Question: The East Coast refers to and performs VES much more often than the West Coast. Can you provide your thoughts on the when's, how's, and safety concerns associated with performing this dangerous fireground operation?

Answer: The first issue to deal with here is the West Coast vs. East Coast stuff! I saw this chasm for the first time as editor of Fire Engineering in 1983 at the Fresno, California, Instructors Conference. I was from the East Coast and had never heard of it before, nor could I account for it. But it sure is nonsense, and I would love to know just who is perpetuating it. It is the greatest detriment to communication and knowledge in the world's most dangerous profession that could ever be perpetrated. Fire has no conscience! Our objectives are the same — lofty as they may be! I think sometimes that people "other than firefighters" benefit best at the manufactured difference between our coasts. We have Earth, Wind, and Fire as basics — how can the Mississippi River change one all by itself? But since 1983 I have doubled the size of the "greatest friends I have in the world" because of Fresno and its spinoffs.

With that said, "Let's play!"

To understand the real business of VES, you should understand that the term is spelled wrong. The objective is to access the "rear" of the fire compartment as soon as possible, to enter it for search and exit when necessary for other vent tactics. So the acronym should read ESV — Enter, Search, Vent. The person that is the "real rescue" in structure fire occupancies is the one with the least time left for us to find him before he loses his life to our annual statistics. Where is his location?

It is the habitable room or rooms into which the nozzle will push the fire. It is the occupancy behind the fire! In our venacular, it is the rear of the fire. If you follow that thinking, you can see (I hope) that the rear of the fire could be the front of the building? So, if you work for me and you have an outside vent assignment (we used to have enough people to dedicate a rear position), your job is to mentally find (size up) the fire floor from outside and then the rear — where the nozzle will push the fire. Your primary function is to get there (Enter) from the outside by aerial, portable, fire escape, adjoining building or breach.

Once there, your job (if you choose to accept it) is to get into the space for a primary search before water is started. Sometimes this is a communication task as well, because of the importance of this area of temporary refuge for our trapped civilians.

Once you accept this premise and begin to account for the area in question by tactic, you can refine the activity forever. "Where is the real rear?" is a question for a great truckie — and one that gets critiqued most often.

Tests have been performed (though we knew what the results would be all the time) on the tenability of that space once water was started. You guessed it: it is too volitile for a fully clothed and protected firefighter to operate in. And that is with solid stream also — though your best chance is with solid stream in this case.

The Search aspect of VES is that you are to search as much as you can (one bedroom to the hallway in private dwellings), close the door, and get out before water starts. Then go to the secondary rear position (another question).

Then the Vent part begins. There are two types of vent contemplated here. The first is to Vent for Life. Once you get to the horizontal entry of the rear of the fire compartment (generally a window), you make a "door" out of the window. If the conditions are still scary and hot and cause you to halt (remember it is your halt level that is keeping you from accomplishing the task), you try to make the entry possible by additional venting — not so much for the fire extinguishment but to get your butt inside even if it is a few inches. Primary Search!

Once the fire or fire operations drive you outside to the aerial device or construct that got you there, now you Vent For Fire Extinguishment. Now open anything that will assist the forward movement of the handline.

"Now what are the dangers?" you ask. It is like being on the "floor above," waiting for fire to errupt all the time. An understanding of the importance of this unique task and the rewards of getting to people before the fire does are really what we are all about. The safety lies in a couple of things. First, you have to get good and better at "reading the building" for correct location and access. Remember, you have such little time and only one shot at it. This aspect gets better in the critique before you leave the fire ground. Then get good at reading the fire and orchestrating its behavior. What I mean here is this: ask yourself a questions like, "Do I break the window to the side of the ladder or fire escape before I enter or after I exit?" A correct answer will cause the fire to be in your control momentarily.

Enter tricks also make for "safe" ops. Take out the whole window, for instance. This puts the extending fire in the upper one-third of the opening and not in the one-half window you are entering. Get in quickly and low (remember the tips of the ladder now?) or, if you cannot get inside, probe with a tool. You will be surprised how much courage you gain when you touch something directly under the window sill.

The main safety thing is understanding. Everyone on the fireground must understand that this area is a search priority. Communication from the nozzle to you is a great start. "Water coming" is a command for you to get out. This understanding will prevent indiscriminate use of fog in your direction, not to mention keeping the positive pressure fans on hold for a while.

I have received letters from state representatives of fire stuff (marshals and directors etc) that told me off. "We don't lose anyone Brennan." they began. "All our victims are dead when we arrive!" Ostriches! Perhaps they also think every fire is located in an outside room! Where did I see that before?

Question: Our Volunteer Department just purchased our first PPV fan. We are just starting to train on the use of this equipment. What are the pro's and con's of PPV? When do you use PPV, and when do you not use this type of equipment?

Answer: Whew — big barrel you opened here.

I assume that your use of the word "you" in "when do you use and when do you not use...," you are referring to ME! So I will answer the question from MY perspective and the perspective of those who worked under me as chief. You should know by now that I think I am the minority opinion, but I belong to another minority too — I have experienced tons of interior structure fire and its behavior.

With all that said, PPV is the greatest thing since plastic fire helmets for operations during overhaul and salvage of structures. When in the Volunteers at home, we would be on scene for hours trying to get ALL the byproducts of combustion of minor fires from the structure with negative fans.

So "positive pressure ventilation" has greatly assisted in that responsibility.

It is also a positive procedure for the tactic of ventilation of inaccessible areas, such as cellars, subcellars, ships, etc.

Please refer to a previous answer in this Q-and-A column on the subject of VES (above) and try to understand the concept of the REAR of the fire occupancy. Positive pressure used on arrival makes this area untenable for the firefighter to enter and for the trapped civilian to survive.

Basically if you can assure that the fire is in a room with contents exactly like the one that is always in the articles on positive pressure then start the fans. What is this you say?

Well, all the rooms in the articles in magazines endorsing the use of positive pressure on arrival are in the outside perimeter of the building and at least two of the walls of the room are enclosure walls for the building. Never have I seen an article that accounted for unburned areas that the fire will be pushed to when the nozzle opens, not to mention positive pressure ventilation.

So in my opinion — overhauling for sure!

If you want to use it during extinguishment (or before water is started), you need to have a valid size-up data-gathering that assures that the positive pressure will not "punish" unburned areas or victims that are waiting for us to find them.

Question: “I believe that a good truck officer should always personally perform a 360-degree size-up of the fire building before making a commitment. Am I right?”

Answer: The practice of a truck officer getting off the apparatus and making a 360-degree site survey before commitment is a great tactic if you never want to perform any SUCCESSFUL truck work! First, you make use of the “no-no” word “always” — that is a tip off that the next thought that follows has some major flaws in it. (NEVER say “always” ... no “never” or “can’t” when talking of fireground activities, at least not if you work for me.)

A good truck officer should have 80 to 90 percent of his or her thinking and mental commitment completed before stepping off the truck. Most of the decisions are from prior experiences and only secondarily from the size-up thoughts concerning how the alarm was received, and then from arrival information, location, time, on-location sights and smells, and more.

Now is the time to adjust for any building-construction design that was not expcected for that location and to assess the fire's location at your incident. This includes not only where you think the fire is now but what size it probably is and where it will go next.

Whether the fire is on a top floor, upper floor, or lower floor is another important piece of commitment information, along with whether the location of most of the fire is in the front or rear portion of the structure. Where are the additional entry and exit points? What is the window pattern and size? Are fire escapes or other constructs present? How much of a life load is probable? All this is in your mind an instant before your second foot hits the asphalt as you move toward the entrance you are going to make (assuming your decision is for an interior, aggressive, offensive fire attack).

A well-trained truck company will provide a great company officer with the information that will impact that particular incident. In short, the crew or team are the eyes and ears of the truck company officer just as the companies are the eyes and ears of the incident commander.

Real rescues — those trapped human beings that have no time left and cannot get out of the situation without you are waiting . . . how long they must wait for you will determine if they are rescues or probable fire-death removals.

The officer that performs a 360-degree size-up all the time is probably one that wants to duck the commitment anyway.

Question: “What is a trench cut or strip cut or whatever it is called in your area?”

Answer: It is a defensive fire tactic used as a last resort to hold an interior offensive firefight on the top floor of a burning structure. It is a last-ditch effort before changing the fireground strategy to defensive after accomplishing an orderly retreat of interior forces on the top floor.

In my jargon, it is a “third-alarm” tactic. It is performed after all tactical ventilation is accomplished in the roof of a building in which fire is in possession of a large portion of the top floor and cockloft (or attic). This assumes that building openings — scuttles, skylights, bulkhead doors (top of the staircase to the roof) and ventilation fixtures and other shafts — are all opened and that the primary ventilation hole in the roof is completed AND being enlarged AND the membranes separating the outer air from the seat or location of fire are removed or destroyed. Only after the interior aggressive engine companies begin to back up or are unable to advance due to fire spread should you think of trenching the roof.

A successful trench must be cut and opened BEFORE the cockloft (or attic) fire gets past its location and to the unburned side. With that said, it is an opening of 2 foot in width that extends from fire wall to fire wall, that will slow horizontal spread of fire by allowing it to get to the outer air. The cut must be from wall to wall and finished before any of the sheathing is opened. If it is partially opened or if it leaves some of the roof space unvented, it will effectively hurry the spread of fire and further trap the firefighters below the roof area.

Using this tactic should retard the speed of the fire through the cockloft as the fire reaches the opening there, giving the interior teams a slight advantage that they did not have moments earlier.

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