No...I'm not talking about that fire triangle we all learned in basic training. I'm talking about those key aspects related to fire behavior such as Flashover and Backdraft. Firefighters are still being severely injured or killed by Flashover at a rate like unseen before. Please take the time to review the Reading Smoke video posted on 2/19. Today's fires are much different than in years past, as a result fire behavior has changed dramatically also. If your department is like mine, the idea of sitting down to drill and review fire behavior is not at the top of the list, but it has to be. According to NIOSH, lack of understanding of today's modern fire behavior is a leading cause to firefighter injury or death.
The Underwriters Laboratories conducted a comparison burn test to show how much faster structures with modern furnishings reach Flashover potential at a rate much faster than years ago. The room to the right is a test room of furnishings of modern day synthetics, plastics, nylon materials. The room on the left is a room made up of furnishings of natural fibers such as wool and cotton. Watch how much faster the room of modern day furnishings reaches Flashover. With today's light weight construction, faster growing hotter fires, now you can see how firefighters are getting caught off guard. As firefighters we must size-up our structures better by reading the smoke, better understand building construction,recognize the signs of an impending Flashover and not put ourselves in those compromised positions. As firefighters, you must know what the fire is going to do to the building and what the building is going to do to the fire.
BE PREPARED, KNOW THE WARNING SIGNS !!
DONT LET THIS BE YOU !!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment