Archives Article 6
Commercial News
March 28, 2008
Firefighters sharpen skills
Lessons learned in
drill put into action
BY BRIAN L.
HUCHEL
DANVILLE — Firefighter
drills this week focused on more than
just saving the lives of fire victims.
With smoke filling the department’s
training tower, Danville firefighters
were prepped Tuesday on how to find and
rescue one of their own who is trapped
in a fire.
The training almost became a reality a
day later when calls of “mayday” rang
out from the scene of Wednesday’s large
downtown fire.
No one was trapped, and the mayday came
as a result of a quick flare-up in the
fire, which drove firefighters outside.
But the mayday call is usually the first
sign that the department’s Rapid
Intervention Team should prepare to go
in.
“Their job is risk management,” said
Capt. Larry Jaggers, who was conducting
the training this week. “If a mayday
would happen to go out, it’s their job
to go in and rescue that firefighter.”
Jaggers said the Danville Fire
Department has used the team for almost
a year and a half. Many area volunteer
and paid departments are using the same
setup.
A firefighter will resort to calling out
mayday for a number of reasons, ranging
from becoming disoriented, trapped or
running low on air, Jaggers said.
It was a situation on the second floor
of the downtown building that prompted
the mayday. Firefighters, feeling the
heat and encountering difficult
situation, sent out the call to make
sure they could get out.
Jaggers said the intervention team was
ready to go in.
“You get into a fire of that magnitude,
you don’t know what can happen,” he
said.
During training this week, members of
the intervention team were forced to
check two floors of smoke-filled
training tower in order to locate the
stranded firefighter. The team listens
for alarms the firefighters wear and
uses a thermal imaging camera to search
areas for the firefighter.
The team members training on Tuesday
said they take the drills seriously.
“It’s always good to do this kind of
training,” firefighter Billy Ryan said.
“We’re ready for the real thing.”
Team members moved quickly through the
tower on Tuesday, finding their stranded
firefighter huddled in a corner on the
third floor of the training structure. A
breathing system was hooked up to the
firefighter and he was led out.
With the number of new responsibilities
the fire department now has, Jaggers
said it’s important to remember the
basics of their work.
“It’s out there now that we’ve got the
haz mat tech teams, the techno rescue
teams, but you know what? Where’s our
basic firefighting skills?” Jaggers
said. “We do all these extra things
since 9/11, now we’ve got to go back and
work on our basics as firefighters.
“You need to stay sharp as
firefighters.”
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