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OCTOBER 2008 VOLUME 161 NUMBER 10
67
77
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P.O. Box 1260 Tulsa, OK 74101 (918) 835-3161
2S POINTERS FOR YOUR ENGINE COMPANY JeffShltpe-This is a baseline for engine company operations ranging from prealarm considerations to posrincident analysis. HIGH-RISE ROPE RESCUES, INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA David Owells-An incident involving three workers dangling
on the outside of a downtown high-rise rests one department's knowedge, training, and perseverance.
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IMPROVING PRECONNECT FUNCTION AND OPERATION Bob Sbovald-The Coeur d'Alene (ID) Fire Department makes its 1 %-inch preconnects work harder and more efficiently.
91
FIREGROUND RECON: DEFINING AN OLD TERM Steven E. Standridge-Since the term has real-world implications on the firegrouod-not just at wildland fires-it is best to thoroughly understand the concept and use it properly.
97
HIGH-RISE FIREFIGHTING PERILS: VETERANS' PERSPECTIVES Jeff CrotlJ-A high-rise fire could be any firefighter's potential problem. Le.lrn the lessons from firefighters present at some of the most well-known high-rise fires in history.
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ENGINE COMPANY TIPS, P. 67
INDY ROPE RESCUES, P. 77
113
LEADERSHIP EXCELLENCE: BALANCING MANAGEMENT WITH LEADERSHIP Ronald E. Kanterman-Learn how to be a good leader and a good manager at the same time.
119
THE IN-LINE GAUGE IN STANDPIPE OPERATIONS Russ Chflpman-This tool for standpipe operations can help ensure crc\vs attack a fire with the proper flows.
121
ROLLOVER EXTRICATION: UPSIDE DOWN WITH NOWHERE TO GO R(~ndy Schm.itz-There are a number of patient and rescuer considerations when patients are t.rapped in this difficult upsidedown position.
125
POSITIONING AERIAL APPARATUS WHEN YOU'RE NOT FIRST DUE Nicholas A. Mttrtin-Positioning of the ladder company can be complicated by the location of engine apparatus, command vehides, police cars, haselines, and equipment.
129
DIVERSITY IN THE FIRE SERVICE: A PROBLEM OR A SOLUTION? John J. McNeil-The challenge for fire service leaders is to actively recruit new firefighters from a diverse candidate pool widlOut lowering job performance standards.
HIGH路RISE PERILS, Po' 97
ROLLOVER EXTRICATION, P. 121 '4 October 2008 FIRE ENGINEERING
High-Rise Firefighting Perils: Veterans' Perspectives BY JEFF CROW
A
HIGH-RISE FIRE CAN BE A MOST CHALLENGING event for a firefighter or fire department: Thousands of people could be in an enclosed stmcture from \.vhich there are very limited means of egress and in which the firc load is extremely h<."'aV)'. And. even though high-rise fires can be the most challenging and dangerous, they are among the least frequent types of fires to which we respond. 'nlis is as tme for firefighters who work in high-rise districts as for those who don't. Firefighters who work in suburban or rural areas may think, "'There's not a high-rise building anywhere in my response area." Are yOll slIre of that? \,(/hat exactly is a high-rise building? Departments and building codes define high-rise buildings differently. In general, a high-risc is any building tall enough so thal its top cannot be reached by your department's tallest aerial apparatus. That can be a bUilding as low as six or seven stories. Today, most communities have at least one six- or seven-story building in their area. And ,-"hether a fire is on the 70th floor of the Sears Tower in Chicago or rhe sevcnth floor of a hotel in a small town, firefighters face similar chal~ lenges. They have to rescue or shelter in place occupants who cannot escape through doors and windows, and they have to move firefighters and equipment up and down many floors to accomplish their tasks. And even if one-story ranch houses and reswurants arc all you have in your territol)', if a major fire were to break out in a high-rise building on the other side of town, YOllr company, and even companies from many miles away, may have to respond. You may have secn the photos of fire trucks running hot across the Brooklyn Bridge and mher outer~borough bridges into Manh,lttan on the morning of September] I, 2001. That obviollsly W:1S an extreme Situation, <md none of us hopes or e..xpects to respond to another 9/11, but the principle rem.tins the same. "The downtown companies aren't going to put our the fire," says Assistant Chief (Ret.) Bob Ramirez., Los Angeles County (CA) Fire Department". "You know who's going to put it out? The outlying companies." He explains: "At a major high~rise fire, the first-in crews aren't going to be anything more than pathfinders. They're going to set up the fire ... and they're going to be spent." Ramirez. may be the person most responsible for putting out one of the biggest high-rise fIres in U.S.
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(1) A helicopter searches for civilians trapped on the 50th floor at the First Interstate fire. (Photo courtesy of the U,S. Fire Admjn~ istration.)
history-the First Interstate fire in Los Angeles (LA). That fire consumed five floors of a downtown L<\ high-rise before Ramirez and his crews stopped the fire on the 16th Ooor; they nearly lost their lives in the process. On the fire floor, Ramirez. recalls, ';We were standing on a noor that was so hot that the pl:tstic carpet was melting at our feet. \'ie had no air. You couldn't stand lip. You couldn't kneel down. Your feet were slipping in the melting carpet." But they persevered and put out that massive fire. "The First Interstate fire," Ramirez says, "was literally a battle between Murphy's Law and firemen, and firemen won" (photo 1), The reason the high-rise district firefighters called to extinguish high-rise fires often do not put out the fire is that the greater alarm companies come in "fresh" and pick up the hose and put out the fire, Hamirez. explains. "I've seen it happen time after time after time," he adds. The point is that high-rise fires are not just the problem of a big city or downtown firefighters. They are eVe1)1 firefighter'S potentinl problem.
LEARNING FROM OTHERS' EXPERIENCE "[AI high-rise [fire] is probably dIe most difficult incident you'll ever have to deal with as a lire officer, and you can't really get good ,It it, because these fires are so rare," Chief
FIRE ENGINEERING October 2008 97
â&#x20AC;˘ HIGH-RISE PERILS (Her.) Jack Bennett, Ramirez' colleague in the LA County Fire
Deparlment, relates. Among many other incidents, Benncll was incident commander at the Fickett Towers fire at which 12 floors on one side of an elderly residential high-rise building were engulfed in flame. To the credit of the LA County
Fire Departmcnr. not one of the building's 300 residents was
killed. So if experience is the best rC:lcher, what do we do when we can't gel enough on-the-job experience 10 learn? We have 10 rely on rntining and, CO a large extent, "second-
hand" IC:lrning from others' experiences. Young firefighters learn by talking ro veterans about their past experiences of fighting fires when "tile fire was hotter and the water was wener." In the same way, ''o'e c;m learn about high-rise fires from the experiences of firefighrers who have fought major high-rise fires. I've interviewed firefighlers from around Ihe nation who responded to some of rhe most significant, intense high-rise fires. Following is a summary of rheir most important pomrsthe lessons [Q be learned from their "voices of experience."
BUILDING SYSTEMS Few firefighrers in the world probably have responded to, analyzed, and taught about as many high-rise fires as Depury Chief Vincent Dunn, who retired from the Fire Department of New York (FDI\TY) afrer 42 years of service. I Dunn says rhat high-rise firefighting is all about rhe building systems. What's the biggest difference between a high-rise fire and other types of fires? First of all, a high-rise is the only building where we're totally dependent on the systems in that building. Our firefighting fails if the elevators fail. Our firefighting fails if the communication system fails. Our firefighting fails if the water or standpipe system fails. Now, in a low-rise fire, we control all those systems. Your portable radio never fails. Your hose stretching never fails. Maybe you get a kink or a burst line, but you can always fix it. And your feet are your transportation system. (At a high-rise fire, on the other hand), you're totally dependent upon the systems of the building. And if the systems fail, we fail. John Norman, FDNY deputy assistant chief (rct), concurs: "For me, knowing the building, knowing the systems, know~ ing the way the systems were designed-I hat's the bonom line.,,2 Norman explains:
alaon syslems in these buildings activate, they turn out to be false alarms. "We go to those buildings all the time on false alamIs, smoke detector malfunctions-you name it," Bennett says. "You know. I guess it's just, again, we're back to the discipline dlat's involved." "'We calilhigh-rise districts] 'the electronic ghetto,' " Norman says, "where you're running automatic alarms all day." Repealed false alamls are a problem, because they make us run hot down city streets for no good reason, endangering firefighters and cirizens. They cause needless wear and tear on fire apparatus and keep apparatus out of service and UlUt";lilable to respond to real emergencies. But the biggest problem with frequent false alarms in high-rise buildings is that they C::ln lead to complacency on the part of the firefighlers who respond to them. This leads to a situation, says Assistant Chief Bruce Kolar of the Clark County (i\TV) Fire Department, where "guys don't want ro put on their rurnouts; they don't want to pur on their SCBA." Back in 1981, Kolar W;IS a young firefighter just starting his career among the newly constructed high-rise buildings of L'lS Vegas. Recalling his complacency in those days, he says, "'I remember thinking thar Vegas was a new town and we would never have the 'big one.' I never felt thai, being in a new town, I would ever get any kind of experience." He got plenty of experience that winter when, in the space of a couple of weeks, he responded to the MGM Grand fire, where 84 people died, and the fire in the Las Vegas Hilton, where there were eight fatalities. He cautions: "It's so easy 10 let your guard down, especially as a firefighter going to a new building. When lhe call came in for the MGM Grand, I distinctly remember thinking, 'It's a new building. What are you going to have there? (photo 2). There's nothing that's going to go on there.' Then, in a couple of minutes, you hear guys screaming on the radio, and the}' were in deep [troubleJ." Billy Sands, now a federal court judge in Georgia, was a captain in the jacksonville (Fl) Fire and Rescue Departmenl in 1994 ,,,,hen he responded to::1 fire at the Cathedral Towers high-rise building, which was home to some 250 senior cilizens. Heavy smoke and fire broke out on the 141h Ooor. Sands recalls, "It was one of these places thar you go to every
A big problem is the building. We have to rely on the building, and when the buildings fail us, we're in big trouble-whether it's First Interstate, where the fire pumps failed, or any of the other numerous high-rise fires where systems in the building have failed. That's when we make headlines, you know.
FALSE ALARMS AND COMPLACENCY Onen, the first and most frequent systems with which we internci in these buildings are those downtown fireflghlers h:lve come to hate-the alarm sysrems. Their purpose is to warn occupants and the fire department that a fire is in the building. The problem is rh~lt, more often than not, when the 98 October 2008 FIRE ENGINEERING
The MGM Grand fire. [Photo courtesy of the Clark County (NV) Fire Department; used with permission.]
(2)
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â&#x20AC;˘ HIGH-RISE PERILS week. YOli get" complacent. NQ[hing's
you'll learn in your career is thaI when-
going
ever you let your guard down, you're
10
happen, And this time, these
people were going crazy." Jacksonville
going ro gel smacked."
Fire and Rescue was able to save all of the Cathedral Towers' occupants; but, Sands warns, "Complacency is what will
"smacked" because of complacency? According
kill you,"
veteran of the Houston (TX) Fire Depart-
So how do we keep frolll gctling (Q
James i\'lockler, a 26-year
"You think rnew buildings) are not
menl, it all begins \vilh leadership by
going to burn," Kolar points aul. "And
ex:ll1lple. '"I find th'll they'll Imy mem-
it's hard for YOLI 10 have that mindsct
bers] do what I do. People do what the capl3in docs. 1 don't really explain myself. I just kind of do ,...hat 1 think is
that, hey, this could happen. But I'm telling you that probably the biggest (hing
necessary, .mel people follow me." Mockler, assigned to the downro\vn high-rise district, was on the department's heavy rescue squad in 2001 when it responded to a fire at the Four Leaf Towers high-rise apartment building. Mockler's crew was sen! upstairs to rescue the captain of the first~in fire attack team, ,\'ho had become disoriented. was running out of air, and called a Mayday. Mockler recalls hearing the captain saying, "Where's my backup engine?" and then, "\'('e're having trouble," before declaring a Mayday. "Eventually, we found him," Mockler says. "It was a big rugby serum. Some guys were running out of air. One of the guys knocked me over." After a desperate struggle that nearly cosl the lives of Mockler ,1I1d his crew, they succeeded in reaching the downed captain and removing him from the fire floor. Despite their heroic efforts, the captain did not survive. In j\'lockler's eyes, the crew will avoid complacency so long as their leader doesn't show complacency. "I think it's a leadership thing," he says. He asks, "When responding to calls for alarms sounding in hotels and apartment build~ jogs, do company officers put on their gear? I think there <Ire a Jot' of guys who don't put their equipment on," he offered. Mockler stresses that he doesn't intend to be <I victim of complacency: "I don't want to be on ale fire floor ,md have to come running out because I ,vent up without my gear or somedling," he exphlins. Mockler uses the frequent false alaml responses he makes in high-rises as opportunities to train his crews and teach them about the building. "We use all these aurommk alarms we make," he says, "as a fire drill for us. \X'e don't look to ,vrite up any tickets about excessive alarms. It's like :1 training session for us." When responding to automatic abnns, he adds, "We go 10 the fire control center; ,ve get ale firefighter's key, and then we proceed as if we had :In incident. And then I drill-yoll know, eadl guy gelS to filll the elevOltor <It different incidents." In this way, Mockler transforms a false alarm from an annoyance to a learning opportunity and trnnsforms the "electronic gheuo" into a training ground.
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HIGH-RISE PERILS • LOGISTICS If, as Ramirez says, the downtown companies-the first to arrive on the scene-often arc not the ones 'who will put out the fire, what should they be doing? The answer is: They're doing the most important part of high-rise firefighting-Iogis· tics. "You have to understand Ihat a high-rise fire is a logistics problem," Ramirez says (photo 3). Bennen puts it bluntly: "We had severnl ftres where we forgot logistics until we were tip to our necks in :llligators." \'{lllar is meanl by logistics? Roughly speaking, logistics is
everything except fire attack and rescue, including elevator find stairway management, resource pool setup, transport of personnel and equipment to a staging area, lobby control, and other activities. Although logistics may not be as exciting as fire attack or rescue, it is, by interviev·/ees' consensus, the most important part of higlH'ise firefighting. Logist.ics is the groundwork thaI must be laid before the fire attack :lod rescue c::1l1 be accomplished. Al a normal fire, like a house fire, most of the firefighters on-scene will be directly involved in the firefighting or rescue effort. At a high-rise fire, the opposite is true. A relatively small percentage of personnel \vi11 be engaged in firefighting and rescue operations, and a much larger percelltage will be involved in logistics. Ramirez cites the follmving rule of thumb: "Four firefighters for every firefighter on a hoseline is a good estimate." High-rise fire logistics is inherently personnel intensive. Ramirez says, "These bUildings will eat
~BUILD.IT...
(3) The equipment pool in the lobby at the First Interstate fire. (Photo courtesy of the u.s. Fire Administration.) resources like you've never seen before." Kolar recalls: The MGM [fire) just overwhelmed everybody. That casino was fully involved in less than a minute. In less than a minute, all the resources of your department are totally overwhelmed (photo 4). That [fire) was so overwhelming, to go from seven o'clock in the morning [when] you've no problem to 7:12 (when] you've 5,000 people you need to put someplace, and you've got a fire that you're dealing with ....
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• HIGH-RISE PERILS
(4) The MGM Grand Hotel fire overwhelmed everyone. The fire moved with unbelievable speed. (Photo courtesy of the Clark County (NV) Fire Department.] (5) Air bottles staged in the lobby at the First Interstate fire. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Fire Administration.)
To keep from being overwhelmed, Bennett says, "Assign
a logistics officer early in the resource game-maybe even before operations." "When yOll attack the fire, it has to be a sliscained attack. YOLI cannot SlOp to run down 20 nights of stairs 10 gCI another .Iif bottle or another length of hose," explains Hamirez. "The hose and air bottle have to be right there (pharo ;). OthCf wise, yOlI lose the fire." Haymond Orozco, commissioner of the Chicago (IL) Fire Department (CFD), was incident commander at thc 2004 high-risc firc at 135 S. La Salle Street, at which four floors of a heavily occupied office building were engulfed in names. "At a large fire in a high-rise building, deploy :Idditional resources to aboveground staging/support areas," he recommends. "This practice will reduce reflex time. If you lose the elevarors, those resources will then have to walk up from the lobby." At this incident, the cro was able to rescue all of the building's occupants. Coming as it did about a year after a disastrous high· rise fire in which six Chicago citizens were killed, the La Salle Street fire is considered the incident at which t.he CFD put into practice the lessons learned from the previous year's tragedy. At a high-rise fire, just like at any other fire, aggreSSive crews want to be aU:lcking the fire and performing rescue. Warns Ramirez, "Everybody wanlS to go squirt waler, but you can't do il. Your mOSt aggreSSive officers and crews may not want to be assigned to logistics, bur they should be." Ramirez related the following concerning a high-rise fire he commanded: w
Early in the game, I took my best battalion chief, who later became the number two man in the fire department. I told him, 'You're going to be logistics.' I could almost see his face drop (as if he were thinking], 'I was going to get a chance to fight fire and now I've got [this] job.' He may have been thinking that; but he said, 'Yes, sir,' and he set it up. 102 October 2008 FIRE ENGINEERING
CREW FATIGUE The logistical requirernellls of high·rise firefighting demand that people and equipment be moved up many floors be/ore lire attl"lck :mcl rescue c:m begin. For Ihal reason, one of the most important aspects of logistics is hovo' you manage and conserve the most valuable tool on the fireground: the fire· fighters. Bennen recommends this basic method for reducing crew fatigue at a high·rise fire. Set up a rotation of crews among three positions near the fire floor: (1) one group actively engaged in firefighting operations; (2) one group st.anding by, ready 1"0 move inl"O action; and (3) a group resting in staging after haVing just left active operations. So, he S,lyS, ;'You've got one comp:lny involved on the [fire] floor; one in the sl:airw<1Y ready to relieve the other company, to take over their hose· line or to get another line to back them up, as the case may be; and one down in sl<lging. Go through that rotation twice, and then relieve (the crews] with fresh crews that have nOI yet been in action. This way, you have three companies rmating. And that continues until you have three companies that are too tired and have to be rehabbed."
FIRE AnACK After a solid logistical foundalion has been established, fire attack can begin. It has to be decisive. Dunn says, "You can't switch from an offensive to a defenSive, outside ;Htack if your fire is above the reach of the hose streams. You know, your ability to do an exterior, defensive attack is taken away from you. In other words, 'You've only got one chance to put out" a high-rise nre: " For that reason, lIsing large-diameter hose and a solid stream nozzle is crucial. That is why, Orozco says, "The CFD prohibits the use of H~-inch hose and fog nozzles in high~ rise buildings." Relative to the successful attack at the La Salle Street fire, he says, HO n verification of the fire noor, rhe first www.FireEngineering.com
• HIGH-RISE PERILS two engine companies combined to lead our a 2'h-illch attack line with a smomh bore nozzle." Norman agrees: I;For FDNY, 2 lh-hosc with solid rip nozzle is mandatory." "You'd bener cover your back by having tbe largest diameter hose and hook up on the floor below the fire," cautions Dunn. When advancing the hoseJine, Bennett says it is important {Q check the ceiling space above your head. "What's happened to OUf guys," Bennett says, "is that they've advanced the hoselinc into the building about 15 to 20 feet, and guess what? The fire was behind them!" He recommends lIsing either the fire hose stre~ml or a pike pole to "knock those [ceilingl panels out ro make SlIre you don't have fire above yOll ,IS you advance down the hallway or into the fire."
When the fire floors become heavily involved, firefight· ers may not have to open windows for venrilation. Glass will breaJ{ of its own accord and rain down on the streets .lround the building. "'There was so much glass coming down at First Interstate," Bennetr says, "thal it trimmed all the trees on all four sides of the building." For this reason, he counsels: "Protect the inlet connections and the hoselines by using ladders and salvage covers. lay lines fire-to-hydrant. Place pumpers as far away as possible from dle building." By the time the glass starts falling, it will be too dangerous to send firefiglll'ers to the apparams t:o reposition them. Fire. apparatus should be parked a considerable distance frol11 the fire building as early as possible in the operal'ion.
VENTILATION
ELEVATOR USE
During the fire attack, Bennett says, "Smoke wiJI cnref stairways." He says that using blowers in tandem may ventilate lhose srairways with pos[iive pressure. D'wayne Ayers, a Jacksonville fIrefighter who was among the first to arrive at the Cathedral Towers fire, s.nv this method work effectively. At that fire, Ayers says, "We set the fans lip on the ground floor, blowing into the stairwells. \X'e opened the fircrighting stairwells to the fire floor, and it worked grear." As for the ventilation of the fire-involved areas, Bennett says, "You're not bashful about the windows. You take those babies out."
The IOpic of elevator use is controversial. The normal way of moving up and down in high-rise buildings, of course, is the elevator. In fact, the invention of the mo(lern safety elevator was one of the things that made high-rise buildings possible. These generally safe and reliable transport systems move thousands of people up and down the dizzying heights of high-rise buildings every day. However, the use of elevators during high-rise fires is a complex and contentious topic. When used correctly at a high-rise fire, elevators can be the key to getting personnel and equipment close to where they need to be to fight the fire and rescue occupants. When used
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â&#x20AC;˘ HIGH-RISE PERILS incorrectly, they can be a death trap_ "If yOll ask, 'how is the next firefighter going to die at a high-rise fire?'
n
Dunn
says. "you can say, 'If's going to be in an
elevator.' " Sometimes elc;vator lise is nor an option. At the First InlerSlale fire, Ramirez says, '"[The elevators) never worked. TIley were already slopped. There \-vas a dead guy in one of them." So he and his
crews had to climb up 16 flights of stairs to attack one of the biggest high-rise
in elevators. They haven't thought it ollt-the raci that fire gets in the elevathey don't. Dunn says, "You know, a lor shaft. The heat and the smoke are bucket of water can pur these elevators going to go to the top and are going to Ollt, blu I've seen freight clevators work affect the mechanism ._. trap people fin with water pouring down through them." the eJevator.I" There is a lot of disagreement on this When 1 told him that many dep:lrtsubjecl. namirez is adamant that elevaments, including mine, allow firc crcws tors Ihat serve the fire floor should uever to lake the elevator to five floors below be used at working high-rise fires. Many the fire, he didn't mince words. "Oh, fire departments, Ramirez says, "compro- you're cr:1ZY," he said. "You're oul of yOlll' mind." mise the firefIghter's safelY by jumping Bennett is just as adamant. "Do nor use elevators. Walk Ihe floors. Elevators can be life threatening. We lost a captain years ago in a multistory bUilding fire." However, most¡ with whom I talked saw elevator use :It a high-rise fire as a calculated risk. "We just do it (use the elevators!," says Norman, "-We do it \vilh caution. We take a lot of precautionary SlOpS. We try to make sure thai we're checking the sh:lft as we ascend ... knowing where Ihe staircases are on each floor as \ve travel up. But to us, it's JUSt a necessary evil." When told of Ramirez and Bennett's objections co elevator use, Dunn explained, '" think most of Amcrie:t uses elevators. Thai'S why they have fireman service." Offitan says, "I've walked 30 flights, 32 flighls of stairs, but in tall high-rises, it's just not pmcrical." Kolar agrees, "When you get a guy up 25 floors, what kind of shape is he going to be in?" 'The issue," Dunn says, "is not whether to use or nor use elev;Hors. The issue is how to use them." That me.1l1S taking precautions. Norman gives this advice when using elevators: fires in hisror)'. Sometimes elevators WOrki sometimes
Every five floors, you're supposed to get out and verify the location of the stairwell, because the staircases do change on different floors .... And check the shaft. Shine your light up the shaft. Look for water, smoke. Look for fire. If you have a hatch on the elevator, while you're traveling, open it and constantly keep an eye up that shaft. If you press '5' and it doesn't stop at 5, well then you should be pressing the emergency stop button. If that doesn't work, force the doors open to trip the interlock. Enter 1n
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HIGH-RISE PERILS • Others echoed the importance of the precaut.ionary SlOpS. "The Fire Investigation Team will check at five-floor inrervals 10 ensure that the elevator is sri II under fire department con· trol, as well as check for smoke and water," says Orozco. "The opCr3lOr of every elevalOr cal" musr have some type of forcible entry tool, an SCBA, a port:lble radio, and one extra air bonle," he adds. Dunn agrees, "\'1/hen yOll use ~ln elevator, you had better have a handheld radio in therc; yOll had bencr havc forcible entry rools to force your way alit; (and] you've gar 10 kcep resting your conLeols every fifth floor." Norman says that elevalors should be lIsed early if they are going to be used. "You have ro move your resources up close 10 the point of attack as early as you can, because you're go· ing to lose the elevators," he says. At a certain poinl in a high.rise fire-for inslance, when \\-'atcr or smoke enters the cleva tor shaft-elevators should no longer be used for moving people. But that doesn't mean that Ihey can't be used at all. David White, president of Fire and Safely Specialists, Inc., in College Station, Texas, a high-rise consulting firm, offers the follOWing suggestion: If we can't do anything else with the elevators, let's use them for freight. I'm going to fill that elevator up with air bottles, hose, generators, lights, whatever else I need; push a button; and send it to the 25th floor. I can get my men up there, eventually; but when I've got to carry air
bottles up there and a thousand feet of 21ft-inch hose, there's no way. So we can just use tile elevator as a freight truck.
In dlis way, \',;lhite says, we're addressing lhe most difficuh task in a high-rise incident-tal<ing care of logistics. In other words, when it becomes too risky ro put people in the cleva· tors, rake them Ollt of firefighter service, put them in regular mode, and use them to move equipment. Mockler has another idea he learned from hard experience: Use the map in the lobby thar directs occupants to stair\\o'clls for evacuation as an aid. When he and his crew members got lost and disoriented at the Four Leaf Towers fire, they pulled dlat map off the wall and used it to find the exit stairwell. "That made a profound impression on me," Mockler says. "One of the things to check is that map, or check for exits, to orient yourself." He says he mal,cs a point of lclling everyone that thc first thing yOll do when you get off the elevator is look at the map. ". teach it as a basic survival skill," he adds.
STAIRWELL MANAGEMENT Inevitably, when enough smoke and ' ....ater enter the shafts, the elevators will stop working. When that happens, the stairways become the prime means of moving up and down inside the building. At that point, managing the stairwells and their use by civilians and firefighters becomes crucial. It is important' to prevent occupants from trying to self-evacuate through smol,e- and heat-flUed stairwells, as happened
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Enter 179 at flreeng.hotlms.com FIRE ENGINEERING October 2008 107
• HIGH· RISE PERILS
(6) The Cathedral Towers fire. (Photos courtesy of Working Fire Training System; used with permission.) (7) Firefjghters rescue a resident from the Cathedral Towers fire. (8) A resident is given fresh air at the Cathedral Towers fire. at the Cook County Administration Building firc in Chicago in 2003, where six civilians were found dead in tJ1C 5Wirwclls. In the \\'ake of that tragedy, the CFO now deploys what it calls "rapid ascent te.lms" (RATS) 10 ascend each stairway :lbovc rhe fire floor to check for occupants and direct those in the ventilation/fire attack stairwell 10 move to another stairwell or
enter safe floors and shelter in place. At the laSalle Street fire, Orozco says, the RATS "deployed above the fire floor and directed civilians to the designated evacuation stainvell. n CFD policy requires th:tt the fire atmck stairwell be cleared of building occupants for a minimum of five Ooors above the fire Ooor before the atL1ck line is advanced onto the fire Ooor. Norman says if there are indications that people are COIlling down from above (the fire Ooor], you have t.o physically verify those spots so that no people are in tl1:]( staircase, and you have to withhold the attack until the ~Htack stair has been checked.
SHELTER IN PLACE YS. SELF·EVACUATION To minimize the risk to occupants in st'<lirwells, often the best' oprion is to have most of them shelter in place. According to Dunn, "A high-rise fire takes away ("wo import:lnt strategies from rhe fire incidenr cOlllmander. The first str:ltegy is rescue. You can't use ladders to rescue people. Your ability 10 use a ladder to get people out is taken away from you. Your ability to rescue people from the exterior and the ability to switch to an exterior/defensive ~tnack are the twO major differences of a high·rise firc. n For this reason, Dunn adds, '''111e strategy for high-risc residenri~l! bUildings is toral defense in plrlCC. Evcr)'bod)' srays in place." Hamirez agrees, "Shellering in place is a part of high.rise firefighting. It is really what it's :111 abom:' "At a high-rise residential building,n Dunn says, "YOll have to tell everybody: 'Slay in your apartment.' Every single :apanment is subdivided. You don't have central air systems. So the safest place for them 10 be is in their apartments."
108 October 2008 FIRE ENGINEERING
Norman notes that FDNY lries to educate building managers that there are other threats than lire. AI the MGM Grand, Kolar recalls, "Some people who stayed in their rooms fared a little better. The ones who wenl for Ihe stairwell didn't do so \vell.'" Arers says his experience at Cathedral Towers brought home the rationale behind sheltering in place at a residential high-rise nrc. "I'll tell you what [the Cathedral Towers fire) did for me," he says. "It gnve me a lot more respect for the building itself (photo 6). 1 came to appreciare the aClual st.ructure, how the building is designed 10 contain the fire." Some types of high-rise conslruction contain fire better than others. Dennett relates th<lt the center core and the cent.er hallway are the two main types of construction found in a high.rise building. Most residential high-rises are compartmcn· talized and have a hallway down the center of the floor. Thai'S why, he says, as a general nile, fire spreads less in a residcntial high-rise. Ramirez considers residential high-rises "a slam-dunk." Your biggesl problem there, he says, "is going [0 be external flame spread, hipping." On the other hand, according to Bennett, "With center core type, you're going to have more fire. If you have hallways with one·houf construction, you're not going to havc as much fire spread. {There's al big difference." www.FireEngineering.com
• HIGH-RISE PERILS A goal, nOles Ayers, is to teach occupants of a high-rise to realize that they can be safe in a burning building. TIle
problem, especially in a posl·9/11 world, is getling the public 10 understand this. Afrer watching rhe collapse of the ",:todd Trade Ccnter towers 011 9/11, civilians tend to overestimate the risk of building collapse during a high-rise fire, disregard firefighters' instructions, and risk their lives trying to self-evacuate when they should be sheltering in place. In facI, Orozco says, "The reality of the p05t-9/11 era is that yOll muSt be prepared to address the (:let th;lt most occupants will not sheller in place." In Florida, Dunn reports, the elderly sir in tJ1C smirs. "They can't even get down the stairs. They bailout of their buildings. They're dying in the hallways and stairways. And nobody knows what to do." H:tppily, that was not the CHse at the Cathedral Towers, at which Jacksonville fire crews were able to evacu<lfe all residents with no fatalities. 'nley did it b}' proper management of the stairwells. Jacksonville assigned a section officer in the lobby to control all of the sl'airwelJs and companies to go up those stairwells. "'If you tell people to go to the 47th floor and sheller in place," cautions Ramirez, "you'd better get firefight. ers lip there La calm them clown. We've clone it l and yOll can have near panic up therc." According to Lieutenant William Langley, who responded to the Cathedral 'Ibwers on the first·in unit, thaI's exactly what J:l<:ksonville did: As rough as this may sound, we were very firm with the occupants of the building. If they tried, if they wanted to go down the [wrong] stairwell-no matter what-we would not allow it (photos 7·8). We forced the flow of traffic. Once we controlled the flow of traffic headed in the right direction, it was like they almost forgot about that stairwell we were using for a fire attack stairwell. so to speak. We had people, firefighters-uniformed, dressed firefighters-at every floor level, actually blocking the exit and telling people, 'You cannot go this way. You must go that way.'
COMMUNICATION "For anyone of these dcfend-in-pbce strategies, yOll need t.hree things," Dunn S:lYs. "YOli need to be able to extinguish the fire. The building'S gor to be fIre resistive and confine the fire to tlmt noor without letting it spread. And people have got 10 pay al1cllIion 10 and comply \virh your insl'ru<.:Lions." Effective communication to the building occupants is crucial toO defend-in-place strategy. Norman says that the building's personnel should make public :lddress system announcements. "\'tle give them what we want them to tell them (oecu· pants), but they handle the s)'stem, make the announcements, because they alre:ldy beg:m th:lI before \ve arrived." Dunn asked the fire s~lfcty director [0 make an :announcement such :lS the follOWing: "The fire's on the 13th noor. Everybody on the 13th and 14th noors-the fIre noor and the noor above-evacuate. Everybody else stay in place." You must make sure th:lt those who evacuate lal<e rhe right stairwell. For that reason, Dunn recommends that the decision
110 October 2008 FIRE ENGINEERING
of which st:linvay will be used for fire arrack :lnd which one for evacuation be made early. There will always be some people who \vill not do what the firefighters tell them for whatever reason-they don't understand the directions or can't identify the correct sl:lirway, for example. "We really don't expect them all to listen," Norman S:lYs. Comlllunication among firefighters working in the building is as important as communicating with building occupams. However, communication among firefighters is onc of the toughest problems when fighting fires in high-rise buildings. And, it is serious! "If you're a chief officer and you don't have communication at a fire, you might as well go home," Dunn stresses. "All we do at fires is communicate. II's the name of our game." L,ngley underscores the communication difficulties. "The radio traffic, in my opinion, is eventually going to get a lot of people killed, because people cannot get through on that radio;' he explains. "'Everybody is trying to talk. It's the same problem that all major departments have.'" Dunn speaks for all high.rise firefighters when he says, "I want one mdio that works in high·rise buildings." As of yet, thar ideal nldio does nor exist. The 9/11 Commission criticized FDl\ry for not h:lving an effective <:ommunication system when responding to the World Tmde Center attacks. Although no one's found a perfecr solution 10 the problem, some progress has been made. Most notably, FDNY has developed what it calls the post (short for "'command post") radio-actually a powerful repeater to amplify and eXlend the range of weak handheld radio signals i.n the building. Norm:lI1 says that since 9/,11, FDNY deployed a number of new itcms and the post radio is probably the "biggesr item .... We've tested it in viffilally every commercial high-rise in the city :lnd have had real good luck," he reports. "\Vhercas before, you \,,"ere Iud."}' to penetralc cighr or nine floors, we're now routinely getting ro every noar, 100 stories," he explains. Norman, however, warns: "Radio communicarion is nor everything. One of the big things we do try to use is h:\rd-wired communications within the building, in the lobby command post :1rea. We have Ooor warden stations out on the floors. \'</e have phone systems in the Sl'airC;lse. They're redundant systems, separare sysrems." Orozco describes the redundant communication systems at rhe L.'1 Salle Streer fire: Radio traffic was very heavy. as can be expected. To deal with this. we utilized a tactical channel as well as a command channel. We also utilized the building's commu· "ication system as designated in our General Order. Chief officers utilized the fire phones located in the stairwells to communicate with the command post in the lobby. We also deployed the engineers of apparatus not committed to pump operations to serve as runners.
If we can't :llways h:1ve the perfect communication systems for use in high-rise buildings, we should at least be aware of what ro expect from the buildings in our area. W'e should use prefire planning and high·rise building inspections 1:0 find www.FireEngineering.com
HIGH-RISE. out to what extent our radios work in the buildings. What we really should be doing at every high-rise building is checking OUf radios," says Dunn. "We send a firefighter to the roof, and he should be able to communicate from dlC lobby to the roof and the lobby t.o the lower noor,"
Communication is the key-whether it's between firefighters on different levels of a high-rise or firefighters with different levels of experience. Because high-rise fires are rarc, high-rise firefighting experience is a rare and valuable commodity. Like any other commodity,
it must be traded and exchanged to be of use. Few of us will ever respond to enough
working high-rise fires 10 master all of the skills we need to deal with them successfully-whether it be controlling building systems, selling up logistiCS, handling stairwell evacuation and ventilation, or any other of the many special challenges of these fires. It's one thing to learn these skills from drills, books, or articles. It's quite another to have perfonned them under pressure. By listening to firefighters who have performed them, we can avoid their mistakes and emulate their successes. And when the time comes for us to roll up on a high-rise building showing heavy fire and smoke, we'JI be a little bit more confident, h:lving learned from those who faced the fire before tis.â&#x20AC;˘
Enter 180 at fireeng,hotlms,com
ENDNOTES 1. Vincent Dunn is me author of Safety and Survival on the Fireground(fire Engineering, 1992) and Strategy of Firefighting (Fire Engineering, 2(07).
2. John Norman is the author of the Fire Officer's Handbook of Tactics, Third Edition (Fire Engineering, 2(X)5). He served as search and rescue manager at the World Trade Center operations on 9/11.
â&#x20AC;˘ JEFF CROW is a 25-year veteran of the Houston (TX) Fire Department/ where he is a district chief responsible for the downtown highrIse fire district. He is a Texas state~ certified fire training instructor. www.FireEngineering.com
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