17512 Columbia

today’s news … Wednesday, September 12

today’s news and information gleanings from here and there! 

Quote for today… “It was one of those perfect English autumnal days which occur more frequently in memory than in life.” – P.D. James

  • Fire department “free-lancing” gets national attention – firefighterclosecalls.com sends an email (text appears at the end of this column) about a Lebanon County incident that happened yesterday and AlertPage public feed tells the story.
  • “Columbia acts to battle bullying  … ‘but it is the first time an effort has been made to involve the entire community.'” – Lancaster Intelligencer Journal/New Era

  • First sign of the season seen; where’s Ryan?
  • “Beginning Jan. 2 (2013) The Patriot-News will print three days a week on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. Papers will be home delivered and will also be available on newsstands.” – Harrisburg Patriot-News
  • POLICE LOG: “MANOR TWP.: Timothy J. Allen, 34, who has a last-known address of South Third Street, Columbia, was charged with stealing a vehicle Aug. 11 in the 300 block of Pisgah Place. Police said Allen took the keys to the vehicle while at the owner’s home. The vehicle was later located in Lancaster City. – MANOR TWP.: Zachary Parrett, 20, who has a last-known address of Rohrer Avenue, was charged with theft and receiving stolen property in relation to the theft June 25 of an iPhone and laptop from the 200 block of Eagle Path. The laptop was later located at a pawn shop.” – Lancaster Intelligencer Journal/New Era
  • “The following local residents have been named to the dean’s list for the spring semester at York College: “Columbia — Austin Mountain, a senior, entrepreneurship – Mountville — Andrew Wenger, a sophomore, accounting; Lindsay Roschel, a senior, history and Andrew Graham, a senior, sport management.” – Lancaster Intelligencer Journal/New Era

Text from FireFighterCloseCalls.com: “Last night, JasonK who partnered with us on that venture, and who runs AlertPage sent us and DaveS some “worth listening to” audio from a working fire in Lebanon, PA.

It seems that Palmyra (PA) Tower 1 was on the air returning from a detail yesterday, they were nine (9) miles away and offered their services and were “heading that way” in non-emergency mode. Certainly well intentioned. However….that is not AT ALL what Lebanon’s Fire Commissioner Duane Trautman (the Incident Commander) wanted, who aggressively and very clearly advised the dispatcher, “Tower 1 can cancel. They have no business inviting themselves to the City of Lebanon. They may return without our thanks. I would like a rundown of who’s responding on the second-alarm—properly.”

BUT all they wanted to do is HELP.

BUT-it’s 2012 and HE is in command. Command means HE decides what to do, how to do it, when to do it and who does it-and he owns all those decisions. Pretty simple. There are few Firefighters who DON’T want to respond in and assist on a working fire-it is natural (or should be)-but the days of “bidding” to go on a fire-are pretty much over. We should have learned that from numerous lessons, but none more “teaching” than on 9/11/01. It’s ironic that the fire in Lebanon happened yesterday-9/11/12. And 9 miles away? That’s a pretty good run-much different than a mile way-which then probably would have automatically put them on that fire through pre-planned box alarms. The offering clearly PO’ed Commissioner Duane Trautman as you will hear. Did Commissioner T get “annoyed” on the radio? Sure-but he was BUSY running a fire and that was a distraction from what he needed.

Some might respond (not necessarily specific to this fire) that “command” doesn’t know “we are available”…or command “isn’t doing what needs to be done”…or command “needs US”. It is COMMANDS fire-good or bad-that’s why he or she is IN COMMAND. I can assure you that I have bid to go on fires, it used to be the way business was done years ago-but those days are over. This is a classic example of COMMAND reminding people who is IN COMMAND and why. Let COMMAND run the incident. As a close friend of mine (and veteran chief) says related to commanding fires as well as general firehouse stuff: “Focus on professionally doing your job great and I’ll focus on doing the same.”

SO should we EVER offer help? Absolutely. The time to offer help is when box alarms, run cards and mutual aid is being planned-before the fire. The time to develop a POLICY on offering help on a regional level or even on bidding runs is before the run…such as your apparatus is out of position but very close to immediately assist in an emergency…or you have a “different than normal offering of immediate resources” ….and that info is something that command would normally not know. A defining policy could be developed where command is made aware of that and on those rare or unusual circumstances with clear parameters. But in this day and age, it should be a rare situation that would allow a company (under normal, daily circumstances) to bid on a run without it being policy driven-no matter how well intentioned it may be….and no matter how badly we wanna go to that fire. Been there-done that.

HERE is the radio transmission (From AlertPage):

http://alertpage1.posterous.com/lebanon-pa-2-alarm-fire-brotherhood-is-not-sh

HERE is Lebanon Fire Commissoners response to why he was “animated” on the radio (from DaveS):  

http://statter911.com/2012/09/12/must-hear-radio-transmissions-mutual-aid-gone-bad-at-two-alarm-fire-in-lebanon-pa/

[NOTE: AND THIS IS WHY THE INSTITUTIONALIZATION, INCORPORATION AND UNDERSTANDING OF THE INCIDENT COMMAND SYSTEM IS IMPORTANT!]

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