Appropriate Levels of Response.

[6739264]

We all know that there are issues with BOMS at the moment, and it seems like everyone here has their own opinion of what is an appropriate level of response to any given incident. So rather than mess up other threads, lets get all that angst out here.

I believe that two brigades should be the maximum initially turned out, with only one brigade being turned out for minor jobs (rubbish fires/car fires/etc). Of course under special circumstances like TFB's, or when there are known issues getting a truck out the door during certain times, then this may need to be amended. In EMA areas it seems like the standard SAMFS and the standard CFS response is initiated for the area, not taking into consideration that the other agency is responding resources - ending up with a billion trucks for a rubbish fire.

The other issue then is brigades sending multiple trucks. There has been more than one occasion when the bells have dropped on a training night, and every man and his dog has jumped onto a truck and gone. When you add in a couple of brigades doing this, once again, it just looks stupid.

So what do people think? Is the rampant over resourcing that is worsened by individual brigades an issue that needs to be addressed? Or is it just another case of the 'we're only volunteers' mentality - as much we kid ourselves about being professionals.

[Zippy]

Its a hard thing when it comes to a multi-brigade response...only method of knowing who is responding to the job is being the Station in Command. Theres no method of viewing a up to the second summary of who is mobile, and how to judge wheather to send a 2nd appliance to the job.

Id personally like a Viewing Only version of Crimson in each station, click the incident number...and view the entire detail of the job, without any radio/phone calls.  This may also make way for making the Pager messages more brief, having the info on a screen at the station, for people attending it.

Anyway...thats enough daydreaming

Alarms of Response is kinda botched now,  the Eastern states seem to have a good system of "Make Tankers 15" etc.  put an exact number of trucks required, rather than a open ended 4th Alarm strike teams response.

the basic's of this all is if tone 7 drops, at least 1 appliance goes regardless.

[Knackers]

I got litle understanding of CFS/MFS/SES responses, but why isnt there a system set up like SAAS. Where each truck is a specific crew and a specific crew gets paged for a job/case, and if the incident is big enough (or requires it) additional crews get responded. Surley you don't need an MFS truck and 2 CFS trucks at a MVA plus SES. I have seen many incidents where only one fire (or rescue) crew is required and half the service has turned out.

Surley the boys and girls in charge need to sit down with each other (CFS/MFS/SES) and work out who has what toys (eg, fire, RCR, Storm, Land Search etc) and implement a plan of response for each area/catchment and to get rid of all the confussion, so 10 trucks don't roll out to a cat up a tree and 1 truck to an industrial fire.

Surley your comms can page, 1 crew required for MVA spillage, and the first 4 to turn out, go out the door and the rest go back home or to work, or you can have a running sheet of Joe, Bob, Bill and Jack are crew 1 (fire) and John, Billybob, Mike and Tom are crew 2 (Rescue) and you do this for the whole week on a day to day or 0800-1800 & 1800-0800 basis.

And if you get paged, you phone in, say "I on way to station" and if a crew is not filled, then comms revert to the next closest resource, page them, and if in the meantime your crew gets a full crew then the other resource gets called off. It can not be too hard, just needs a little give and take and some people to realise the can't save the world on their own by attending every incident and that their service is not better then the next.

If MFS take over Aldinga and Seaford as the community needs a full time crew due to the growing population base and they need reduced response times, so be it. CFS can back them up (if required) and be the primary response for grass/bushfires.

If this would not work, so be it, but seems logical and my view only. As the way I see it, SAFIRE have no idea what resources are where and how many resources they have at an incident.

[bittenyakka]

I know it doesn't look good if heaps of resources arrive but I think you shouldn't hold back if you brigade is responded. There have been times that i have been going to a job and the other brigade has defaulted and you often don't know this until you are waiting for them to bring the keys.

this is more applicable in areas where most of the brigade work away from the local area.

[chook]

Not sure which part of the state you are from Knackers - but don't have that problem here (sometimes it the other way around!).
As has been mentioned previously - Tone 7 goes off, Unit Duty officer contacts Adelaide fire (try and gain further info), appropriate resources dispatched, Sitrep sent backed to unit, decisions on further resources made etc.
No dramas - it seems more of a problem in the urban fringe! Maybe too many resources around that part of the state
As for "plus SES poseing around for the cameras." news footage does not support this (its normally our fire friends ).
Suggest you watch a bit of news TV or read a few newspapers before making statements like that one And as I have said in another post Landsearch is a different type of response, so I suggest you read the comments there - surfice to say it requires a fair number of people to conduct successfully!
Anyway as Zippy 28 said once that Pager goes off, a response happens & the level is managed appropriately.
And in volunteer brigades/ units your sheet idea wouldn't work because you don't know who will turnout - I believe SAAS has similar issues
Anyway great ideas it does hi-light an issue, though is it that big a one?
cheers

[jaff]

Struth Chook, the Morialta search the other night it looked like the SES guys were trying out for the next episode of Mcleods Daughters, when those cameras went on your boys were like moths around a light .Im told the CFS boys were hanging back remaining mellow , but making undiscernable mumblings about lack of power tools

Cheers Jaff

[chook]

Ah now they were METRO SES that would explain it and I all ready know what shrinking violets CFS are Jaff
cheers

[6739264]

Its a hard thing when it comes to a multi-brigade response...only method of knowing who is responding to the job is being the Station in Command. Theres no method of viewing a up to the second summary of who is mobile, and how to judge wheather to send a 2nd appliance to the job.
...
Alarms of Response is kinda botched now,  the Eastern states seem to have a good system of "Make Tankers 15" etc.  put an exact number of trucks required, rather than a open ended 4th Alarm strike teams response.
...
the basic's of this all is if tone 7 drops, at least 1 appliance goes regardless.

Thats the problem with the new comms system. It was much easier to resource track from a brigades point of veiw when you could hear everything occurring at once.

The "Make tankers 15" system is pretty much phased out in the eastern states (I believe QLD still use it?) in favour of the much better Alarms system. The Alarm system allows specific resources to be turned out in conjunction with the alarm level, whereas appliances must be individually called in the "Make Tankers 15' system. It also takes a load off the OIC by not having to call individual resources. Not to mention the varied amount of appliances the CFS has.

I know it doesn't look good if heaps of resources arrive but I think you shouldn't hold back if you brigade is responded. There have been times that i have been going to a job and the other brigade has defaulted and you often don't know this until you are waiting for them to bring the keys.

this is more applicable in areas where most of the brigade work away from the local area.

This bring up to god points. The first is, who says the second crew HAVE to turn out? It would do well for them to stay at the station until either an upgrade of response is called for, or a stop is sent. (of course depending on the type of incident, etc etc) The second issue is that or brigades not having keys to buildings they are turning out to. The usual practice seems to be the primary brigade gets keys, and the other that turnout have to hope they show up. Perhaps all brigades that turnout should have keys, just in case.

[mack]

ive noticed huge problems with over resourcing in some areas, ie; victor harbor group jobs

but at the end of the day they have gotten the job done.

knackers - what you propose is not really a viable option for a 100% vollunteer service [talking cfs/ses point of view], i know this system works with SAAS, however you are talking about a busier service, with a much smaller group of responders, that partake in a roster. I cannot imagine CFS personell agreeing to this [i know i wouldnt for my brigades 100 jobs a year].

Also, my interpretation of your suggestion would drastically increase response times & put a higher workload on comms... i cant imagine it working well if every firefighter rang in to say they were mobile to the station.

Lets face it... the system we already have works.

[bittenyakka]

true numbers, the second truck doens't really have to go.

and with secondary responders gettign keys we have found it like getting blood out of a stone for some areas. hoever give it enought time and i think they will come.

[boredmatrix]

the current system might work, but is this a case of "it ain't broke so don't touch it....."??

or someone suggesting that maybe we can get more out of a system that is currently in place.....??

or someone having the balls to stand up and say "I think we CAN in fact do this better, why don't we have a go?"


The biggest problem facing ESO's today- is that governments are implementing much tougher guidelines in relation to Governence and Accountability.  While most frontline staff don't agree with it, it's a fact of life!

Responsive systems (ie: Ad Hoc) are not in vogue with current business practice. While we are not doing this role to provide a "business" as such - Gov't's dictate that ESO's run "as a business" and for some reason fail to see too far outside of that square! - the cynic is me knows that it's all $$ driven - but hey...what would we know, we just fight fires/perform RCR/provide urgent medical interventions and transport to hospital!???

[rescue5271]

May be we are seeing more groups/brigades sending more than they should due to the new funding??? I can never work it out we have had a number of jobs that should have been upgraded from the first call that MFS got but still they only page two brigade's what will it take till its fixed???

[chook]

Yep you are right Matrix its all about money. We UM's in our region have been given instructions (which I can't go into) however it is guarenteed to increase the number of vehicles at an incident. Our people don't agree with it, however sadly it the way it is.
In fact half of my day was discussing funding, budgets & the brave new world!
It suxs, now I will have to justify every single purchase this year & justify every single piece of equipment - no matter its source!
And yet we don't get stuff all, for going around training units, passing on knowledge etc. The whole sytem sucks, and I can't see it getting better.
We are now part of a government department who are quite prepared to do whatever it takes to please their political masters.
Anyway I think I have said enough, just filtered pissed off with the whole system.
cheers

[Red Message]

I'm used to seeing two pumps turnout to just about everything. I look at some of the SAMFS responses of truck after truck to an alarm and my jaw drops.

It just seems crazy to empty stations and leave areas unprotected simply because of an AFA. Even the working jobs that you see are packed full of trucks. The Leabrook job the other day for example, had both brontos out... but for what exactly?

[uniden]

Yes but you have to turn out those appliances to AFA calls cause they may be fires.. Appliances go K3 at the jobs if they are not required, which means they are available for further calls.
Doesnt take them any longer to respond from another incident than from the station.

[bittenyakka]

The point of having an AFA fails if the fire brigade Does not assume that the alarm is working and hence it is a going fire. So based on this assumption it is reasonable to send the appropriate resources to deal with a worst case scenario.

however a worst case scenario in a city is much worse than any station can handle so send a reasonable compromise.

Plus say there is an AFA in the Santos (westpac) building it turns out to be a going job on the 8th floor every hand can be put to good use then rather than wait for more crews

[Red Message]

Its obvious you have to turn out appliances for alarms calls. I have been there when AFA's turn into a VERY big job. The outcome would have been no different having two or twenty two appliances on scene to begin with.

If you look at the number of AFA's that are really jobs, that may not support the over resourcing of AFA calls.

[Alan J]

I got litle understanding of CFS/MFS/SES responses, but why isnt there a system set up like SAAS. Where each truck is a specific crew and a specific crew gets paged for a job/case, and if the incident is big enough (or requires it) additional crews get responded. Surley you don't need an MFS truck and 2 CFS trucks at a MVA plus SES. I have seen many incidents where only one fire (or rescue) crew is required and half the service has turned out.

G'day Knackers.

I think most of your suggestions are in use by one or more brigades or SES units.

The busy brigades do tend to roster their crews, partly to be sure of getting out the door, but also to manage fatigue & enforce stand-down times.  Other less busy brigades are merely grateful for every warm body that turns up, & hopefully can scrape up a single crew during b/h or long weekends.

Paging the DO that you are coming is something we implemented at Western Adelaide SES a long time ago. One of the first to do so IIRC.  It works well when your members are widely dispersed & 10-15mins+ is "acceptable" 1st response. That isn't a criticism by the way.... that's a fact of life that metro SES units have to live with & manage due to their demographics. Been there, done that.  Paging your atendance & travel time worked well with commercial paging networks - dial the pager number, instant machine answer, hit 4 buttons on keypad (person ID & ETT in minutes) hang-up & Go. 10, 15, 20 people could do so simultaneously.  It's a waste of valuable oxygen trying that with some Link operators...   

Not really an option when your goal is out the door in 4-6 minutes from page. The time taken to lodge a page message chews up too much of that. If you don't have a crew inside 6 minutes, the call defaults (or should, depending upon where the brigade is). Many groups dual or even treble respond brigades to most jobs simply to be sure of a timely response by at least one.

Whatever system used, the response will only be as good as the information provided by the caller.  Fact is callers sometimes lie to ensure that their info is "taken seriously".  By way of example, we have more than once been responded to a local home when the resident has seen smoke some distance away behind some hills - >25km away on one occasion.
Q="where is the fire" A="just across the paddocks"
Q="how far away is it?" A="pretty close"
Q="can you see flames" A="yes, it's pretty big & getting bigger"

The other point is, you have to respond to the risk if the caller/alarm worst case is correct, not to the probability that they are crying "Wolf".  First arriving responder stop-calls the rest if they are not required. Works well provided interservice politics isn't a factor. (I am Stop Call King because I live six (legal) minutes from my brigade.. )

hope the above makes sense. It's late & I'm tired.
cheers

[Cameron Yelland]

It appears to be necessary to make all rural fires 2nd alarm (4 trucks) during the FDS, especially when the SDI is so high.  Most of the time it may not need more than one or two brigades but having those extra two on the road can only be a benefit if it turns out to be bigger than first thought and if they arent required just stop call them.  Remember, you will never be dragged over the coals for calling too many brigades but you will be if you dont have enough.

Also in the current FDS it also seems necessary to call a third alarm (8 trucks) to any rural fire on a Fire Ban Day.

I dont know if this applies to the hills dwellers where it seems brigades are only around the corner from each other but out in the sticks where there is 10-20-30 mins apart and an approx. response time of 5-10mins i think its probaly quite an acceptable response.

[Katrina]

I was told the other day (that particularly hot and windy one) that any fire calls were to be 8 trucks right from the start. Jump on anything so it can't get going and just stop call units if they are not required, makes sense to me on a day like that

[Zippy]

During the Willunga and Willamstown fires...any other jobs pretty much had to go 3rd alarm possible 4th as brigades were short of appliances and a lot of crew only just completed shifts at those fires and/or worked.  Seemed like a interesting case what happened at Balhannah/Nairne.  Throw everything at it and hope the best, which happened.

[SA Firey]

If you read the news on the weekend it said that they are throwing everything at any reported calls which is good can always stop call appliances. Bring it on

[ltdan]

This topic keeps popping its head, but it is an interesting topic to see other peoples ideas and thoughts.

The brigade I am from will always respond with another station  Several reasons for this:
* Support
* Safety
* Logistics

You never know how many appliances you will actually be able to respond from your station at any given time.  So responding two stations from dispatch assists in making sure crews are mobile.

I have been responded to jobs which are suppose to be a wheelie bin fire and on arrival it is a fully blown domestic fire.  Therefore it is going to take at least another 10 minutes for a station to assist you if you are a single appliance station depending on your location.  If we look at other regions not 1 your closest station might be 1 , 2 , 3, hrs away.

The actions we have seen in the last month or so have been positive, with the attitude "jump on it with what you got and get it out".  If it is a nothing job you can always stop call oncoming appliances but pretty embarrassing when you arrive at a job and you need help and you don't  have any.

Group and brigade attitudes/rivalries need to go and I am aware it is not in all places but it still is out their in some areas.  We all need too work together to get the job done smartly, quickly, safely.  Respond the closest brigades to the incidents not the brigades you want because they are your mates.  This may include SAMFS, DEH, SES and Forestry SA

Hopefully SACAD will help this, and as I have been informed you will be able to continually change the SACAD system to help you and your community, through the correct channels of course.