The company and command officer’s ability to accurately and effectively read the building establishes not only the direction of an incident but also its potential outcome. What can you access from this street view of this building, its occupancy risks and structural and collapse profile? What type of strategies and tactics would you employ upon […]

Don’t neglect to look at the little things when conducting a Building Size-up and assessment

A fire in a three story multiple family apartment building injured four City of Chicago (IL) firefighters when an interior stairway collapsed during firefighting operations. The building was constructed in 1927 and consisted of 5456 square feet of space with 3-5 apartment units. Built of masonry wall construction with a wood floor joist system, the […]

The Predictability of Building Performance must take into consideration that in the context of today’s fire ground, buildings and fire dynamics, small changes on initial compartment or structure conditions may often produce and result in large-scale or magnitude changes that affect the long term outcome of the incident. We have assumed that the routiness or […]

Know what to look at when Reading the Building? Looks can be deceiving.

Knowledge and proficiencies related to building construction are formulative to all strategic, tactical and task level assignments. Without understanding the building-occupancy relationships and integrating; construction, the compartment, occupancy risk, fire dynamics and fire behavior, fluid situational awareness and risk analysis, the art and science of aggressive and smart firefighting with well-informed incident command management, company […]

The New Rules of Combat Fire Engagement: How do You Measure  Your Effectiveness on the Fireground? What are Your Rules of Engagement Based upon? Are Your Operations SOP Driven? Are they Aggressive or Measured? What is Employed in your Size-up? How is Risk Assessed, Monitored, Adjusted? Do Company Officers Manage Tactical Objectives? Is Tactical Entertainment […]

It is mission critical to comprehend and understand your department’s operational capabilities and the necessary deployment demands for fire suppression, fire flow and phased operations at commercial building fires. Training Download Available.

There are numerous factors to be cognizant of at commerical building fires especially when it comes to identifying precursors and indicators for collapse. Got Fire? Anticipate Collapse!

Sizing up a structure for a fire attack is a skill that takes time, practice and experience to fully develop. In some cases, if the size-up is too rapid, critical points can be overlooked.The National Fire Fighter’s Near-Miss Reporting System’s Report of the Week (ROTW) has some insights.