“Engine 5 on scene of a two-story wood-frame residence; nothing showing.”
There has been a lot of talk lately about the use of the term “nothing showing” and whether a first-arriving unit should use this term to describe the conditions they see. Fueling this discussion is research into fire behavior and smoke travel conducted by UL and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), which indicates observations from the street may not accurately capture the severity of the incident. As a result of this research, several well-respected authorities on fireground operations have recommended a move away from this term. There is even talk by the IAFC and the International Society of Fire Service Instructors (ISFSI) to remove the term “nothing showing” from the vocabulary of the American fire service.
All of these people and groups make compelling arguments against using “nothing showing.” As is often the case, however, there are two sides to the discussion.
Taking a blanket approach to new concepts in the fire service is not necessarily in the best interest of your organization or your firefighters. Well-run departments will take new concepts and view them in light of how they relate to the department’s SOPs. This is a lot of fancy talk for saying that before you abandon the phrase “nothing showing,” you need to examine how your department responds to a report of a fire. If your fire department bases its response on the premise that when they’re dispatched to a fire, there is a fire until they determine otherwise, then they will be successful no matter what someone says on the radio. The key element is that an investigation must be conducted to determine whether there’s a fire. The report of “nothing showing” is just a snapshot in time.
Dressing Down?
One argument against the use of the term “nothing showing” is that it will lead companies to become lax and do things like dressing down and doffing their SCBA. I have one word for those who believe this: supervision. If your officers don’t permit such behavior, it will not happen.
An incident from when I was a battalion chief makes this point. We caught an automatic alarm at a high-rise apartment building. The first engine and I arrived together and I transmitted a “nothing showing” report. The engine crew came off the rig ready for war and went into the building to investigate. I saw the ladder company turning into the parking lot and noticed one of the firefighters riding in the jump seat area with his arm hanging out of the window. I could tell that he wasn’t even wearing his bunker coat, much less his SCBA. This company didn’t need to hear “nothing showing” to dial it back.
Suffice it to say, that company left the scene knowing that I wouldn’t tolerate such behavior. Maybe they didn’t like hearing that; maybe they thought it was over the top, but they got the message. I can only remember this happening one time in the nine years I spent as a shift commander. Supervision–and courage to supervise–is what is needed to solve these situations, not a change in radio terminology.
So how do you help supervisors maintain that battle-ready focus? The most important thing is to impart is that the first-arriving officer must determine what made a person call to report a fire. Until that is done, responding forces must maintain their battle focus. This sounds simple and to be honest it is. Unless there are conditions evident from the street, you cannot determine what really made the reporting party call 9-1-1.
There is no shortage of tribal knowledge among company and chief officers about how a “nothing showing” report turned out to be a snot-slinging all-out firefight. When an officer trains their people to understand this, the crew will quickly learn not to assume that “nothing showing” means nothing is happening.
Another good strategy: Teach crews to view their responses as a continuum, lasting from dispatch through the safe return to quarters. Going back to my original statement, “nothing showing” is not the end of a response; it’s just a moment in time on that continuum. With this mindset, officers will find it very easy to keep their people focused. Once the determination is made as to why the party called 9-1-1, you can then move on to the next phases of the response, be it taking action or returning to quarters.
Slowing Down
So does this mean that a fire department should fly down the street with a dozen companies to every run regardless of what the first-due unit reports? Of course not. The fire service must be smart about how we do business. Research tells us that our turnout times are the key to making timely responses. Once we get out of the firehouse, we’re basically going to get there when we get there.
This is why it makes sense to use a “nothing showing” report as a cue to discontinue an emergency response by units not on the scene. If an officer subsequently determines that there really is a fire, then a simple report of “place the companies back on emergency speed” will get the remaining units to the scene about as fast as if they had continued at emergency speed. The key is to maintain your forward progress in a battle-ready posture regardless of what the initial arrival report was.
Now, I’m sure that some of you have unique or different circumstances within your response areas. When dealing with high-rise buildings or large commercial occupancies, fire chiefs might want to avoid the use of the term “nothing showing” and adopt alternative terminology. It could take 10 minutes at some of these properties to put a set of eyes on the problem that generated the 9-1-1 call. If you’re dealing with these types of situations, then your context is different and as such, you should put mechanisms in place that fit your needs. As I said in the beginning, the one-size-fits-all approach normally does not yield good results. Regardless, no matter what your response area is, I believe that the “snapshot in time” approach along with strong active supervision can pay dividends.
Rethinking Tactics
The discussion around “nothing showing” is a good opportunity to consider whether it’s time to rethink your department’s tactical operations. Maybe you can use this change in terminology as starting point for modifications in your SOPs. Maybe it’s time to go out and repaint the fence, and abandoning the use of “nothing showing” will be that little nudge your organization needs to get the ball rolling.
You are the best judge of where your department is and what you need to do. The point of this article is not to disagree with a lot of very smart people who make some logical points; it is to say that fire service leaders should be looking at everything with a critical eye and determining what is best for their organizations, based on the specific context in which we operate.
