BY CHRIS WHITBY
Whether it’s a small rural fire department replacing much-needed equipment or an urban fire department buying every toy known to man just so it can say that it has it, hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars are spent purchasing fire service equipment each day. And often, one aspect often overlooked during these purchases is what I call “Firefighter Ergonomics.”
You may be asking, What do ergonomics have to do with purchasing and using fire equipment? One dictionary definition of ergonomics is, “the science of suitable working conditions.” This may sound very scientific, but I by no means am a scientific guy. I am, however, a firm believer in working smarter, not harder, and keeping things as simple as possible. Let’s look at how an ergonomic state of mind can enhance the performance of some types of fire service equipment.
PERSONAL PROTECTIVE CLOTHING
Our first and most important category of fire service equipment is personal protective clothing (PPC). Everything we use, from hand tools to the ladders we climb, is affected by our PPC; the proper fit of this PPC is critical to your performance on the fireground.
As a fire instructor, I see on a regular basis how ergonomics affect our fire personnel. During this training, it amazes me that departments would send their personnel to a recruit school with PPC that is five sizes too big or too small—gloves that hang off the user’s hands, for example. On two occasions, an urban department with an ample budget sent members with leather work gloves instead of structural firefighting gloves.
My all-time favorite PPC incident involved a student who had a petite face and was sent to class with an extra-large self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) face piece that clearly had a one-inch gap between the seal of the face piece and the user’s face. This was after the member’s department sent an affidavit signed by the chief that the student had PASSED his facial fit test as required by the OSHA 1910.134 Respirator Protection Standard.
ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT
Electronic equipment is another valuable component of the modern fire service. In today’s day and age of interoperability, one hot topic involving budgets is purchasing new radios. In one of the training exercises I was conducting, one of our department’s members had a brand new portable radio that he couldn’t boast enough about. So I asked him what he thought its best feature was. He replied, “The Mayday button.” I asked him how it works. He told me that if you press the little orange button on top of the radio and hold it for two seconds it will transmit a Mayday tone, and that radio’s number would come up on the chief’s radio.
Although this may sound very high tech and simple, it wasn’t. The department in this example did not try the new Mayday feature under live-fire conditions. First, the button was about a quarter of an inch round and recessed into the top of the portable radio. How is a member going to activate this button while wearing structural firefighting gloves? Second, this department’s members, like in many other fire departments, wear their radios under their turnout coats and talk through a remote microphone. Now, they have to get to the radio under the coat and press the button. How easy does that sound? Had they tried the radios under live conditions, maybe they would have realized that they should have purchased the remote microphones that had the emergency button built into them, thus allowing the members easy access to it even when donning the radio under the coat.
What are some of the things you are looking for in portable radios—several channels, multiple banks, and trunking capabilities? Although all these features seem very important, have you thought about how members are going to use the radio in a structure fire? Can they turn the knobs to change channels with a gloved hand? Is the radio easily knocked off channel by simply bumping into it?
While we’re on the topic of electronics, let’s look at another high-ticket item in this category, the thermal imaging camera (TIC). One of the funniest stories I heard was that a sales representative from a TIC company told a fire chief to be careful and not to bang the camera around too much. Is he kidding? Obviously, this person hasn’t ever been in a real fire. I try not to get banged around too much myself, let alone have time to worry about my TIC getting bumped. Once again, look at the camera. Can you use it with gloved hands? If it gets bumped, does it flicker or malfunction? How easy is it to use and hold while you’re crawling down the hallway during live-fire conditions?
PERSONAL SAFETY SYSTEM
Another piece of equipment rapidly coming into service in my state is the personal safety system (PSS). The State of New York recently passed legislation requiring that firefighters entering a fire have with them a personal escape rope system. Now that it is mandatory for all departments, we are seeing an increase in sales representatives touting this product. Be very cautious when purchasing under this type of stress. Many departments in my area are rushing to meet the legislation deadlines and are not looking at all the factors involved. Will the PSS unit work with existing harnesses? If you get new harnesses, will they work with the bunker gear? Even simple things can be factors, such as if the PSS unit will deploy properly if it is placed in your left pocket.
While conducting a firefighter survival course, a county fire department wanted to try out its new PSS unit. Having a backup belay system in place, we decided to let the department try out its new PSS units during the course. A couple of issues we noted during the training were the following: The PSS had to be stored in the member’s right bunker pocket, because if deployed from the left side, the PSS unit’s rope would have to cross over the descent device, which caused it to bind up and would not allow the member to rappel down to safety. Basically, once they were out of the window, they were suspended there like piñatas. Great, I made it out of the intense fire, but now the autoexposure will get me.
Second, several sets of bunker pants are clipped on the right side instead of the left side. This also meant that the harnesses the members wore did the same thing. This may not seem like a big deal, but it was. The side on which the harness snapped, left or right, would determine the position of the spine of the carabiner. Anyone familiar with rappelling will tell you that the spine position during the loading of a carabiner is a major factor.
GADGETS MEMBERS
Finally, I want to quickly discuss gadgets members—you know, those who have the latest in glove straps, specialized door hangers, and fancy tool straps. These items may seem cool at the trade shows, but they can entangle you in a fire.
During a live-fire SCBA confidence class, I saw my partner become entangled by a glove holder strap while crossing over a burnt mattress box spring. A clip on the glove holder strap, which was hanging from the front of his turnout coat, became entangled on one of the springs. The clip was not designed to be used with gloved hands. It took the two of us a couple of minutes to untangle the strap; ironically, this flimsy metal clip never broke, even with two of us pulling on it. Luckily, this was a live-fire training evolution with safeties in place, if needed. What if we were exiting a real fire because of a low-air alarm or an SCBA failure?
There is a simple way to prevent this from happening in your department. Prior to purchasing equipment for your members, let them try it out, and get their feedback. You can easily accomplish this by asking the vendors for a demonstration model and asking them if you can throw it down the stairs prior to trying it out. If they tell you no, do you really want to entrust your life to a piece of equipment that can’t take a simple fall down a flight of stairs?
One of the best performance-based sales pitches I have ever seen was from a firearms company that was trying to convince a prospective law enforcement community buyer to purchase a firearm. The representative put the pistol through a drop test, usually from a helicopter. The company also tells the buyers that its product is built to perform right out of the box. We should not only expect this same kind of performance from our equipment, we should demand it. Also, never allow a sales representative to make up your mind about purchasing equipment. Your members should decide what works for them.
CHRIS WHITBY, a 20-plus-year veteran of the fire service, is a fire protection specialist with the New York State Office of Fire Prevention and Control and a captain for the Mechanicstown Volunteer Fire Department in Wallkill, New York. He is an assistant chief of operations for the Orange County Hazardous Materials Response Team and a fire instructor for the Rockland County Fire Training Center in Pomona, New York.
