BY CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN
Firefighters must master the ability to take a mental snapshot of the situation presented to them and use that to make critical tactical decisions. Our business boils down to making decisions in a high-stress environment with life-and-death consequences. It does not matter if you are talking about a structure fire, a heart attack, or a technical rescue incident. Operating under those circumstances can be overwhelming, especially for a firefighter just starting out. If we want our people to thrive in that kind of chaotic, stressful environment, it is imperative to train them in fireground tactical decision making.
We have all worked with someone who was always cool and collected and seemed to know what the fire was going to do a second or two before the fire did it. Usually, those are the experienced members who have been around the block and have a chest full of war stories to share. There is no question that experience is the best way to master the art and science of sizing up a situation and making tactical decisions. Experience comes with time, though, and we are not responding to the same number of structure fires as we did in the past. How do we develop experience in a firefighter who may respond to only a handful of structure fires a year? We do this through training. Obviously, training is our “answer” for a lot of situations because none of us were born experts at firefighting. Training our members to be skilled in tactical decision making, however, must have a particular focus. If it is going to be successful, it must rest on a solid foundation.
COMBAT DECISION MAKING: THE BOYD LOOP
The Boyd Loop1 is a concept well known to fighter pilots and special operations warriors. They rely on it to develop and perfect their abilities to interpret their environment in a manner that enables them to gather information relevant to their situation and to use that information to make decisions and plot their actions. The fire service can use this approach to making more informed decisions on the fireground by examining the concept and training in it.
The Boyd Loop, or the OODA Loop, is named for Col. John Boyd of the U.S. Air Force, a fighter pilot who wanted to determine the best way to turn a tactical engagement in his favor.
OODA stands for <Observe, <Orient, <Decide, <Act.
- Observation is the process of gathering data. You use your senses to get information about what is happening. The key is to develop a filter so that you do not gather too much information. You need to focus on the critical information for your assignment and let the rest of the chaos become a fuzzy part of the backdrop.
- Orientation is the process of synthesizing the available information and your personal mindset to deal with the problem. Put another way, it is taking your finely honed skills as a firefighter and matching them with what you have observed about the task at hand.
- Decision is where the rubber meets the road. You take the information, analyze it, and set the best course of tactical action to achieve the strategic goal. You use your standard operating guidelines (SOGs), your training, and your knowledge of the current fireground situation to help you decide what you are going to do.
- Action is what it is all about. Firefighters are pretty much task-oriented creatures. We exist to “do” things on the fireground. The other steps in the Loop have gotten us to this point.
It is important to understand that the OODA Loop is not a linear process. It is a dynamic cycle that starts when you are dispatched and, hopefully, continues until you have finished critiquing the incident. You do not simply pull up in front of the fire building, see that there is a fire on the first floor, pull a hoseline (you are assigned to an engine today), and then go put out the fire. You don’t stop there. As you continue the fight, you are constantly gathering more data, orienting yourself to the threats that are developing, deciding on a course of action, and then acting on it.
Using the Boyd Loop correctly gives you more time to think. The smooth and efficient thought process allows you to maintain your focus while devoting a portion of your conscious mind to continually working through the OODA Loop.
LAYING THE FOUNDATION
There are a few prerequisites for successfully applying the Boyd Loop: well-designed and practiced SOGs for engine and truck company operations and a solid grounding in fundamental fireground skills. Most departments already have these prerequisites in place. If your department doesn’t, it wouldn’t be impossible to master fireground decision making, but it would be considerably more complicated.
Engine and Truck Company SOGs
Why are engine and truck company SOGs important? Using the analogy of a computer, we, like computers, have only so much “RAM” to work with. If we have to devote our mental energy to figuring out what tool to bring or what our individual priorities need to be, we are behind in the Loop already and at a disadvantage when it comes to maintaining situational awareness. Our SOGs should help limit the number of times we need to go through the Loop. They act as a flow chart for our common decisions. If you pull up in front of a structure fire, what is your assignment? What are your tools? If this is not spelled out ahead of time when you get on scene, one of the first trips through the Loop would have to be “wasted” on choosing a tool. The topic of riding positions/tool assignments has been covered in great detail by many fire service authors. Those specifics need to be worked out based on your jurisdiction and what your “bread and butter” fires involve. If our SOGs are designed to provide clear direction about essential fireground tasks, we save a trip through the Loop.
Incident Action Plan
In the same manner, having a standing guideline for an incident action plan spells out our strategic goals, which frees the initial-arriving officers from having to make trip after trip through the Loop. Developing SOGs ahead of time, which function like EMS standing medical orders, cuts down on the amount of thinking you have to devote to a given problem. It is much like going to a restaurant. You walk into a “steak place” with every intention of ordering a rib eye, medium rare, with a baked potato. The only decision you have to make is choosing an appetizer. You walk in, and the waiter hands you a menu. What do you do? You see if there is a special that catches your eye and are ready to order. Your friend that came with you, though, had no idea of what he wanted to order, so what does he do? He looks at everything on the menu!So now you have to wait to execute your decision until your friend has figured out what he wants. Time is not of the essence when ordering dinner, usually, but the same analogy applies on the fireground. If you have a huge menu to pick from because the SOGs didn’t lay a foundation for picking the right “meal,” then you waste time filtering through everything, even options that are not relevant to the situation at hand. Well-designed SOGs on which firefighters have trained and practiced to make sure they work help to reduce the time needed in the Observe, Orient, and Direct stages of the Boyd Loop.
SCENARIO
Let’s say that my assignment is the outside vent member (OVM). Our SOGs take care of focusing me on what I need to observe and the orientation I am going to take. They streamline the decision-making process for me because I should know what my specific initial response tasks are. By having tool assignments married to a fireground assignment, I have reduced the confusion even further.
I arrive on the scene of a structure fire and observe a two-story, ordinary construction, single-family residence with fire showing from the Division B/C corner. My SOGs orient me to take a 24-foot extension ladder, a halligan bar, and a pike pole to Division C; throw the ladder to the second floor in a manner that allows it to be used for rescue; ventilate the fire room with my pike pole on being notified that the attack engine is prepared to make entry; and then open any exterior doors on the Division C side and make a primary search from the exterior, without entering an immediately dangerous to life and health atmosphere, until I meet up with my partner, whose initial task was to mirror my actions in the front of the building. How difficult is working through the OODA Loop going to be? It should be pretty straightforward. The only element of my assignment that may necessitate more brainpower is choosing the right window to ladder on the second floor. I am able to think about (Orient) that as I am making my size-up and triaging the building.
To make my way around to Division C, I choose to go down the Division D side of the building. As I pass between the building on fire and the Division D exposure (I’d call this space or passage a gangway, but using National Incident Management System terminology makes this information accessible to everyone), I Observe a woman hanging out of a second-floor window in need of rescue. What do I do now? Go through the Loop. I Observe a condition. I Orient myself with my understanding of the circumstances as I know them from our SOGs and the current situation. There is a potential life safety risk; our SOGs say it is the job of the second truck to ladder the Division D side. The second truck is on scene. Now I have to Decide. Do I abandon my assignment of opening up in Division C to rescue the woman, or do I make a quick radio call? “Command from Truck 1 OVM, I’ve got people hanging out second-floor windows on the D Side. I’m continuing to the C side” (Figure 1). Do you Decide to do something different if the second truck is a mutual-aid company that you know is five minutes out? There is no one right answer. Your decision must be predicated on the observations you make based on the current conditions and the orientation you have assumed. Once you make your decision, it is time to Act.
Having a solid grounding in fundamental fireground skills is the key to reducing the amount of “static” in the action phase of the Loop. You have made it around to the D side without encountering any situations that may cause you to divert from your SOG-based assignment. Your first task is to throw a 24-foot ground ladder to a second-floor window so that it can be used for rescue. Can you do it? Do you know how to throw a ladder by yourself? Do you have the strength? Do you know where it is supposed to go for rescue? If you don’t, then you are once again slowing down in the Loop. Now you have to take a trip through the Loop to figure out how you are going to accomplish the task at hand.
The basics should be so ingrained in you that there is no need to “waste” any time in the Boyd Loop thinking about them. They are called “fundamentals” for a reason. They are fundamental to being able to do your job. If you are prepared through regular training in how to throw a ladder, perform vent-enter-search, stretch a hoseline, staff a 2½-inch exposure line by yourself, or any other fireground task, you are speeding up your trip through the Loop. You are compressing time by removing unnecessary items from the menu and giving your brain more time to focus on those things that are 100-percent specific to your situation: sizing up the building, reading the smoke, and observing the effects of your fellow firefighters’ actions.
DEVELOPING FIREGROUND TACTICAL DECISION-MAKING SKILLS
Even if you have good SOGs and are an all-star firefighter, your ability to use the Boyd Loop to make tactical decisions on the fireground will be limited if you do not practice doing it. The training needs to go beyond just teaching the SOGs and the fundamental skills. Once your people know what their assignments are and how to perform them, the training needs to get more challenging. Complexity and speed must be increased if your firefighters are going to continue to develop. Incorporate a scenario where the OVM has to decide what to do about the woman hanging out the second-floor window. Have your folks pull up in front of your tower, an acquired structure, or even someone else’s firehouse, if that is your only option, for a simulated fire and have a role-player in front of the building pointing to a second-floor window saying, “My five-year-old is in the room; get him.”
What would they do? How would they move through the OODA cycle to get to acting on the problem? Build these unexpected developments into your scenario-based training. Throw in an evacuation drill every now and again. The late Francis Brannigan wrote continually about how every sailor in the Navy is taught how to abandon ship. How many of us are practicing how to make an orderly tactical retreat if the air horns start blasting?
There are bound to be firefighters who resist challenging training—or training in general. It may be that they are worried about being embarrassed or that they do not understand why it is vital. Embarrassment tends to arise from not feeling secure in your ability to perform the required task. Not understanding the importance of the training comes from seeing the department’s values as incoherent or inconsistent. Fixing those underlying issues probably needs to be a priority. Remind these firefighters that just because they have been firefighters for X number of years doesn’t mean they know it all or are perfect. Every professional sports team practices all season long. They are making millions of dollars because they are so good at what they do, and they still practice. Members of the Special Operations Command train constantly. Use these examples of professionals in very exclusive organizations as models of professionals who take training seriously.
Once the drills are done, do a hot wash on the tailboard; talk about what went well and what can be learned. How direct those sessions are depends on your corporate culture. I believe that sparing someone’s feelings is less important than making sure that a dangerous error in a critical fireground task is fixed. However, do not criticize the person—criticize the action.
Personal “Mental Rehearsals”
Beyond departmental or company-level training, conduct personal “mental rehearsals.” Think about what you will do if you are presented with a particular circumstance. Pick a building in your district, and think about how you would handle various situations there. I play the “what if” game constantly. It helps me make decisions on the fireground more smoothly. When I walk up to the door of a house I have not been in before, I look down both sides and take a guess at where the kitchen, baths, and bedrooms are. It’s a little quiz I give myself to mentally rehearse my size-up skills. What would you do if you suddenly fell through a floor? Are you training in calling a Mayday? It’s the evolutionary step that takes us beyond our self-contained breathing apparatus emergency procedures and prepares us to respond to a situation that has a huge potential to be mentally overwhelming.
Mental rehearsals give us a low-stress opportunity to work through various challenging situations we may have to confront. Thinking through what your actions would be if you find yourself in trouble will help reduce the stress if you suddenly find yourself lost, disoriented, or trapped in a fire building. You are not going to respond well the first time you see a problem. That is the reason we drill and need practice applying the OODA Loop in our training. You can build your experience bank by analyzing possible situations, performing mental rehearsals, and conducting challenging scenario-based training.
There is no single way to learn any skill in the fire service. Fireground tactical decision making is a complex process that is a synthesis of your experience, your training, your situational awareness, and your comfort level. The physical and psychological stresses of firefighting impact us differently and need to be addressed separately. Hopefully, being introduced to the Boyd Loop and taking the time to think about how your organization teaches decision making will make you better prepared to confront the challenging environment of the fireground. By ensuring that your firefighters have well-planned SOGs and a solid foundation in the fundamentals of fireground tasks and have had the opportunity to be challenged with real-world scenario-driven training, you will prepare them to make critical life-or-death fireground decisions.
Endnote
1. Howe, MSG Paul R, U.S. Army Ret. Leadership and Training for the Fight. Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2005.
CHRISTOPHER BRENNAN is an engineer with the Harvey (IL) Fire Department and a 13-year veteran of the fire service. He is a fire service instructor and author. His book The Combat Position: Achieving Firefighter Readiness will be available from Fire Engineering in 2011. He maintains the Web site www.fireserivcewarrior.com.
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