FIREFIGHTING IS DIFFERENT TODAY!
EDITOR’S OPINION
Had not my grandfather’s life been snuffed out in an explosion while fighting fire in a gas works in 1920, he would have said that my father’s “today’s” fires were not the same or as bad as his own. I’m sure, because that’s exactly what my father told me at the end of his 37-year career as I started fighting my “today’s” fires.
Neither my father nor his father were different than any of the yesteryear firefighters evaluating the operations to which they no longer respond. Now, I’m yesteryear. There’ll be no more of my “today’s” fires—no more 10,000-run companies and no more “burn, baby, burn” experiences of the intensity found in major cities 18 to 20 years ago. Today’s firefighter looks at his tradition. He’s also told it’s easier now. But is it?
The firefighting force is performing with criminally short manning levels. The volunteer sector finds it hard to recruit and impossible to retain its membership. The paid sector is bleeding from the slashes of the fiscal official’s saber.
Hazardous materials are found everywhere, from the six-million-gallon storage tank to the plastic toilet seat.
Interior combustibles disappear in a Btu product higher and faster than ever before. The classic heat curve is a damning spike.
Lightweight building materials, given birth by a performance code, are only defying gravity and give up easily to the rape of fire.
Humanity, our primary responsibility, is being “shelved” in numbers and altitudes that make responding equipment useless—except for the “human equipment,” the firefighter.
Because of our space-age protective envelope we are able to penetrate into the bowels of hell further than ever.
Putting most of these conditions together, it’s no wonder that flashover is trapping more of us while more buildings than ever crash down on our heads.
Just as my father and I defended our position to our elders, I proclaim your praises with a departure from tradition. Your firefight is different than mine—it’s more complicated and assuredly more dangerous.
Be careful out there.
