Search & Rescue

This week I am asking for information as much as sharing information. The topic is basic firefighter search and rescue training. My question and ideas that I want to explore are pretty easy and straightforward as well as the questions that I am asking.

* About how many hours of actual SCBA training do your new firefighters receive before you allow them to become 'interior"?

* What are you teaching them about "oriented search techniques" such as keeping a member in a stairwell or protected area, or such as using a person with a thermal imager to guide rescuers?

* What facilities or techniques are you using? Fire station with obstructions? An actual Maze or maze trailer? Acquired structures? Training facility building?

* Are you using live smoke, Roscoe machines with theatrical smoke? Blacked out masks?

* For obstructed masks there is black spray paint, crushed waxed paper, Nomex hood on backwards...and what else is out there that works and is effective?

* Have you done any experimentation with how much area a two person search team can search in about 15 minutes or one air bottle with escape time? What square footage can be searched? Is it different in a residential vs. a commercial?

* If you use search ropes what techniques are you using? Knotted rope? Un-Knotted rope? Knots every 20 feet? Knots every five feet? the one and two knot system? What guidelines are you using for when to use a rope search?

There are a lot of firefighters from a variety of departments that read these pages. I would hope you would use the form below to answer some, any or give comments on these above thoughts so we can share the information.

If you choose not to share the information that is OK, but I hope I have made you think about some of these issues. If I have raised issues you don't know about, please use the form to drop a note so that I can answer your question confidentially.

Thanks for your help.