Guidelines (again)

[Billy]

I know we have had this discussion before but it seems that some people just bury their heads in the sand where Guidelines are concerned and hope that it wont happen to their Service or anyone they know. What really gets me is the fact that we all know what the problems are with Guidelines and I believe we have the solution in front of us but the will is not there to take action to solve the problems.


The main problem with guidelines is the securing of them within buildings and this is the one that I believe leaves most services exposed and could be resolved relatively easily.
All fire services carry out Operational Risk Assessments (ORA’s) so crews know the risks to fire-fighters within buildings should a fire occur. Your Services legal department if you have one will be able to explain the importance of these ORA’s should a fire occur in the building and a fire-fighter gets severely injured, or worse.
Within my service, we have a section on the ORA, which we have to fill in if there is a disorientation hazard within the premises. Now although we log the disorientation hazard, we do not give a list of appropriate control measures for this hazard. On questioning crews within stations they have stated that a guideline is an approved control method for a disorientation risk within a building and some can even quote the old fire service manuals which described when we used guidelines. (for those new to the job, the fire service manuals covered everything you need to know technically about fires, they even talked about  a subject called building construction and stuff and yes they came in an A5 size book and not on a DVD).

Now if you consider the reason we do ORA’s is solely for the safety of Fire crews- how many services actually log on an ORA if they can safely secure a guideline within a building?
 This is compounded by the fact that most people would not use guidelines at an incident because we all know we cannot properly secure them inside the building!!

So I know this might be a radical idea but see if we all know what the problem is- do you not think we should try and sort it?

The following suggestion in my opinion would resolve the problem and ensure that all fire services carried out accurate ORA’s to reflect the risks and hazards within the buildings and pass them onto the fire crews and building owners.

During an ORA, in a building where there is an identified disorientation hazard, the crews would then look at the layout of the building to see if Guidelines could be safely used and secured within the building. If they could be used and secured, it will be logged within the ORA and any crews who may attend an incident there will know that guidelines can be used safely  and properly. If they cannot be used safely, this will be highlighted to the owner and they will have 2 choices.
1.   fit securing devices so we can use our equipment safely or
2.   Do not fit them and we will log it in our ORA that we cannot use them.

At least this way the OIC will know when they turn up if it is safe to use guidelines or not and we have done a suitable and sufficient assessment of the premises.

The initial tests done within the Service have shown the following:

 Securing a guideline within a building using a conventional knot uses about 1.5  to 2 metres of line and takes anything from 30 seconds to 1 minute to tie in daylight conditions.

Securing the guideline using the new securing mechanism uses 20 cm of line and takes 10 seconds in simulated fire conditions wearing BA.

Another surprising outcome was that when one team tied the guideline to an object in the conventional manner and another used the new design, the team who used the new design got the same distance within the building using 50% less air.

Further tests will be done in at our training centre and we will look at the outcomes.

I would be pleased if people would look at the comments above and give me feedback on their opinion of the proposals. I would be grateful if anyone could give a valid reason for not looking at this and in my opinion cost should not be an issue for the following reasons:
 if we work on the premise that any fire is a failure in the risk assessment within the premises,
We fit emergency lighting and fire exit signs in buildings to protect the public.
We fit smoke suppression and detection systems to protect the public
We fit sprinklers and fire escapes to protect the public.
All these for a fire that shouldn’t happen, but we accept it.
But heaven forbid we suggest something that will be solely for the safety of fire crews should a fire happen.
 Furthermore, the owners will have a choice whether to fit them or not and if they decide not to, they will know that we wont use all our equipment at our disposal within their premises- simples….

Too many firefighters are being seriously injured or worse in large commercial premises and anything that makes it safer for us to do our job should be considered.

Let the debate begin.

 

These posts are my own personal opinion and should not be taken as the views of my Fire and Rescue Service.

[Kaiser]

Interesting subject Billy,  I know that the German Fire Service Institute in Munster is working with the German authorities and the Cologne Fire Service to work out an electronic solution to this problem. I have recently been in touch with a colleague there to get more information and hopefully be allowed to visit them and see first hand how this new system will work.  If you PM me I will send you details as and when I get them.
Kaiser

[Mike Buckley]

Yes Billy, interesting topic. However I would suggest we go back to the basics. The purpose of the old Fire Precautions Act and the Fire Safety Order is to ensure that people who are inside the building when a fire starts are able to escape unaided. (Let us ignore residential homes for the minute). The legislation does not deal with preventing damage to the building, as far as the law is concerned the building can burn to the ground but as long as no-one is injured or killed God is in his heaven and everything is OK.

Given that why are the firefighters entering the building at all?

[fireftrm]

Exactly. No one to save no need to enter. Guidelines are so far down the hierarchy of risk controls that we should never consoder their use. Great for laying around the woods and blidfolding kids to follow them, or as washing lines. Otherwise? No FRS should carry them. Having building occupiers fit clip points to 'help' us use something so dangerous and pointless ? God no!!!! If the Fire Safety officer finds that the building design/use has the potential to lead to lives requiring rescue by a guideline search (though how anyone would ever live long enough in so badly smoke logged, fire under control, to be saved by a BA guideline search I know not) they should use enforcement powers to prevent its use, until it is made safe for people to escape. When we arrive then all we need do is pour water through openings, unless we can use BA safely without the need for guidelines or other controls.

[Billy]

Kaiser

Thanks for that - anything that could be of benefit in this area will be greatly appreciated.

Mike

Thanks for your comments. What i'm trying to highlight is the fact that Services carry out ORA's in potentially dangerous buildings, if they are involved in a fire, and dont even check if we can use our equipment in them. 
I thought we carried out ORA's to protect Fire crews who risk their lives in these types of buildings.
These proposals would help the OIC greatly as they would know where they could and couldn't use guidelines.
On your point that we can let buildings burn down and all is well under the legislation is already affecting us in the UK for the following reason:

Now I know I am a bit of a dinosaur but I joined the job to fight fires and save lives if needed. furthermore, I thought that one of the key aspects of Risk Assessment I always used was "We will take a reduced risk in a highly calculated manner to save, saveable property".
 It might be  cold and wet in Scotland and our buildings may be different but the roofs and walls are made watertight, whether it is from rain or a jet of water from the outside, they are designed so that water runs off them and the inside stays dry, especially if they are on fire.
If we work on the premise that fireftrm says ,Quote: "NO ONE TO SAVE, NO NEED TO ENTER" we will do 2 things.
1. We will greatly increase the amount of car parks throughout the UK and in doing so will greatly affect the lives of countless employees who no longer have any premises left (except for 1 NCP shed per site)
1. The worst thing is that we will totally ignore the experiences of good fire crews who were previously dealing with this type of fire in these buildings day and daily and actually putting them out. When we do this we not only erode the experience of crews but we totally demoralise and demotivate them as well. So when we get a similar building on fire and heaven forbid, anyone is in it- the crews will have no experience to fall back on and I personally think we are starting to see the consequences of this.

Fireftrm

It is patently obvious from your posts that you have never actually managed to use a guideline properly and have witnessed the benefits they can give to fire crews if used properly. Have you had a bad experience at training school when you got tangled ip in one and couldn't get out. ?
You always say that they are dangerous and pointless when what you really should be saying is that the incorrect use of them is dangerous and pointless, in the same way that incorrect branch techniques/ BA search procedures and Gas cooling techniques are dangerous and pointless.
Anyway, your Service must have got rid of guidelines by now as over 3 years ago you posted on here stating that "your service were actively seeking to remove them from appliances" Surely if they were so dangerous and pointless this would have happened as a matter of urgency.. 

These posts are my own personal opinion and are not meant to be representative of the views of my service

[Mike Buckley]

Billy,

I got halfway through my last message and then got hauled off to do something else. I was one of the dinosaurs and I agree with the attitude you take, however there are two factors that have come into play since I joined the service.

The first is the general attitude to Health and Safety which is used to stop people doing things as opposed to its real role which is to make people do things safely. I am afraid your first post shows this when you say that although you carry out ORAs and you correctly identify the hazards but then you do not identify the controls needed to deal with the hazards. I don't know what your legal department says but in my view this leaves your brigade wide open to action if something goes wrong. Would your Fire Safety Department accept a Fire Risk Assessment that identifies a hazard and then does not say what needs to be done about it?

The second is the construction of modern buildings particularly industrial ones. Today most of these are almost disposable, the general idea is that if you buy a industrial site you first bulldoze what is there and then throw up a factory as cheaply as possible. Compare these to the older prewar buildings where you could work underneath a fire doing salvage work relatively safely, in fact we had equipment to drill through the ceilings to let the water out and catch it in hoppers to prevent damage to the rest of the building.

These factors and the general attitude to the fire service from the government and the unions in my view have led to the deskilling of the service leading to the problem you find yourself in now.

[Tom Sutton]

I’m with Billy and if you are dinosaur then I must be the primeval soup. Those who wish to get rid of guidelines what happens if you arrive at a large smoke filled hotel and confronted with persons unaccounted for, do you just leave them to their fate. If you decide to have a go without the assistance of guidelines then check out http://www.fire.org.uk/FireNet/ba.php especially Covent Garden and RAF Neatishead.

[fireftrm]

PPV, TIC, Fire Safety measures..........................

Guidelines are form the primordial soup and should crawl back in. There is no example that I can think of where they are a suitable safe control.

Smoke filled hotel? Then deal with the fire and ventilate! Guidelines laid, searched off and then what? As it will be an hour + before the rooms have been searched the fire will have either a) killed everyone, or b) been out for ages. The safe and correct way to dela with this = fire fighting and search and rescue, using BA teams with TICs (if required) or PPV. The corridors will have smoke and fore resistant doors across long corridors and all rooms will have FR doors too with fire detection. If the residents are all still in their rooms and we end up laying a guideline then normal fire safty measures have failed, all our normal response procedures have failed and we are into the fantasy land of rescue by string. 

I thnak god that the dinosaurs are extinct in my reality. The alternative universe that Billy and twsutton live in kills people by its inability to see.

[kurnal]

 I thought that one of the key aspects of Risk Assessment I always used was "We will take a reduced risk in a highly calculated manner to save, saveable property".

Quote: "NO ONE TO SAVE, NO NEED TO ENTER"

Yes we need to provide firefighters with the tools to do the job safely and in my opinion this must include all the kit that you all mention and decent wayfinding systems. Guidelines were all we had for many years and they are fraught with problems especially that they slow you down so much in making your egress.

There really is no excuse for their remaining in use in 2010. When security guards have the technology to see through our clothes and when the American air force can direct a bomb into a bunker hatch by remote control we should not need to lay a piece of string to use as our guide to save our fire fighters lives. Its down to inertia at all levels and a lack of investment in proper Safe Systems of Work.

Firefighting is by its nature a dangerous occupation. How many deaths have arisen from the use or failure to use guidelines? As an electon looms it prompts me to ask what value the Politicians place on a firefighters life?

Is there any difference in expectations, tolerance of fire fighter losses or attitude to investment between the Political Parties?

[Tom Sutton]

fireftrm it goes without saying you would be firefighting at the same time as searching and if all these wonderful control measures you high lighted worked it would not be smoke logged and no need for guide lines. If it was found that guidelines were never required then there would be case of getting shut. But I suspect there are many large complicated premises were they could be require but if smoke logged building are a thing of the past then I stand corrected.

Kurnal I agree and if there is state of the art wayfinding system that is better than guide lines then use it instead. If you check out the link above you will see a number of fatalies because guide lines were not used or available to them.

[Billy]

If There is a state of the art wayfinding system that is better than guidelines then we should use it, but at this point there isn't.
So why dont we use what we have correctly.

Fireftrm

You mention a "smoke filled hotel" with all the appropriate precautions in place- what you went on to describe was everything that Rosepark Nursing home had in place.
Nuff said...

Oh- and you still haven't explained why your Service still has Guidelines when you know they dont work- maybe they disagree with you on this one.

[Midland Retty]

Interesting debate!

My view is that whilst guidelines are still carried on those big red lorries they should be used properly, and safely.

Many of you have pointed out that this is the 21st Century and that technological advances should have consigned guidelines to the big brigade bin in the sky long ago. However guidelines are still with us and  crews still train on their use. I suspect there is good rerason for this.

Whilst some would say satisfactory fire precautions in premsies should, in theory, mean that fire service intervention will be minimised and rescues will almost be a thing of a past and that fire will be detected, contained and suppressed quickly, the reality is that life isn't quite like that, and accidents will always happen.

So if anyone can guarantee that an incident wont go belly up or that we will never ever have another huge fire in a large sprawling building with multiple persons trapped, or that there is a better alternative to guidelines out there which is cost effective, is small enough to be carried on one of those fire engine things and allows crews undertaking SAR to quickly resume searches when another crew has come out of the building then I'll happily listen to it!

[fireftrm]

I cannot imagine a hotel where every fire safety measure has failed, where the fire is out, or uder control, where the smoke logging is such that no one can get out of their rooms and where a guideline will be a safe means of then getting around. Twsutton will have firefighting gear as well as carrying out a search, great and to be expected. So why lay a guideline? Follow the hose. You cannot serioulsy expect that laying a guideline will help? Explain how and how this can be done quickly enough to kee up with offensive firefighting and help SAVE lives?

Guidelines were used to rescue the living at Rosepark?

We have PPV, we have hose, we have fire safety measures, we have TICs we have no need for string

My service is examining the removal of guidelines......................

[Tom Sutton]

fireftrm I used a hotel as an example because it can be complicated and I agree it is unlikely that guidelines would be required in that situation. It is more likely to be a basement or underground type incident like the Covent Garden or RAF Neatishead was. I also agree it is a rare situation when they are needed but if they are then they are essential for crews to find their way out safely.

I wasn’t suggesting one crew did everything it would be a number of crews which was the norm in major incidents or it was at the jobs I attended. It is not essential it should be laid out quickly it should be done methodically and follow up the fire fighting crew maybe in a four man team. If things go pear shaped then the crews at least can find their way out and if properly trained it can be effective.

As for using hose it was the standard procedure until Covent Garden which was one of the reasons why two of our colleagues died.

Does each crew who are committed have a TIC with them and does it have a homing device that shows the way out?

If guidelines were used at Rosepark then maybe that was a mistake but I do not know the full details of that incident and the Oic should be certain that they are necessary before committing to their use.

I still say you should stay with them until a better wayfinding system is produced for those smoke logged incidents.

[fireftrm]

I agree with your points, to a point. I am glad that you don't think that a hotel, or nursing home would be good examples of where guidelines would be suitable. However, you use Covent Garden as a rationale for guidelines. Perhaps we can examine the report into that fire, which did lead to the string line being adopted:
 i.No guidelines - Hose used for this purpose was difficult to trace in the deepening water which eventually reached four feet in depth. (could you imagine us having such quantities of water used and, if we did, crews exposed to it today?)
ii.Men worked alone - In trying to rescue a colleague, one fireman became so exhausted he barely made it back to street level to summon assistance. As it happened he collapsed and vital minutes were lost in the rescue attempt. (we always work in pairs now, guidelines would not help!)
iii.No recording and supervising procedures for men entering and leaving the incident in BA.(we now have ECO and some services have telemetry)
iv.No method of summoning assistance in an emergency as with present day DSU. (we have now and some have telemetry)
v.Communications were bad to non-existent - These consisted of signals or as was often practised, the mouthpiece was removed thereby allowing the ingress of toxic products into the respiratory tract. (radios...............)
vi.No minimum charging pressure for BA cylinders. Many were only 2/3 full. (80% minimum rule........)
vii.No low cylinder pressure warning device. (we now have a 10 min safety margin, ECO and some even have telemetry)
viii.Many donned BA but did not start up until it was absolutely essential by which time they had taken in quantities of smoke and gases which had its effects. It would appear that an ability to “eat smoke” and the time taken to service sets were contributing factors in this procedure. (not the procedure today)
So Covent Garden does not show why we need guidelines, indeed all the other , modern practices would negate a need.

May I refer the readers to Gillnder Street and Staple Hill Supermarket fires? In bith cases guidelines were used, uneccessarily, and were contributory to the deaths of three firefighters.