The Firehouse

My condolences go to the families and friends of the four firefighters who died today while fighting a wildfire that started the evening of June 20th. It seems that they were placed upwind from the fire line, when the strong winds that were blowing at the time suddenly changed direction, and overran the team. Two more firefighters are injured with second-degree burns. Strong winds have prevented attack helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft from operating. The fire is as of today still uncontrolled.

This is a short video showing the controlled burns we did last May, to dispose of several tons of fallen tree mass that had been left over after the strong winds earlier this year. They were gathered in an abandoned quarry and burned over the course of a week. Best watched in HQ!

Towards last year’s end, our fire department acquired a Will-Burt TAC Stick, which is in essence an AC current detector. It measures the alternating magnetic field caused by AC power lines, and provides an audible and visual feedback when it detects current. The beeping and flashing rate increase proportionally to the detected current and inverse proportionally to distance – thus, you can very accurately determine if one particular cable in a multi-conductor layout is live. The stick proved its worth during the January high winds which brought down dozens of power lines, from 220V residential lines to 110kV supply lines. These lines feature automatic re-arming of fail-safe circuits, which attempt to energize the line up to three times after a short-circuit has been detected at the nearest upstream switch. Thus, it is very important to stay vigilant when operating around such lines. The TAC Stick can warn firefighters when a line is re-energized, without having to rely on utility personnel.

Another scenario worth considering is industrial or residential fires, where the stick can determine if particular power lines are energized before applying supression. I recommend you watch the video in HQ to see the text annotations better:

This is a video of our fire department’s work during and after a period of severe wind storms we had at the end of January – enjoy!

Have to buy an airhorn for your truck or engine? Look no further than Air Horns Of Texas. We have purchased a twin 1510 kit from them, and the service has been excellent. Prompt responses, fast shipping, and they even upgraded the compressor to a 2 gallon tank as we were going to use twin horns. The install guide could be a bit more “modern”, but is sufficient for anyone with even minimal experience in fitting electrical & air systems. This is how our truck sounds now [mp3].

After Ladder the roof, another firefighting humor blog closed its doors, a new one appears – Ladder and Halligan. It takes a look at firefighting from the satirical side, while bringing home subjects that are sadly very true, such as inexperienced fire chiefs promoted out of politics. I hope the blog lives long and prosper, good luck guys!

We had a curious situation the other night. A driver left home and drove down some dirt tracks, following (the obviously wrong) directions his GPS navigator game him. Like I reported some time ago, these navigators sometimes include even horse trails as valid roads, and will try to take you down them if you’re not cautious.

Local Police Department received the call at 8pm, informing the driver was stuck in mud in an unknown location. He could see a railroad track which provided a first clue as to his whereabouts. Three units were dispatched to assist the officers searching for him. A while later, the control room talked with the driver directly, and he gave a set of coordinates that he managed to pull from his GPS navigator. We checked these but turned out to correspond to the point of departure (his home). The driver was found shortly after, before we could call him again and try to instruct him on how to get his actual coordinates from the GPS.

The main lesson learned from this: we are going to try and write a compendium of the steps needed to read the latitude and longitude from the most sold brands of GPS navigators. Looking back at some calls involving lost drivers or RTAs with undetermined location, such advice over the phone would have proven invaluable. I would recommend you study this protocol for your own departments, as one day you could find yourself in the situation where life depends on quickly finding a vehicle equipped with a GPS navigator.

It seems that they are already legally bankrup, but the Madrid-based Mobuzz has sent out a cry for help, in the form of a request for people’s donations. They need to raise 120.000€ to keep going, and seem to have already raised 20.000.

To be forthcoming, I’m not going to donate. Being a volunteer firefighter in a severely understaffed and underfunded municipal department, where the council tells us they cannot afford 12.000€ for a set of four air packs (SCBA) as a result of the crisis, makes me put Mobuzz’s call for help under a different light. The SCBA sets (pictured below) would allow us to safely enter burning structures and actually save lifes. We find that at times, we cannot intervene, and have to wait until nearby departments respond, which can take 20-30 minutes. So far we haven’t had to lament fatalities due to this shortcoming, in part due to luck, and in part due to our crews taking (otherwise unnecessary) risks.

We are offering an infinitely higher ROI with a 10th of what Mobuzz needs to survive. There have been plenty of comments, some in favor, most against, in the blogs of Martin Varsavsky, Enrique Dans, and even TechCrunch. Essentially, many people would rather give to a charitable cause, than to keeping the lifestyle, company perks, and jobs of an internet startup.

I feel Mobuzz’s pain, almost every startup is in a very similar situation, facing deep cost cuts and layoffs to try to survive, or facing certain death already. Before considering a donation, I would make these questions:

• My donation will go towards keeping your site alive, your jobs, but what are you going to do about your style? Are you going to lay people off, run on a shoestring budget, cut the number of shows, move to smaller and cheaper offices, sell your expensive editing equipment and go back to handheld cameras, which for web video work just as well? Basically, I need to know your plan on how you intend to make my donation count.
• What happens after and if you raise the money? Are we just prolonging your agony? When the 120.000 run out, and you face the same situation again a few weeks or months down the line, do we need to donate again?
• If you do make it and raise new funding, or eventually turn a profit, will you publicly commit to returning the donations, or even better, donating the 120.000€ to a charitable cause?

One final doubt – some sources quote 2 million visits per month, yet both Alexa and Compete seem to disagree – this is a chart comparing it to elmundo.es, one of the most read online newspapers in Spain, and a source of some of the buzz:

Where’s the traffic?

Never forget. On a day like this seven years ago 343 brave firefighters gave their lives to save thousands. Here is a link to the FDNY tribute.

We were given a demo of the Pro/Pak portable foam generator by the sales rep, who came by our firehouse a couple of weeks ago. There is a serious intent on purchasing one of these, as it would help us off-load the pumper by 400 liters of foaming agent that we carry on top of the 2600 liters of water. One of these portable packs can deliver up to 10.000 liters of foamed mix for every 10 liters of agent! In reality, you would use medium expansion at 0.3% to 0.6%, which still provides a few thousand liters of foam. The unit is a bit heavy on the shoulder, but adequate for moderate work, such as car or garbage fires, or K type fires that are not involving other parts of the compartment or structure.

As you can see in the videos and photos, the unit is a self-contained shoulder-carried case, with three snap-on nozzles for different attack modes. One provides high-pressure, low-volume foam for long reach, the second provides also low-volume but higher concentration of foam in the stream, and the largest nozzle gives a good flow of medium-expansion, higher volume foam. The flow is controlled by the twist handle, and there is a selector for the percentage of foam mix. Using special foam agents, you can go from 0.1% to 0.6%, while standard foam requires a change in the selector by unscrewing it and screwing it back on turned 180 degrees, so that the mix ratios are 1% to 6%.

Here is a video of the unit in action:

And a picture of the demo – click on it to visit the Flickr photo stream:

I would really recommend you consider adding this to your arsenal for quick interventions, which do not require large volumes of foam projected at a distance. It’s excellent for quickly delivering a sizeable amount of foam with limited manpower and/or water supply.