year career with FDNY as a field deputy chief. I would average five responses each tour. They were not the same responses as battalions and companies, where the overwhelming majority of the runs were minor incidents or false or unnecessary alarms. Deputy chief responses were usually incidents where the battalion was using all first-alarm units or more—four engines, three ladders, a squad, and a rescue—and the incident wasn’t under control. Nobody believes in an effective incident command system more than I do. I feel my thoughts and views on incident command are as good and as valid as anyone else’s. Incident command is not an exact science to be followed exactly as written in the National Incident Management System, the Incident Command System, or Fire Ground Command.

Ted Goldfarb
Deputy Chief (Ret.)
Fire Department of New York
Fire Science Coordinator
Middlesex County (NJ) College

Alan Brunacini responds: Chief Goldfarb has been “irked” by just about everything I have written for the past 35 years, and I always welcome his thoughtful and very experienced observations. He represents the very effective and long-standing big-city Fire Department of New York operational techniques. My experience reflects working in a low-rise, less congested western city for 50 years. I think our different approaches require the readers to decide if operations in central Phoenix, Arizona, or in Times Square, New York City, match more closely where they deliver service. I agree that there are very few “absolutes”—simply, that is the reason they make chocolate and vanilla.

“Good” firefighters are the premium firefighters

I thank Captain Kelly Jernigan of the Winston-Salem (SC) Fire Department for her commentary “Less Diversity Is Needed in the Fire Service” (Fire Engineering, February 2010). She has articulated so many of my own thoughts regarding the controversies surrounding the issue of diversity, ones that I would never be able to say aloud because of the fact that I am a white male.

As a career firefighter married to a female career firefighter, I appreciate only one type of firefighter: the good ones. I have far more love and admiration for a good firefighter whether a man or a woman; black, white, or Hispanic; or otherwise than for one who grew up in my neighborhood and is a waste of space.

It’s high time we in the fire service started putting a higher premium on competence and enthusiasm than we do on gender or ethnicity and we started looking down our collective noses at members who are clearly interested only in gaming the system. I have always thought that, as Jernigan has said, it’s an insult for members of a minority to suggest that their own minority is not able to compete in the realm of standardized testing. I think that view is tantamount to bigotry, regardless of the racial composition of the person who holds it.

I applaud Jernigan for her very well written article and for tackling an issue that is rife with thorny barbs and snags for other people to hang things on. I also applaud Fire Engineering for having the guts and commitment to the true heart of our craft to print an article that might be considered offensive or controversial by lesser minds.

Sean J. Wilson
Royal Oak (MI) Professional Firefighters
IAFF Local 431

Avoiding low-pressure conditions for interior firefighters

Reference is made to “Keeping the Pressure On” by Kevin Kalmus (Training Notebook, May 2010). This is an excellent article concerning pump operations on a typical fireground. Although the scenarios are quite realistic, some things can be done to avoid having interior firefighters exposed to low-pressure conditions.

First, the pump operator (PO) should have been making notes (mental or written) concerning the static hydrant pressure and the subsequent drops in residual pressure as more lines (nozzle flows) were added to the fire. By the time the incident commander (IC) was ready to deploy the aerial for the roof fire, the PO should have already made an analysis of the available water and informed the IC not to open another large-caliber stream from the same main without readjusting the delivery rate of the other exterior lines.

Second, the PO on Engine 1 should have been operating with the tank refilled (as soon as the hydrant line was charged) and kept the “T” to “P” valve (between the apparatus tank and the inlet of the pump) in the open position. This allows the pressure governor to throttle up to provide the needed master gauge pressure of 150 pounds per square inch (psi) and gives the PO a minute or so to react to the loss of supply. An engine equipped with a pressure relief valve requires the PO to remain at the panel until all lines are in service and the engine has been throttled up enough to supply the correct 150 psi at the needed maximum volume with all lines flowing. I do not advocate the PO’s leaving the pump panel to throw ladders or deploy ventilation, but on short crews, the pressure governor can be a real advantage if used correctly.

Where does the rapid intervention team line come into the picture? It is one more reason to verify the adequacy of the water supply before committing another major line to exterior attack.

William N. Hoehn
Driver/Operator
Crystal Fire Department
St. Marys, Pennsylvania