Rural Fire attack

[flmslayr2]

I am looking for people who have experience covering rural areas. I am in a discussion of tactics at a rural structure, mainly barn and large shed fires. Who;

A.) Uses deck guns for initial attacks (if access allows this)

B.) How much water do you have enroute to a scene when you have a confirmed structure fire in rural areas.

C.) What attack lines do you use for these fires (and house fires also)


Thanks

[tgc204]

rural area's

A) We do not use deck gun for initial attack.

B) Assesment is made on scene. As soon as we have a call that is out of the water district we have automatic aid that responds to the call with us. When we get on scene the decision is taken if we need more water supply.

C) All attack lines on our pumper 1 3/4". We do have on 2" line to protect exposures.

Ltn. Charle Chiasson

[FyredUp]

flmslayr2...

1) The deck gun should be an option for first in.

The rule of thumb has been use 1/2 of your tank water in a blitz attack. If you leave 1/2 of your tank water and the blitz attack does not work you have water for exposure protection while establishing a wtaer supply.

There are really 2 basic reasons for the failure of a hard hit with a deck gun. Inadequate flow. Improper placement of the stream.

2) We only have 3 or 4 places that we can't reach with an LDH hose lay. If we have a confirmed working fire in the non-hydranted areas we have mutual aid with one engine and 2 or 3 tankers. We roll with 2000 gallons, mutual aid may bring up to 8000 more.

3) We use only 2 inch attack lines that flow from 160 gpm to 326 gpm. The next step up is either the deck gun or a rear preconnected deluge on 200' of 3 inch.

FyredUp

[JJBat150]

A. Deck gun is an option based upon circumstances of each fire. Like FyredUp says carefull use is needed.

B. (2) 1250 gallon engines & (1) 1500 gallon tanker For a grand total of 4000 gallons coming from us. We have automatic mutual aid set up for any structural call that brings the next closest department with more water.

C. 1 3/4 are the usual first off lines for smaller structures, have 2 1/2 's preconnected for the bigger ones. Both engines can put class A foam through (2) 1 3/4 for exposure protection. (Class A is also used for initial attack of all fires)

[bendone]

We do not have any deck guns. We use a combination of 3, 2 1/2 and 4, 1 3/4 preconected lines for barn fires. these are supplied by a 2000 gpm pumper with a 1000 gallon tank. We have 2 4200 and 1 2300 gallon tankers. Mutual aid can supply ten or more tankers with an average size of 2000 gallons.

[HFDCLanger]

A) Deck gun (preferably remote) is the absolute best method of delivery for a blitz attack if apparatus positioning allows it. Otherwise we'll drop our 200' 500gpm Blitzfire line with a crew of one.

B) 2,500 Gallons plus class A foam on the first-in rig. Second due can lay a line. Long lays of LDH far out-perform tanker shuttles.

C) 200' 2 1/2" 500gpm Blitzfire preconnect and 1,250gpm bomb line. 1 3/4" lines for overhaul. We're considering using 2" hose for the Blitzfire for easier 1-man deployment by our smaller firefighters.

[Dalmatian90]

A.) Uses deck guns for initial attacks (if access allows this)

Our usual attack Engine-Tank carries 1200gpm and keeps a 1-1/4" tip at the end of the stacked tips on it's deck gun. At 150psi, that works out to be 569gpm, or just about 2 minutes worth of water.

A 3" bomb line with a 350-1000gpm fog nozzle master stream is also on board.

B.) How much water do you have enroute to a scene when you have a confirmed structure fire in rural areas.

1st Alarm for a reported structure fire brings 7,000 to 8,500 gallons of water on wheels plus 12,000' or so of LDH. It's a heavy 1st alarm, but we seldom have a 2nd alarm! The more rural western side of town tends to get more water, less hose than the eastern side where hydrants are more common.

Depending on location & reports, the responding officers may request additional tankers.

C.) What attack lines do you use for these fires (and house fires also)

Deck gun (rare, but sometimes useful)
Bomb lines eat fire
Blitz lines eat fire, if you have a crew that doesn't turn the movement of one into looking like a drunken centipede.
1.5" lines in the right situation -- if you have a wall you can "defend", and 1.5" line with a Rockwood nozzle & second story applicator can be used to keep the fire from spreading. The little lines help confine the fire while the big lines go for the center of the heat and knock it down. If you don't have walls to keep the flame spread in check, then your big lines have to start from the outside and work it and that's not always the most efficient.

Generally with us, if it's fully involved deck guns/bomb lines/ladder pipe. If it's partially involved, 1.5"/1.75" lines first to cut off, then the big boys to kill it.

[FireHairedWoman]

Hi,
I was volly for 3 years in a rural area with limited water resources. Most of the fires I attended were out in the middle of fields like barns, abandoned structures, sheds etc. The only water we had was that which we took with us as there were no hydrants or nearby streams, lagoons or ponds where we could draft our water. We took our 500 gallon pumper truck and had our 1500 gallon tanker on its way behind us. We would assess the situation to see if there were other structures or fuel nearby, sometimes we needed to call the utility companies and get the natural gas, electricity or whathaveyou shut of. Sometimes we could not approach directly and had to cut through fences or the like. Most of the time though, we would dump half our water so 250 gallons on in the first five minutes from a 1 and 1/2 inch hose (sometimes larger hose if we had water on scene and depending on the size of the blaze when we arrived and whether other mutual aid departments were there), then spend the remaining 250 gallons to keep the fire from spreading until our other water arrived. It seems that most of the abandoned structure fires or barn fires were in the middle of the night (can anyone say arson?) and our sop stated that we had to leave a certain number of personnel back in our township. One of the biggest problems that we found besides the lack of water and people was not knowing what is in the building. Many old sheds, barns, or agricultural buildings have a wide variety of stuff stored inside such as propane tanks, butane fuel, motor oil, gasoline, kerosene to name a few. That stuff is noxious and a small 5lb propane tank can make a hell of an explosion. As with any fire..approach with your eyes and ears open and look all around including up. I went to one fire where another department was spraying water on a structure but they didn't realize that they were standing right under electric wires which were arcing and sparking! Good luck.

[911WACKER]

DECK GUN

The deck gun is the best choice if you have position and water to do so, I have before used it while the chief screamed at me before. Consideration must be made to water supply, in the two cases that I used it our tanker was directly behind the engine with 3,000 gallons, so the deck gun was used to empty the 1,000 gallons of onboard water off the engine while attack lines were being stretched, the tanker stretched a pony line to supply me with the engine. The chief is old school and thinks that the deck gun is mainly a tool for pump training. Both times the fire was knocked down faster and easier than ever before, now they consider it every time out the door!!

This department I no longer run with however at that time we had 7,000 gallons of tank water on initial dispatch of any structure fire, usual second alarm was two more tankers bringing about 4,000 more. Rarely did we run out of water, usually sent tankers home before they were used.