FE Volume 164 Issue 1

The response of the Albany (OR) Fire Department (AFD) to a small fire in the Santa Claus section of the Heritage Mall brought to light the need for preplanning a response to this location and establishing a collaborative relationship with mall management. Santa, his reindeer and elves, and mall employees and shoppers were not injured in the fire call. However, the incident brought the department’s attention to the fact that the mall was difficult to navigate for responders, fire department connection locations were not clearly labeled, and the stores had no visible addresses near the mall’s storefront entrance.

Even the smallest flow rate nozzle, regardless of stream type, if operated long enough, can suppress any fire in a confined compartment. However, when the lives of trapped occupants or firefighters are at stake, an aggressive stream that can effect a rapid knockdown is needed to place an effective volume of water between the occupants and the advancing fire without steaming those people within the compartment or areas opposite the applied stream. As discussed above, the modern-day engine company should expect that its arrival time is in line with a flashover event. As provided by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the April 2010 report on Residential Fireground Field Experiments, a timed three-person engine company and a four-person engine company began applying water to the room-and-contents fires with an “early arrival,” at 11 minutes and 24 seconds and 11 minutes and 11 seconds, respectively, with the fires producing a high release rate (HRR) of 1-2 megawatt (MW), which is within the HRR ranges necessary to induce a flashover.1 These two factors alone necessitate that a single stream be capable of effectively and safely absorbing the heat release rate of the fire at hand while also capable of immediately reducing the chance of a flashover or stopping a flashover that may be well into development.

Personnel’s knowledge of their response area is a basic component of a fire department’s success. The sooner the fire department arrives, the sooner things start to get better. When considering structure fires, it is important not only that the first-in engine or ladder company, but also the entire fire response, make it to the right place as soon as possible to successfully mitigate the emergency. Depending on the location, this can be a major challenge.