Delayed response to deadly motorcade crash; High-rise blowtorch testing; Are you UFO ready?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3IIyhYvbHE&rel=1]Old video of the day: The video isn’t really old, but the fire engine is. Take a tour of Manassas, Virginia in a 1967 Seagrave.
Delay in getting help to motorcycle officer who died in Clinton motorcade
Any of us who listen to scanners regularly have often been struck by what can often be a long turn-around time when police radio for fire and ems or when firefighters and medics urgently need the cops. Through the years I have heard the problem in a number of jurisdictions. The Dallas Morning News reports an investigation is underway after just such a delay when a motorcycle officer went down during Senator Hillary Clinton’s motorcade in Dallas on Friday:
Officials are investigating a five-minute delay between when Dallas Fire-Rescue dispatchers learned a motorcycle officer had crashed and when paramedics were first told to go to the scene.
Senior Cpl. Victor Lozada They are also trying to understand why police dispatchers had trouble generating a written order for help immediately.
Authorities say a faster response probably would not have saved Senior Cpl. Victor Lozada, who lost control of his motorcycle Friday while escorting presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton to an Oak Cliff rally. But the delay does raise questions about whether the city’s new automated dispatch system works as well as it should.
“It does look like it took awhile, and we’re looking into it to see if anything went wrong,” First Assistant City Manager Ryan Evans, who oversees the police and fire departments, said Saturday.
Fire Deputy Chief Tommy Tine, commander of fire dispatch, declined to comment when reached by telephone. Fire Chief Eddie Burns did not return e-mails requesting comment.
Lt. Joel Lavender, a fire spokesman, sent an e-mail Sunday stating that the department was “gathering factual information related to this incident.”
Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle said “that officers who were at the scene of the accident were concerned about how long it took for an ambulance to respond.” He said he could not comment further until he knew all the facts.
Read the article and the timeline.
Weekend coverage
Click here to see some of our weekend stories. Included are the must see video of the explosion in Durango, CO that injured 7 firefighters, police and firefighters and a water battle that went bad in Wisconsin and the latest on the continuing battle in Boston.
High-rise lab
The New York Times looks at testing going on to determine the impact of wind on high-rise firefighting and tactics to counteract the blowtorch effect:
… the instant combination of fire and wind can blast fireballs across rooms and down corridors without warning, within seconds, and at temperatures that render hoses and protective clothing of little use.
In New York City, at least 11 people, including four firefighters, have died as a direct result of those kinds of fires since 1980, and dozens of others have been badly burned. For firefighters, “it is like walking into the barrel of a loaded shotgun,” Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta said.
Now, amid an expanding search across the nation for better ways to prevent or contain high-rise infernos, the Fire Department, federal fire experts and engineers from Polytechnic University in Brooklyn have taken over part of Governors Island, the 172-acre former Coast Guard installation off Lower Manhattan, for a week of pyrotechnics intended to test “alternative strategies and tactics for wind-driven events.”
Firefighters from departments in Los Angeles; Chicago; Austin, Tex.; and several other cities across the country will be observing.
FireGeezer has pictures of the testing
Raw video from house fire in Utica
Some early video from WKTV-TV of a house fire at Riverside Drive and Ashland Avenue in Utica, NY. Click here to see it.
Edmonton fire
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NG6NCrWVbHk&rel=1]
This is from a $4 million fire sparked by roofers that left many seniors homeless. Read details.
Calgary fire
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjexSrELoLU&rel=1]
A short video from a fire Sunday that destroyed two businesses in Calgary’s Connaught neighborhood. Pictures and more details are here.
Do you have a UFO SOP?
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRP8kP_a8DU&rel=1]
A fire service publication adds fuel to the fire for UFO believers.
Pressure tactics
I note some glee from those observing this hose rasslin’ exercise.
