Category Archives:

The Hyatt Regency Skywalk Collapse 1981; The Begining of Urban Heavy Rescue
July 17, 2011 | Architectural Design, building construction, Building Construction for the Fire Service, buildings, buildingsonfire.com, Christopher Naum, Codes, Collapse, command, construction, Engineered, failures, Fatalities | Christopher Naum | No Comments
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On July 17, 1981 a suspended walkway collapsed in The Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri, killing 114 people and injuring 216.

Shopping Center Explosion: Fluid Risk Assessment
March 18, 2010 | "pre-fire planning", "Situational Awareness" assessment, building construction, command, construction, explosion, failures, firefighting-operations, gas leak, Mayday, NIOSH, special-operations, Sprinklers, Systems and Assemblies, tactics, training | Christopher Naum | No Comments
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NIOSH recently released it’s report on the Penn-Mar Shopping Center Explosion that occured on May 7, 2008 in Prince George’s County, Maryland. Report Copy HERE. A number of mission critial lessons and insights can be gained regarding initial response, command management, operational safety, tactical deployment and effective situational awareness and dynamic risk assessment through an […]

Maintaining Situational Awareness
March 16, 2010 | "Situational Awareness" assessment, assemblies, building construction, Christopher Naum, Collapse, Combat Fire Engagement, command, construction, decision-making, Deployment, events, firefighting-operations, fires, History Repeating Event, LODD, major-incidents, NIOSH, occupancies, ordinary, risk-based assessment, Safety, strategies | Christopher Naum | No Comments
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Maintaining focused situational awareness while recognizing and processing a wide latitude of incoming information and observations at complex and multiple alarm incidents is a significant challenge to even the most experienced of incident command teams. However, things can go wrong and they can go wrong in a rapidly escalating manner with little time to recover. […]

Remembering Brackenridge 1991 Floor Collapse and LODD
December 21, 2009 | "firefighter safety", "pre-fire planning", "Situational Awareness" assessment, building construction, buildings, Collapse, command, command-leadership, fire behavior, fire suppression, firefighting-operations, History Repeating Event, line-of-duty, LODD, major-incidents, occupancies, Remembrance, Reports, risk-based assessment, tactics, Trapped, volunteer | Christopher Naum | 1 Comment
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Remembering Brackenridge, Pennsylvania December 20, 1991: Four Firefighters Killed, Trapped by Floor Collapse Four volunteer firefighters died when they were trapped by a partial floor collapse during a structure fire in Brackenridge, Pennsylvania, on the morning of December 20, 1991. All four were members of a mutual aid truck company that had responded to the […]