February 5 - “Escape from the attic”

I know.  The title sounds like an episode of Criminal Minds.  I had another chance yesterday to witness some of the training our Galveston fire fighters go through.  The scenario on this one was working your way through an attic while in full bunker gear and breathing pack.  Just the thought of it may awaken latent feelings of claustrophobia in many people, but these guys attacked it with a vengeance. 

They started out by making their way through two two-by-fours that were set up to be about the distance between the studs of a house wall.  Sounds easy enough, right?  Not necessarily.  Remember the bunker gear and breathing pack.  They had to turn backwards, allowing the breathing pack to enter the space first.  Then they made a motion as if they were swimming the backstroke through the space, first one arm, then the other as their body twisted through in response to the motion.  And some of them had to almost duplicate the motion to get their hips through. 

Next came a crawl across what would be some of those rafter beams in the attic.  I’ve been in our attic enough to recognize the effort it takes to keep your body on the rafters so you don’t fall through the ceiling sheetrock.  That’s not easy in shorts and a t-shirt.  And on their way the guys had to deal with occasional wires strapped across the track.  Why wires?  Again, I remembered back to my own jaunts in the attic.  Wires just like that are used to hold the air conditioning and heating ducts in place.  Of course in the simulation all they had to do was clip them with wire cutters.  But wait.  That meant they had to reach down into their pocket with gloves on their hands and find them.  And have you ever tried to operate a pair of pliers with gloves on?  Not so easy. 

Next was a drop down a few feet into what simulated a sub-ceiling.  They had to turn completely around and crawl on their stomachs to retrace their path, now underneath the rafters.  The instructor gave them the option of going from rafter to sub-ceiling either headfirst or feet first.  I would like to have seen someone try headfirst.  That would have been quite a gymnastic move.  But they were all wise enough to take the other option.  As the made their crawl, they then had to make a hard left-hand turn into a small, enclosed space that led to the final exit point.  I thought the turn might be a tough skill, but every one of the guys handled that with ease.  I guess that was a good thing, because to make their exit from the maze they had to squeeze through an exit hole about sixteen inches high.  That task, by the way, was impossible to perform with the breathing tank still on their backs.  So the backpack had to come off before they could “escape.”  But safety protocol required calling a “Mayday” before the tank was removed.  And any time a “Mayday” call comes across the radio, virtually everyone who hears it who isn’t actively involved in fighting the fire instantly stops what he is doing and listens.  So in a real life situation, that final extrication is probably the longest few seconds of the whole ordeal, as everyone waits for the “Self extraction completed” indication.  Of course they still had to exit through that same set of studs that was the entry point, and it was somehow not quite as easy as the first time. 

They were all physically and emotionally charged by the time they completed the exercise.  One of the safety measures involved in this kind of a drill is a blood pressure and pulse measure before and after to keep an eye on their health.  All of that entered into my response when several of the guys “invited” me to give it a try.  One even suggested that it would give me something to write about in my blog.  Come on.  Like I would write about something like fire department training procedures.  I assured them that I was never going to be running into a burning building, much less a burning attic.  They didn’t give up easily.  I heard some pretty ridiculous scenarios.  “What if your house in on fire and on your way out you come to some stairs so you go up the stair but they lead to your attic and you find yourself up there?”  Uh … right.  If my house catches on fire I promise to get my family out and run away.  And if any of my family is in the attic?  Again, that would be a strange scenario, but we have some highly trained professional fire fighters who have proven themselves before my very eyes to be proficient at just such a skill.  I think I’ll wait the four or five minutes and trust them to do their job. 

Psalms 33:20-22 says, “We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield.  In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name.   May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you.”

Father, thank you for the men and women who happily risk their lives to crawl through attics and run into burning buildings.  Be their hope and shield.  Amen.