Preferred search procedures

[Guest]

I am interested in knowing what various brigades are advocating as the preferred search procedure in bread and butter house fire persons reported situations.
I have personally long been in favour of going down on all fours for a number of reasons;
1. takes advantage of improved visibility at lower level.
2. places BA wearers below the hottest temperatures in compartments.
3. casualties in need of rescue are most likely to be at or near floor level  (beds, chairs etc.)
4. using gloved hands is more conducive to locating small child casualties as opposed to stamping on them with a size 10.
As someone who works in a training dept i am keen to gather your thoughts on the suitability of the traditional sweep and stamp versus the method described above, specifically for persons reported incidents.
I pose a number of questions,
1.In going down on hands and knees the firefighter might potentially be vulnerable to injury from discarded hypodermics, however do you feel that a risk assessment of the premises and area might overcome this hazard and risk with the Ff adopting the procedure most suited to their risk assessment.
2. Should we therefore teach both methods formally in order to address the dual issues of Ff safety and effective searching.
3. Should we continue to only teach one at the expense of the other (as has always been the case).
Thoughts please.
Regards,
Mike Anderson
Cheshire Fire Service

[Guest]

The whole idea behind stamp and sweep is for Ff safety as opposed to searching for casualties. Why not try a thermal image camera for searching.

[Guest]

TICs have their uses but should not i believe be relied upon as the sole means of searching for casualties. Their reliabilty at detecting small children or babies hiding or hidden under  bedding or quilts is dubious.
In addition, sod's law would dictate that upon taking it out of the box one of two things might potentially occur; the batteries may be flat or the equipment may be defective. What then?
Perhaps you operate in an area where every pump carries a TIC, however in other areas only the 1st pump on 2 pump stations carries the eqpt. In other cases some of our stations have 8-seater crewcabs with 5 BA sets and carry only one TIC. Almost certainly it will not be possible on all occasions for every team committed to take with them the said item of eqpt. What reliable procedure then should we formally teach our crews?
I fully appreciate that sweep & stamp is primarily for Firefighter protection but lets not forget why the Firefighter is there in the first place.
Although i operate presently in a training environment i would gratefully appreciate the thoughts not just of other trainers but most importantly operational staff. Do you feel that current FS training methods are equipping you with the skills to effectively and safely search in the scenarios i illustrate.

[Peter]

Mike

I think the issue is  covered by your last point - Both methods should be 'tools' in the 'toolkit' for use dependant on the scenario - teach the benifits/hazards associated with both, application comes with experience.
Peter

[guest28]

like most of the replies on here i believe that both methods have thier pros and cons , i just like to know what happened to common sense ? surely we all except that all jobs are different , size, age, condition of the house, intensity of the fire,  age of the persons involved and as a result a method thats subtable for one incident may not be the best for the next incident... or even from room to room.

[burgermuncher999]

I absolutely agree. However, it is all too easy for training centres to rigidly define the distinguishing line between what is taught in training centres and what we know to be custom and practice in the real world. They might then categorise the one method as acceptable and everything else outside of the book as being 'bad practice'. Our training centre has certainly moved to a mode of training that recognises the reality of the operational incident and as such we instruct Firefighters on how to be safe whilst 'doing it for real'. To ask them to complete a BAR by the book using sweep and stamp and nothing else is in my mind to be seen to be playing the game and might not adequately address the reality of what should be safe and effective practice for the operational Firefighter. We still make them aware of the sweep and stamp 'tool' but also instruct them to search effectively on all fours for the reasons i state above. My experience is that no other Brigade i have served in informs the student in this manner. They all insisted on the sweep and stamp at the training centre and didn't formally recognise any other method.
Is this change in teaching style being reflercted elsewhere and do you think it is an improved and more progressive way in which to maintain the skills of experienced Firefighters and prepare them to perform safely in the real world.
Mike Anderson.

[rips]

Why not ensure all Brigades are using PPV?
Then you wouldn't have too worry about "stamping" on some one or crawling around on your hands and knees for the majority of the time.
It's about time Brigades sorted themselves out and pushed forward with PPV.

[burgermuncher999]

Using ppv is highly effective but crews will still be required to search in smoke filled rooms until such time as they locate and create a suitable outlet. As a trainer i have noticed that some crews do ventilate first and wait for the smoke to clear before seraching and this does create a small but significant delay in thoroughly searching the compartment. What i would advocate is that the search for casualties and the location of a suitable outlet should be done in unison.
There are other factors to be borne in mind such as what if the fan breaks down. To use fans as the sole means to search and rescue/ make progress would be to dilute the very valuable basic skills of moving in smoke and darkness.

[ladder]

I feel that traditional search procedures are generally safer and progress can be made quicker.I appreciate there would or could be occasions when crawling would be more suitable but probably few and far between.As far as training school goes,I think it is a good idea to mention the "crawl" procedure but BA is generally one of the hardest and mentally challenging areas taught and teaching two totally different techniques could make life difficult.The traditional search procedure also leaves firefighters free to be able to keep in contact by touch where this is not impossible on all fours but more difficult.I think the general concensus would be that this is how we are taught to search in heat and smoke,but there are occasions where this may have to be adapted.Use your common sense.