Multiphase Study on Firefighter Safety and the Deployment of Resources

1. Multiphase Study on Firefighter Safety and the Deployment of Resources High-Rise Field Experiments

2. High-Rise Toolkit What’s inside? Full Report Dept. of Commerce release notes 10 Fact Sheets Executive Summary DVD of photos Contact information for requests

3. Subjects of Further Discussion Timing Performance in Experimental Search Generating % comparison tables Time-to-Task Data Determining design fire for model FED Model Results

4. Experimental Search Data pages 64-68

5. Reading Button Plots

6. 3-Person 10th Floor Search

7. 4-Person 10th Floor Search

8. 5-Person 10th Floor Search

9. 6-Person 10th Floor Search

10. Comparison Time Data pages 138-146

11. Generating % Tables Starting with synthetic data… Differences are found by subtracting the row time data from the column time data.

12. Generating % Tables Divide differences by the time value of the column.

13. Generating % Tables Convert to % by multiplying previous by 100.

14. Fire Out Comparison

15. Floor 10 Search Comparison

16. Overall Time Comparison

17. Time-to-Task Data pages 69-83

18. Reading the Graphs

19. Attack Line Pathway

20. Advance Attack Line

21. Advance Second Line

22. Fire Out

23. Search Patterns: Fire Floor

24. Search and Rescue Fire Floor (10th Floor)

25. Victim #1 Found (Fire Floor)

26. Search Patterns: Floor Above Fire

27. Search and Rescue Floor Above the Fire (11th)

28. Victim #2 FoundFloor Above the Fire

29. 3-person Crew Operations

30. 4-Person Crew Operations

31. 5-Person Crew Operations

32. 6-Person Crew Operations

33. Fire Modeling and the Fractional Effective Dose pages 84-95

34. Design Fire

35. Fire + Suppression

36. Water on Fire / Fire Out

37. Tenability: FED

38. Tenability During Search: Stairs 4-Person Crews 3-Person Crews 5-Person Crews 6-Person Crews

39. Tenability During Search: Elevator 4-Person Crews 3-Person Crews 6-Person Crews 5-Person Crews

40. Tenability / Search Complete

41. Crew Size Comparison

42. Conclusions • When responding to medium growth rate fire on the 10th floor, 3-person crews ascending to the fire floor confronted an environment where the fire had released 60% more heat energy than the fire encountered by the 6-person crews doing the same work. Larger fires expose firefighters to greater risks and are more challenging to suppress.

43. Conclusions 2) Larger fires produce more riskexposure for building occupants. In general, occupants being rescued by smaller crews and by crews that used the stairs rather than the elevators, were exposed to significantly greater dose of toxins from the fire.

44. Standards of Cover • Resource distribution is associated with • geography of the community • travel time to emergencies • Distribution is typically measured by the percent of the jurisdiction covered by the first-due units. • Concentration is also about geography • arranging of multiple resources, • spacing them so that an initial "effective response force" can arrive on scene within time frames established

45. Conclusions 3) Properly engineered and operational fire sprinkler system drastically reduces the risk exposure for both the building occupants and the firefighters. According to NFPA: • ~ 40% of buildings are NOT sprinklered • Sprinkler systems fail in about one in 14 fires Fire departments should be prepared to manage the risks associated with unsprinklered high-rise building fires.

46. Next Steps • Urban Fire Forum High Rise Implementation Guide • 1st Edition – Community Risk Assessment (Residential- Low Hazard) • 2nd Edition – Community Risk Assessment: High-Rise Implementation Guide • NFPA 1710 Committee • October 8-9 - Atlanta

47. Next Steps 2nd Edition – Community Risk Assessment: High-Rise Implementation Guide

48. Matching Resources to Risk If fire department resources (both mobile and personnel) are deployed to match the risk levels inherent to hazards in the community, it has been scientifically demonstrated that the community will be far less vulnerableto negative outcomes in… • firefighter injury and death • civilian injury and death • property loss

49. Matching Resources to Risk • Following a community hazard/risk assessment, Chiefs must prepare a plan fortimelyand sufficient coverage of each hazard and the adverse risk events that occur….Standard of Response Coverage. (Standards of Cover) • Total number of fires occurring annually should NOT be the sole driver of crew size, overall staffing or on scene assembly needs. • Standards of response coverage is defined as the written policies and procedures that establish the distribution and concentration of fixed and mobile resources of an organization

50. Matching Resources to Risk • Response time goals for first-due units (distribution) and … • Response time goals for the total effective on-scene emergency response force (concentration) … • …Drive fire department objectives like fire station location, apparatus deployed and staffing levels.