General Discussion > Industrial & Private Fire Services

private fire appliances

(1/21) > >>

rescue5271:
What do people think of private fire appliances that have been bought by farming communitys to provide help to CFS in summer? I am all for it providing that all those on the appliances are dressed to level one gear and know what they are doing. I would like to see the CFS introduce a guide book for private units giving them the correct information on who/what and where to report to. The CFA (Vic) have just done this guide book and its not too bad something that we (cfs) could also do.

Remember all the water you can get helps put out that fire.

Firefrog:
This is tough one for me. In the urban fringe many brigades have hardly seen a private unit but further out there are many.
The issues that I can see.
Comms
Clothing
Training
Knowing and then carrying out the incident management plan
Accountablity

Of course it is the locals right to assist and CFS can never protect every property so private units are good in that regard. I just don't know how best to manage them on the fireground.
If the actions of private units didn't have any potential to impact on CFS safety then we could just let them do their thing. But I think some management is needed.
I have a lot of questions few answers. Does anyone have case studies on it working well?

Macca:
Hi guys as a new bloke to SA I can see a lot of fall backs of a private appliance attending a fire such as insurance, training, and a crew manning that truck, when the original crew is stood down  it is a great idea to do it but in the long run what happens if someone is injured 8)

kat:
All good issues raised - but how do we stop them? We would have no hope of enforcing any ban even if we were to face the ire of the community by imposing one. And as Blinky pointed out - the extra water is great ('specially if someone slings them a litre or two of A Class foam). And the farmers units have been great front line attack and certainly reduced the scale of a few recent jobs I've been to started by farm machinery. But there is no doubt that there can be some negatives :!:
So perhaps the happy medium is to try to work in together and provide them some information and education. The handbook sounds like its worth a try. Our Council fire prevention leaflet tells local farmers to wear appropriate clothing and report to the fire service (on UHF - we had to buy one  :) ) Anyone out there got an integrated approach working?

corocfs:
i think the events of black tuesday definitely highlighted some problems with private units...
people fighting fires NEED training, protective clothing, the right equipment and the ability to communicate with the cfs to make sure they r used/being affective..

however there is also no doubt at all that in some areas they are vital for knocking a fire down quickly

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page