tranning burns

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Permalink Reply by Michael Rocke on November 13, 2009 at 5:02pm

Right Jack? I have total control over my budget every year. Besides making sure the trucks/equipment run, and the electricity/heat are on, I make sure the guys get training. If I have to pay for a course they want, I do. If I have to pay for permits do burn a house, I do. I just burned a place in October. No money for the permit, just food for the guys, a few pieces of plywood, and a police detail for the day. Less than $500. It frustrates me so much to see departments that can't get training because of money. I would spend my own money before I let an untrained guy go out on my truck.

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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on November 13, 2009 at 5:24pm

Live burns are really a small portion of training. If there is a house to train on there is a lot that can be done without burning the thing. We get several vacant structures to train on, doing RIT, cutting roofs, laddering, fire attack, search rescue and so forth. The only limits are your imagination.

On another thread called "Dead Man Walking" a poster there mentioned about doing things enough that they become a routine. That is absolutely correct. You say new guys freak out. Get a house, smoke up a room (you can use a smoke machine without a permit and they can do a good job smoking the place up) then operate how you would if there was a fire. Pull lines, ladder, vent, search and so forth. It becomes routine and while it doesn't curb fears it gives a base to work on and something to fall back on.

Here is another good one if you have a thermal imager. Set up different objects of different temps around a structure, send in a couple people to do a search and to locate all the objects. Some are cold, some are hot, also place dummies, or even people around in places like bathtubs, closets, etc so a proper search is done. Switch the camera around halfway through with the other person.

Training burns in acquired structures is good if you can do them, but in no way the only way to learn. As for the burn tower stuff, the issue may not be the fact you can't use it, but there has to be certified fire instructors to be there. The burn building for the tech school is in our city, but we just can't go in there when we want, we have to call and schedule, despite the fact we have several certfied fire instructors with our dept who also work for the school.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Rocke on November 13, 2009 at 5:43pm

I was not saying that training burns are the most important, but they are essential. There is alot you can do for little or no money to train firefighters. I was just saying that if money is the reason why they cannot do a live fire, then they need to approach the people in charge of the money and correct that. It may be that the chief feels its not necessary. That is the way the chief before me felt. We had at least 6 guys leave because they couldn't get the training they wanted/needed. I have changed that. Maybe Bret's department needs to change that too.

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Permalink Reply by Jack/dt on November 13, 2009 at 5:51pm

A Chief that thinks that training is NOT necessary? Holy crap! WTF was he doing as chief...oh wait...social club. I got it.

Michael...good to see that not everyone felt that way. Too many "departments" think that training is just too hard on the "members", they're more afraid of losing "members" than having actual firefighters.

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Permalink Reply by John Crabbe on November 13, 2009 at 6:20pm

I wasn't replying to you Michael, but addressing the OP wanting more "tranning". Just simply stating that there is still much that can be done and important things learned without setting the place on fire. There is always room for training, even if you can't do live fire. If you train on the basics enough it should become automatic.

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Permalink Reply by Captain703 on November 13, 2009 at 7:06pm

That's kinda the idea that my dept. has stuck with. It's too hard for us to aquire a live burn structure in our township so we practice the basics at the station. We set up a maze in bay and black out our masks. We use a smoke machine in a couple of rooms to train with the thermal imager. There is alot of stuff we can do without a burn but let's face it, a burn is the only way to even get remotely close to reality.

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