FORT SILL, Okla. -- If there is building fire on post, Fort Sill Fire and Emergency Services firefighters are expected to respond within four minutes. Once on scene, they establish an incident commander and quickly assess the situation to begin search and rescue, firefighting or lifesaving techniques and sometimes all three simultaneously.
To maintain their proficiency in fighting structural fires, about 20 firefighters from four Fort Sill fire stations practiced their skills July 23, in Building 6018 Bessinger St., a vacant dormitory-style building on the initial entry training side of the post.
"This is like a big orchestra we all have different parts to play, but it all comes together in one event," said Clint Langford, Fort Sill assistant fire chief of training, referring to the different fire companies, who worked together. "There are multiple things that we are doing at the same time."
Although there were neither flames nor smoke (Fort Sill has no live-fire facility), everything else about the training was realistic including spraying water.
"Their tactics, firefighting strategies, radio communications will be just like real-world," said Langford, who coordinated the training and evaluated the firefighters' response.
Langford didn't make the training easy. He selected the most difficult sites to reach on the three-story building.
In the first scenario, firefighters from two companies responded to an automatic alarm and had to go up flights of stairs with their hoses and ventilation fan.
In the second scenario, firefighters from two other companies had to scale the building to get onto the roof to ventilate it. They did this with a manual extension ladder and then hand-lifted extraction tools to firefighters on the roof. They also used a 100-foot aerial ladder firetruck.
The training was an opportunity for some of the newer firefighters to learn to operate the aerial ladder as well as get conditioned to fight fires in the summer heat, Langford said.
Firefighter David Brammer, of Station No. 2, said the training was invaluable and that he gained experience working with the aerial ladder.
"We had a few minor (mechanical) hiccups, but there's always a Plan B and that kicked in," said Brammer, who has worked at the department for three years.
Firefighter Elroy King, of Station No. 3, acted as a lieutenant for his fire company for the training.
King said the training got the firefighters used to the command structure: "working with the incident command and getting the incident commander position rolling and getting personnel established in their roles of what they need to do."
After each training scenario, Langford led an after action review with the firefighters. He gave them kudos, pointed out what could have been done better and listened to their comments.
Fort Sill has very few structural fires because of the numerous built-in fire protection systems in buildings, including sprinklers, smoke detectors, heat detectors and fire alarms, Langford said.
"We have early detection of fires and quick responses," Langford said. "A lot of times we'll get there and the sprinkler system has it extinguished or the fire is so small we can put it out with a fire extinguisher."
Overall, the training went "really well," Langford said. "There were a couple mistakes which were quickly overcome, but this is where we want to make them on the training ground."
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