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LFBs Grenfell Criticism by Channel 4 Tonight


Messyshaw

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Dispatches are due to bash the LFB during a documentary tonight.

Social media is alive with angry speculation. The trailers do make the film look a bit tabloid

Let's see....

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Well that was disgusting👍🏼 I do love how it was 30 minutes long: 28 minutes spent on slating LFB, 2 minutes spent on talking about the cladding.

Dany Cotton’s comment about landing a spaceship on the Shard did make me chuckle however.

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5 hours ago, Messyshaw said:

The trailers do make the film look a bit tabloid

Thought that when I saw the trailer last week and like Jamie, I didn't watch the programme live, but recorded it. Having now watched it, the football was the better choice. Quite clear the makers had an agenda. A very poor programme which won't help anyone or get near the truth.

To add to the "tabloid" feel, at the end after the normal if you've been affected by this... the announcer hardly broke breathe, before giving details of the next shock show about 100 vaginas.😲

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I was shocked how savage the show was and clearly designed as an attack on us.  It was also far to personal about the initial OIC. 

There was no depth or intelligence there, just a quick 30 minute smash in all of our balls, with far too much opinion rather than fact.  

Stay put is a government led thing, and evacuation plans for residents are the responsibility of the landlord. 

FRS don’t own stay put 🤷🏽‍♂️

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Everyone's vision and thoughts are clear with hindsight. Not a chance anyone who attended that night wanted to do anything other than their best. In fact I remember watching it thinking when I wake up they will be talking about dead firefighters. We all on here know exactly what those incredibly brave and professional FFs must have gone through and continue to go through after this incident. 

The focus on the initial IC was disgusting and I believe he was in charge for way longer than he should have been, although I completely understand the dynamics of an incident like that. Yes there are things to learn for all of the UK Fire Service after an incident like this, as there are in a lot of other incidents. I have a terrible feeling the LFB are gonna get hung out to dry over this incident and just pray the guys and gals who gave so much at this fire don't start to believe they are in some way to blame for the outcome

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I noticed them reference that an “expert” had said it would be possible to evacuate the block in 7 minutes. That is a fundamentally flawed assertion with no context behind it. 

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@BurtMacklin mass evacuation of a tower block with one staircase, in the dark and smoke? It would be a Hillsborough Disaster v2 on the staircase! As well as the fact it would hinder all firefighting operations from the bridgehead upward on the inside?

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exactly, even if the residents regularly practiced evacuation drills. and there was a central means to signal an evacuation it would still have been a disaster. 

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15 hours ago, Keith said:

... the announcer hardly broke breathe, before giving details of the next shock show about 100 vaginas.😲

Sounds like an interesting show. Who would have known that Channel 4 had that many Directors on the Board?😉

  • Haha 1
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I honestly think that by the time an evacuation could have been called, if it had been implemented, more people would have died. And LFB would have been hung out to dry for disregarding national policy. Cant win either way. Lazy journalism with no grasp of reality.

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To be honest, I do think the LFB could have changed their stay put advice earlier than they did - But I am typing this from the comfort of my own home and after 20 months of reading and watching and hearing tens of thousands of words and images of the job. Hindsight is a wonderful thing! 

The actions that night were based on what should have happened and not what was actually happening for a while. Nobody on earth would or could have predicted the way the fire penetrated the homes. OK, there have been cladding fires that have spread dramatically externally, but I have never seen one that has entered the building like that. Many just consume the cladding and effectively burn out, but not this one. I passed by on my way to work at 6am and saw fire in every flat on the entire west face (above the 4th). It was literally unbelievable.

The attachment may help why it spread like it did, but of course the Public Inquiry is best placed to determine the true facts. The image shows a proposal drawing that the Grenfell refurbishment developers submitted to the local authority (I have added the labels and colour for clarity). I cannot confirm if this is the 'as built' drawing, but you can see if it was installed like this, the combustible insulation (in yellow) tucks under the PVC window and window board. The combustible cladding is actually inside the flat with only the thin combustible window board being the only separation .

As incident manager, would you have considered that as a likely route of fire spread at 1am when standing outside, attempting to devise an action plan as the fire runs away from you? I bloody know I wouldn't have.

This drawing is  open source material available to the public, which the media has already published. If the Dispatches journalists had put a bit of effort in, they would have found this too and added it to their cockumentary. Maybe they did see it, but decided it might add balance and proportionality to their tabloid film

So yes, the LFB did make mistakes. Dany Cotton should have acknowledged that mistakes were made and the LFB (as always) will strive to learn from them. He "I wouldn't change anything" quote was naive from a Commissioner. However, I applaud her actions on the night. Plus I still maintain the crews on the scene on the night and those that followed on reliefs, the managers (soon officers!) that had to make decisions on the hoof, and the ConOffs who had to listen to people die did absolutely magnificently. 

What a shame the Channel 4 journalists couldn't have acted as professionally :(

Grenfell Insulation.jpeg

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We as a national group of firefighters and a national union cannot allow LFB to be hung out to dry over this. 

We must stand shoulder to shoulder with the initial OIC and every single member who attended that awful night. 

I will be. 

  • Like 8
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