Firefighter's Dilemma

[Keith]

The FBU have produced a powerful film to highlight the issue of increased attendance times and the difficulties this creates for crews.

See Firefighter's Dilemma

In a similar situation what would you do?

[Dyson]

in answer to your question, 100,000,000000 % would of committed immediately on arrival 

[Jet]

I've seen this film already and I think all it's achieved so far is infuriated firefighters and highlighted to the public how risk averse we are, rather than the intended message. Very poorly executed in my humble opinion.

I think a better message would be the same situation with the CM deciding to commit straight away with a successful rescue then seeing her being hung out to dry by management for doing the 'right thing' and that should be the dilemma that's highlighted. 

And to answer original question it goes without saying we'd be going in straight away in that exact situation. 

In hindsight, maybe my suggestion doesn't really get the attendance time message across. Still, I don't think we should be advertising ourselves as being the sort that won't take reasonable risks to save lives. That is the fire service ethos after all. 

[TandA]

Agree with above, commit on arrival.  I have never had a second machine to play with straight off anyway so it's not really a new dilemma for me.

[Carl]

The philosophy of the fire services approach to risk assessment (and this is taken directly from the Fire Service Manual Volume 2 (Fire Service Operations) Incident Command) is:-

• Fire fighters will take some risk to save saveable life
• Fire fighters will take little risk to save saveable property
• Firefighters will not take any risk at all to try to save lives or property that are already lost

So for me, I agree with the above and would commit. Our CFO introduced a while back and made it loud and clear that if officers wanted to step outside of a SOP, then as long as the message was sent that you were doing so he would back you all the way. We often do this and send the message "Crews now stepping outside of SOP" and once we have done what we needed to do we send " Crews now working back inline with SOP". Ive never been questioned yet.

This came out of the crews not committing down a well due to restrictions. Think it was a Scottish FRS.?

[Steve]

I saw the film and died a little.....

Cutting off your foot for an ingrowing toe nail comes to mind. I despair.

[Cardiff_Fire]

Agree wholeheartedly with Jamiejet. Makes us look risk averse. As you say, presenting it as a successful rescue "despite all the odds" would have played better in my opinion.

[Messyshaw]

Sadly, not such a far fetched piece of drama. 

I know that similar weak decisions have been made in recent times in  London

Then of course the scottish shout where crews were not permitted to rescue a lady who had fallen down a shaft/mine

I am reassured that the replies here have been full of common sense  

Re the film, who is going to see it? And how do the FBU see it reducing cuts?

[Noddy]

Agree with everything said.  

[Dyson]

Jamie, one part of what you said niggled me a bit  

Highlighting to the public how risk averse we are?

We are not, i am not, I'm fairly sure from what i see of you here, that you are not.

Not only would i of acted swiftly, and have done so in the last week or so in a similar situation to this, deploying under rapid deployment with 4 riders, one pump in attendance, making 2 rescues. The CFO contacted me personally the next morning to inform me i did the right thing and that he was pleased with that.

I also think, that in my Service, if i performed as a commander as the video shows, i would be relieved of my command fairly quickly. In addition to this my position would be untenable as the troops would have zero confidence, therefor i would have zero credibility.

[Jet]

Sorry Dyson, what I wrote obviously came off with the wrong impression. I guess what I meant was it showed us as risk averse when normally and particularly in live threatening situations such as in the film, we are in fact not afraid to take risks at all. I think 'highlighted' was the wrong word to use!

[OscarTango]

This made me think of that mine incident as Messey mentioned. Plus Walpole lake where crews waited and a man drowned in a foot of water and the Daily Mail had a field day. Its a tricky balance to express to the public why cuts and response times matter while at the same time not portraying us lacking initiative and being excessively risk averse due to procedure.

Here we have Ops Discretion where we can step slightly outside of procedure if we can clearly make an intervention to save life or stop an escalation of an incident. It's put back on an informative that ops discretion is in use. The chief has openly said if crews find themselves having to make those sorts of decisions they will be fully supported.

Im not ICS but I can be pretty sure my OIC would have take the same actions as others above have said.

[Firestorm]

On 6/3/2017 at 22:00, Steve said:

I saw the film and died a little.....

Just a little?

Sweet jesus, what was all that about? A fcuk all fire that's dealt with dozens of times a day across the nation.

If the FBU wants to make a point, surely we can make it in other ways?

I have, and will continue to, committed crews to worse than that.

[Hmckay91]

It's obvious the FBU produced that video from an official fire service insider perspective, and in doing so has alienated the front line firefighters (as its not reality) and totally went over the head of the target public audience.      

We had this Fire Prevention Initiative a few years ago called the "3 Minute Drill" which may have even been "borrowed" from the UK, it still sends a powerful message...

[Cashybai]

I can only echo everything that everyone has already said. Personally I think the FBU have totally dropped the ball with this one, and I can't fathom who advised them that we'd do as portrayed?

[Old Legend]

On 03/06/2017 at 21:48, Carl said:

The philosophy of the fire services approach to risk assessment (and this is taken directly from the Fire Service Manual Volume 2 (Fire Service Operations) Incident Command) is:-

• Fire fighters will take some risk to save saveable life
• Fire fighters will take little risk to save saveable property
• Firefighters will not take any risk at all to try to save lives or property that are already lost

So for me, I agree with the above and would commit. Our CFO introduced a while back and made it loud and clear that if officers wanted to step outside of a SOP, then as long as the message was sent that you were doing so he would back you all the way. We often do this and send the message "Crews now stepping outside of SOP" and once we have done what we needed to do we send " Crews now working back inline with SOP". Ive never been questioned yet.

This came out of the crews not committing down a well due to restrictions. Think it was a Scottish FRS.?

Carl, I'm a newbie to the forums and as you can see I've come to this conversation a little late.  But the firefighters maxim in Volume 2 has been superseded by the one in NOG:

"… the greater the potential benefit of fire and rescue actions, the greater the risk that is accepted by commanders and firefighters. Activities that present a high risk to safety are limited to those that have the potential to save life or to prevent rapid and significant escalation of the incident."

I find it strange that it puts risk accepted by commanders before that of firefighters, I hold the view that firefighters, often unsupervised, are the people who take the real risks and make some of the most critical decisions after an IC has taken the risk to commit. I'm sure the FBU would have been 'in the loop' when it was agreed and quite clearly it contradicts the message of their video.

[Supernova9]

I'm not sure I agree with you there OL, NICS and Incident Command in general involves commanders providing briefings to crews, which should provide them with the risk envelope to work in. Given that the incident commander is legally responsible as the person who makes the risk assessment for the entire incident, their decision is not just 'commit or not', but exactly what they're looking for crews to achieve, and what actions would represent unacceptable levels of risk.

Also, can crews be fully aware of the risks involved when they're inside a structure unable to see the full extent of the incident?

[Old Legend]

Hi SuperN, isn't there a chicken and egg thing going on here?

The IC commits on what is known at the time using the as yet incomplete situation awareness (SA).  That knowledge along with their level of expertise is what firefighters take into an as yet unexplored environment.  It is they who are likely to first encounter the unknown's of that unexplored environment and have additions for an IC's SA.  It may also be the case that they have instantaneous decisions to make based on the risks they encounter, risks the IC or any member of his/her command team are unsighted on.  But we must also remember that as you indicate SA is a moving feast and I would defy anybody to be able to tick the 'complete SA' box. 

[Cashybai]

OL its a two sided sword. Yes, the crews inside the environment may well encounter the first unknowns, but equally the OiC outside might well see the first changes to SA (Grenfell) . Its a situation that all inputs from all sources can and should have equal importance.

[Carl]

On 06/08/2017 at 13:34, Old Legend said:

Carl, I'm a newbie to the forums and as you can see I've come to this conversation a little late.  But the firefighters maxim in Volume 2 has been superseded by the one in NOG:

It has indeed. For our subscribing members the NOG Foundation for Incident Command can be downloaded from with our very own downloads section.