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About Vernonia's voice. (Vernonia, OR) 2007-current | View Entire Issue (June 20, 2019)
vernonia rural fire protection district june20 2019 7 Vernonia Rural Fire Protection District Wildland Fire Preparation A Drafting and Water-Shuttle Drill the fire scene quickly and ef- fectively is vital. Therefore, By Larry Boxman the main objective for this Paramedic with Mist-Birkenfeld RFPD drill was to practice drafting In our rural environment, wildland fire is a (using suction to move water very real and dominant force that warrants consider- from a body of water to the able attention and response. Wildland fire manage- intake of a fire pump) and ment involves planning, implementation, monitoring, water-shuttling. and evaluation to facilitate the protection of people, The drill was spread- property, communities, and natural resources from the out over several miles to cre- detrimental effects of unwanted fires. The wildland fire ate a realistic situation that environment we face today and in the future demands required an area to get water, that we continue to pursue learning and development. an area to store water, also The importance of learning cannot be overstat- known as the dump site, and ed. Learning contributes to continuous development the actual simulated fire lo- and increased capability. As a result and to prepare for cation. this year’s fire season, a wildland fire drill took place To get water, a on Saturday, June 1. The drill was organized by Divi- source is needed such as a sion Chief Nick Berg from Mist-Birkenfeld RFPD and pond or a lake. A remote included firefighters and apparatus from Mist-Birken- pond on the mountain was feld RFPD, Vernonia RFPD, Clatskanie RFPD, Scap- chosen and this was called poose RFPD, and Columbia the draft site. One end of a River Fire & Rescue, as well five inch hard suction hose as Columbia County 9-1-1 was placed in the pond and dispatch. A total of 31 per- the other end was connected sonnel, both career and vol- to the pump on the fire truck. unteer, participated, as well This produced a flow rate of as 14 different fire engines over 1,000 gallons per min- and water tenders. ute and allowed for incom- Mist Mountain was ing water tenders to fill their the area selected for the drill 2,000-3,000 gallon tanks in because over the past five a matter of minutes. A con- years there have been three tinuous flow of tenders ar- wildland fires in remote ar- riving empty at the draft site eas on this mountain. The and leaving full of water en main issue with fires in route to the dump site oc- these isolated areas is wa- curred. ter supply. These areas do At the dump site, a not have pressurized water- 3,000-gallon portable water distribution systems such as tank was set up. The water hydrants, so getting water to tenders quickly unloaded their water into the tank and proceeded back to the draft site. A fire engine was placed next to the portable water tank and withdrew water from the tank and was able to spray water through a deluge gun to protect the area from the fire. Additional water ten- ders extracted water from the portable tank and delivered it to the scene of the simulated fire. Progressive hose lays (a method of deploying hoses so that additional hoses can be added as needed) were utilized to be able to squirt water from several different angles. Firefighters utilized these hoses to attack the fire from various directions. Over 35,000 gallons of water in 150 minutes were shuttled from the draft site to the dump site and ultimately to the fire. This was an extremely success- ful drill and demonstrated a high level of cooperation amongst the six participating public safety agencies. As with any training exercise, an “after action review” was conducted with all participants to discuss what went well and areas to be focused on during future drills. Safe and effective response to wildland fires requires continuous learning and training for firefight- ers. To ensure that this education is meaningful, it’s imperative that firefighters participate in hands-on training using the equipment that would actually be used for fire suppression. The exercise that took place on June 1 proved that although we can’t guarantee that wildland fires won’t occur, we can assure residents that their local fire departments strive to be prepared and quickly respond and effectively suppress these fires. Train Like Your Life Depends On It! By Captain Will Steinweg Over the last few months we have been ramping up our training here at Vernonia RFPD. Why do we train you ask? Well, with the obvious reason being keeping the community and ourselves safe, we also have to consider the chang- es that happen in the Fire Service. With ground to us. The way we do this is by work- ing closely with other fire departments in our area as well as our state train- ing agency, the Department of Public Safety Standards and Training (DPSST). These agencies help us by loaning mo- bile training props for us to use. We also work with the Lower Columbia with a training prop for roof ventilation. This gives our volunteers practice on something that we don’t get to do very often anymore. Usually we are only able to practice roof ventilation when we ac- quire houses to burn for training. With the strict regulations on training burns, we very rarely are able to acquire these houses. With the prop we were able to change the pitch or slant of the roof as well as get our volunteers comfortable with their abilities. The roof vent prop is construct- ed of 2x6 rafters and OSB sheeting to make it as real as possible for a training environment. We were also fortunate enough to get the material to build the roof donated to us by CB2 Industries LLC, as well as a few ventilation props loaned to us by Columbia River Fire and Rescue to make the most of our training. These training props give us valuable experience when we go out on emergency calls. If you would like to come see what our training program looks like or join our team please feel free to come by the station and pick up a volunteer application. We have a lot of different training opportunities avail- able and we don’t just train like our lives depend on it, we train like your life de- pends on it too! Calls responded to May 1-31 houses being built with lighter weight materials, and furniture being made of compounds that are closer in nature to gasoline than cotton, we have to be ready for the unexpected. Vernonia Fire is not set up with a large training ground like larger city departments are, so we have to improvise and bring the training Regional Training Officers Association (LCRTOA) for these needs. During our Fire Academy we were able to borrow a Forcible Entry Door from LCRTOA to get hands on practice on forcing entry into residential and commercial struc- tures. Recently DPSST provided us Fire Emergency Medical Service Hazardous Condition Service Call Good Intent Severe Weather & Natural Disaster Special Incident No Emergency Found False Alarm Total 5 32 0 11 1 0 0 0 1 50
