By: Gabriel Angemi
The importance of the interior stairs during firefighting operations transcends code-compliance and construction materials – and even their design. The interior stairs becomes the primary means of egress for occupants and firefighters alike – and the preferred path for fire and firefighters to ascend towards upper floors. Fire has always preferred taking the path of least resistance when spreading to uninvolved areas of a burning structure and the interior staircase becomes a willing travel partner. Firefighters themselves prefer the easiest path as well and when fire involves lower floors, the race is on for control of the interior stairs. This becomes the principle concern for the engine company and a major concern for the truck: Owning the interior stairs allows us the ability to conduct our interior business as we please. This runs the gamut from victim removal – including those removed during rapid intervention operations – to post-control operations such as salvage and overhaul.
Interior stairs take many different and aesthetically pleasing design forms based upon the layout and occupancy of a building: the most familiar being those types found in Type-3 (Ordinary) or Type-5 (Wood Frame) buildings. These stairs are usually of the return or straight-run type and may be constructed of varying metals or woods. Despite the construction and design standards used to create the stairs in question, the most important aspect becomes those who intend to use these stairs during a fire. Although this aspect is rhetorical, consideration of the collective stairway’s travelers’ intentions becomes the focus of this article: the hazards to descending or trapped occupants, the engine and truck company’s positioning and the ability to conduct post-control operations requires that everyone on the fireground understand the importance of “holding the stairs.”
Interior stairs in Type-3 and Type-5 buildings are usually openinterior staircases. This allows fire to travel uninhibited to upper floors and bedrooms trapping unprotected occupants. Occupants rely on the interior stairs for virtually every facet of their habitation within the building. Whether entering or exiting, or retiring for the evening, the interior stairs henceforth become referred to as the “primary means of egress” during a fire. Heavy smoke and fire prohibits occupants from self-evacuating, thereby requiring our intervention – regardless of which type of fire-company we are responding to the fire on for the tour.
The engine company’s primary placement for the first hoseline must be the interior stairs. Upon arrival of the first-due engine company, the engine officer should conduct a size-up of the fire and stair’s location in relation to each other; the balance of the nozzle team should also be considering the operation of the nozzle based upon the officer’s size-up. The engine officer shall ensure that the nozzle team protects the stairs at all costs if the fire involves lower floors with occupied areas above. The nozzle firefighter shall operate the nozzle and place water between the fire and occupied areas – or the most severely exposed areas above – for two very important reasons: the ability to extinguish extending fire from lower floors and protection of the firefighters conducting searches above.
The survivability of the occupants and the upper levels of the structure require that water is placed on the fire as quickly as possible. Basic hoseline operations notwithstanding, the nozzle firefighter must protect the stairwell in order to ensure the advance of the first hoseline and those going above to conduct a primary search safely. The engine officer shall determine the ability, based on fire conditions, of the first hoseline to ensure the stairs remain viable for the entire incident. The second-due engine company will depend on the first hoseline’s protection of the stairs in order to safely proceed above the fire floor to extinguish any extension of fire. The second line also takes the same interior stairs to protect the first hoseline’s position and becomes a contingency should burst-lengths, loss of water, etc. occur. More often that not, truck and rescue companies are usually tasked with conducting primary searches above the fire floor, and their safety and success are in the hands of the engine company and a viable staircase. Truck and rescue company firefighters going to the floor above – like trapped occupants themselves – are extremely susceptible to extending fire traveling upwards via the interior stairs. Those firefighters going to the floor above must communicate with the first-due engine company to ensure said staircase will be controlled if the second hoseline is not yet stretched and charged.
Firefighters operating on the floor above should be evermindful of their orientation within the fire building – particularly when operating near open-interior staircases. They should make every attempt to determine the progress of the first hoseline, as well as any communication regarding loss of water, burst lengths, loss of the stairs, improper (uncoordinated) ventilation, etc. These communications will require that a secondary means of egress be located or placed – and considered by those operating above. If a problem is encountered, never hesitate to transmit an ‘urgent’ message so everyone on the fireground can account for their position – and to be sure that they still have the ability to continue operating in their assigned area(s) of responsibility.
There are many odds and ends involving interior stairs and operating adjacent to their location. For instance: if the stairs are burned away, a “Collyer’s Mansion” condition exists, or obstructions prohibit safe ascent to the floor(s) above, consider utilizing a ground ladder to traverse these conditions. Always err on the side of caution, particularly if there is any chance of fire extending to the floor above. What’s more, a known life-hazard in an involved area distant from the interior stairs is perhaps the only instance when the first hoseline may deviate from its placement at the interior stairs. This must be communicated quickly to everyone on the fireground and may require holding searching companies on the lower floors until the second hoseline is placed into operation. If the interior stairs is to ever be used to go above unprotected, secondary means of egress such as ground and aerial ladders must be placed as soon as possible in the event that a rapid egress must take place. If there is any delay in getting this equipment placed, then it may be better to await a hoseline in order to “hold the stairs.”
