West Potsdam, NY
Firefighters from several area fire departments participated in a 2 day course on Firefighter Survival. The course was taught by State Fire Instructor Dave Gagne and was held at the George E Briggs Fire Training Facility in West Potsdam. The course teaches firefighters how to recognize dangerous conditions when operating inside a burning structure, how and when to call a "Mayday" and how to perform self rescue techniques to exit a burning building. The tactics and procedures taught in the Firefighter Survival course are what a firefighter would use as a last resort to exit a building if caught in a life threatening situation. The first night was spent in the classroom going over situations that may cause a firefighter to become trapped. Some of these situations may be rapidly changing fire conditions, entanglement, floor collapse or falling through a floor, SCBA failure or low air.
The second day firefighters participated in practical evolutions to practice what they had learned. Firefighters wore full gear including SCBA. The face piece of the SCBA was obstructed so firefighters were operating with zero visibility. A safety line was used for all evolutions involving bailing out windows.
Firefighters practiced
1) Locating a hose line, indentifying a coupling and following the line to safety.
2) Rapid location of a window or door and clearing the opening.
3) Forcible entry of interior doors.
4) Breaching a wall
5) Bailing out a first floor window
6) Escaping head first down a ladder
7) Escaping from a second floor window via a rescue rope.