You Must Come Out Swinging!

You Must Come Out Swinging!

If I have witnessed it once, I have witnessed it 100 times. Too many candidates get sucked into concentrating too much on the check-off list for their tactical without realizing it. In the process, they lose control of the fire and their score gets hammered.

Q: What’s your best tactic for rescuing or knocking down the fire?

A: An aggressive attack on the fire!

Yes, you want to cover all the bases to make sure boxes are checked off on the rating sheet. That said, isn’t the best tactic for putting out an aggressive fire simply to extinguish and rescue? Go fight the fire with all of your resources. In the process, you will check off the boxes on the rating sheet. If you put out the fire too – well that is an added bonus.

But, what happens if things go wrong? Many candidates put work out of sequence early in the exercise. This will make the problem bigger than what the raters intended. This can be assigning units to place positive pressure ventilation, a crew to pull ceilings, assigning more than one unit to carry out search, rescue, or other tasks. This is before they have the first line on the fire, a RIT team assigned, utilities pulled and a crew sent to the roof for ventilation. Trust me – these add a rescue problem that wasn’t given to them.

First things first – you need a solid plan before the fire gets away from you. How long can you tread water? A solid POA fills major areas the raters will be checking off on your scoring sheet. This is where you can rack up big points. Once you have proven you can handle the call from the beginning, you will nail it. As soon as the raters know you got it, they will help you over the top to that next badge. It’s a beautiful thing when it happens.

Captain Rob Smith