It’s 7:30. I’m drinking a hot cup of coffee and getting to know my new crewmembers as we complete the daily inventory. Being a newly appointed officer, all the anticipation and excitement of what may happen today mixes with the knowledge of what must happen today. As a crew, we check the boxes on the inventory as we perform an intensive check of what tools are on the truck and what condition they’re in. Check by check, tool by tool, one thing becomes glaringly aware: the look of newness on many items (airbags, torches, cribbing, etc.).
“Is all of this equipment new or has it just not been trained with and exercised?” I asked the dreaded question, hoping for the best but expecting the worst. The answer: “Cap didn’t like us to train with the tools very much because things always seemed to break or get lost.” As I mulled over the answer in my head, I kept coming back to one thing: If we don’t train with the tools on trucks and engines, how do we know their capabilities and, more importantly, their weaknesses?
What’s Inside the Box–& What Does It Do?
A fire truck is a giant rolling toolbox filled to the brim with some of the most basic and some of the most complex tools made for performing all types of vehicle extrication ops, including cutting and heavy lifting. It’s not only important to perform the daily inventory on your truck or engine and know what’s in your toolbox, but it’s paramount to know what your tools are capable of doing on the scene. Every tool has a function and is capable of many things. For example, do you know the answers to these questions?
- What’s the hook-up sequence for your high-pressure air bags?
- What’s the lifting capability in weight as well as the expanded height of each bag?
- What’s the open spread length of your spreaders?
- What’s the psi rating at the tips for spread and pull force?
- How far does your ram extend?
- What is push force vs. pull force?
- How much cribbing does your apparatus carry?
- How tall of a box crib can you build, and what is the rating in lbs.?
- What’s the rating of your bottle jack and, when it’s extended, what’s the length?
I could go on and on, but I’m sure you get the idea. The time to know the answers to these questions is NOT in the middle of a torrential downpour at 0300 HRS when we arrive on scene of a two-vehicle accident with three patients entrapped. This is go time–not the time to learn what our tools can’t handle.
Knowledge is power and power is confidence, and this all derives from training. We need to know how far our cutters open and how they react when cutting through an A-post on an Audi. We need to know that our Come-along was re-spooled correctly as well as its capabilities in a 1:1 vs. a 2:1 set-up. We need to know how to use our stabilization struts and what lengths they’re capable of reaching and weights they’re capable of stabilizing.
How do we know all of this? Because we pull the tools out on a regular basis for thorough exercise and training!
How Can We Master the Tools of Our Trade?
Structure and planning are integrated in the world of extrication. All good truck/engine/rescue companies have riding assignments, tool assignments and job descriptions that go hand in hand with those assignments. Further, it is paramount that each and every one of us knows these job descriptions, and is 100% capable of and confident in performing them. This confidence comes as a direct result of structured training using the tools inside our toolbox. It may help to establish a training schedule that pairs extrication topics with days of the week:
- Mondays: Train on air-bags, heavy lifting and cribbing techniques
- Wednesdays: Cover stabilization with struts, chocks and anchor points
- Fridays: Address SRS scanning, reviews of hybrid response and shut-down procedures
- Saturdays: Practice hands-on cutting at our local friendly “crusher.”
You get the idea.
I know you’re all thinking to yourselves, “Sounds great, but when do we train for firefighting, ladders, search and rescue, ventilation, EMS, continuing education, hazmat, high-angle rescue etc.?” A firefighter’s job is extremely difficult due to the fact that we must be proficient at a variety of things. Not many jobs require you to be a caring and compassionate makeshift structural engineer/rope rescuer/knot-tying expert/hazmat guru–who also possesses cooking skills–but our job does! I know that other training is a must, and days sometimes get away from us, but we are all capable and hopefully willing to do a little something every day. It doesn’t need to be a three-hour hands-on training every day. But try to set some time aside every shift and hold a 30-minute discussion on cutting techniques or airbag usage do’s and don’ts. It’s a huge benefit and will better us all. It’s the little things that add up to make the big differences on the incident scene. Let’s make this commitment to better ourselves daily through training and skill-building so we can become the firefighter who does make the difference. That difference could be to a family involved in a two-car accident at 0300 HRS!
Fulton’s Extrication Training Resources
Following are some resources that I use, enjoy and find helpful:
- Hybrids and Emergency First Responders: www.HybridCars.com
- Puyallup Extrication Student Handouts: www.thepxteam.org
- Vehicle Extrication: A Practical Guide, by Brian G. Anderson
- FireRescue magazine extrication articles: www.firefighternation.com/tags-page/extrication
