GETTIN' SALTY EXPERIENCE PODCAST Ep.232 | "Author's Corner "30 Fires You Must Know_

Disclaimer.

We'd like to know before the start of this interview that the opinions about to be expressed by the guest of tonight's Getting Salty Experience Podcast are that of the guest and do not directly or necessarily reflect the views of the host of the Getting Salty Experience Podcast.

We're listening to the Getting Salty Experience podcast.

Hello, Hello, Chiefly Experience. Welcome back to Experience podcast. That's the only one that brings chief Leave and the fire house kitchen table to you. We got Mike sitting into.

Here.

What's missing?

Hmmm, very very quiet.

I'm hunting, that's what's missing. Roofie roofer. I don't Ohio off the grid somewhere probably, I don't know.

I'm gonna hit us up on another seven, ten, twelve, fifteen point. I don't know.

I don't know what he's got. I mean, how much how much does he have to kill? He's already got to like fifteen points or something, right.

He's got some big ones. Last two. I think we're pretty decent from what he's selling us.

And he's back.

That's why I had an opening on the Hollywood Squares here right, Otherwise that's.

Right, circle gets a square?

Who do you want to be?

Square?

Gets a circle?

Whatever?

That show?

Portland? On that show? Yeah, I'll go back and gat myself. Lynn god man, look at that.

You definitely went back old.

I think he's older than me, though. Are you older than me?

I'm fifty five? How old are you?

I'm older than him? Are you lying?

You had me beat fifty six?

I got you by one man.

Fifty one, soon to be fifty two at the end of the month.

What's my twenty what twenty four? I'll be twenty five year Oh my god?

Yeah?

Whatever?

Yeah, all right, all shut your pile. You just start that a fire career too, Chief, Can you imagine to go?

Now?

What you what you know?

Now?

Right?

Just thought over man, what you have ahead of you, the potential? Don't squander it? My friend.

You know it's funny to say that cheap go ahead. Yeah, I was gonna tell you, Chief. I just uh give a little shout out to my new guys. They're getting ready to go to the road. I've got nine new guys going to the road. They get a little trial run next weekend. In the following weekend they get released to their shift. So I gave them that a good old speech. You know, the love they have for the job. Now, don't let it go away. Always remember that, reflect to

Uh.

I gave him a shout out. I said that we're gonna watch, we'll go.

I'll give a shout out to good luck in your careers. Uh, to the new firefighters wherever you are, and hopefully you're you're learning right these these podcasts such as this where we're gonna talk about two important fires tonight h A critical and keeping you healthy, safe and making sure that you have a long and fulfilling career.

Absolutely meant to that. You gotta drill it into him gons.

Yeah, so I hope we did. You know, we do the best we can. We got a ten week program, so it's pretty rigorous program.

Make this required watching. I hope to all you guys, I mean, you're the chief over there, right of training.

I try to throw it out there, you know, I.

Don't try to throw it out watching.

You know you want to throw out there. You gotta be careful, you know, remember.

I'm gonna tell you what you should this right here? Where did I get this? Is this back in stock Hell? Christmas?

Perfect?

Yeah, it's and it's It's been number one, number one best on Amazon in multiple categories as well, so in Amazon.

Look, we have a number one best selling author with us here tonight. What to the Team is written extremely well. I gotta tell you though, man, that chapter seventeen.

Yeah, one of the one of these shows will get to that.

But yeah, but do you forget me?

Yeah?

As I say, we have two authors tonight.

We have an author. I have his right here.

And I will tonight we'll do chapter twenty two and chapter Yeah, we're.

Gonna have Mike fall City. Wow, we're just we're just burst it all over the place.

But right before the holidays, Yeah, for sure.

And you don't even you don't even have your pipe tonight.

I have it over here. I could. I'm keeping that the pipe and this over there. You stay over there. There's no room for you here tonight. This yeah, should be required no shit, this should be required reading by all the academies around the country.

Man.

Yeah, we've heard some that some departments that are having it required reading. We've and we've heard from a couple that as we come out with these different podcasts featuring the chapters, that they are encouraging and some requiring.

Their members to listen to that too. So that's it's pretty cool.

It's just all these different methods, whether it's the book, the website, these podcasts, to really enhance the learning experience for these for these thirty fives.

Yep. Is the website up and running.

It is.

Yeah, the the links are not on it from the other podcast yet, but we'll be getting those on in the next week.

We've done ready.

Now we'll play it on every single podcast, not only this one that we do, but every guest that we have on because it's that important. Have you guys started writing the next facts you're talking about or at least.

No, we have not. We've only talked. We've we've talked briefly about it only because we've been we've been inundated. I guess is a good word to use with for people who would like to write about a fire that they had and honor their their brother or sister that was.

Killed in the line of duty.

So at some point right now, the bigger, the bigger challenges we're trying to get the podcast for each of the thirty fires, which I.

Don't know, I'll tell you what for.

For you guys that do the podcast on a weekly basis and and twice a week basis, it's a lot just be you know, So kudos to you guys for what you do in the quality of show that you that you.

Put out there.

And as you know, there's there's several really good quality fire department style podcasts out there, and it's amazing the effort that you guys all put into it.

So uh, I know, I appreciate it.

I know that the fire service in Lodge appreciates it, and we're all better because of it.

So thank you.

And we're only asking for a couple of things alike air and subscribe. Is that a lot?

No?

I don't think so.

I don't very reason too.

And I know we can get into with the guys tonight. But you write a lot. You've seen a lot in your career, a lot of it good, some of it not good. Because the fire service it's a hard job. You're going to see some tough things going through these events. I mean, even if you didn't know the person directly before their death. It does feel like you know them in reading their story. What's the emotional toll like, do you ever find yourself having to stop and compose yourself?

Yeah?

And you know what, and I've said it, uh before, I think so I take I take what we do very seriously, and I take our training, our education, are remembering on our history very seriously. I love the fire service and I love the people that that serve in the fire service. We are ultimately all cut from the same cloth, and we're all trying to pull in the same direction. And I think when we learn from incidents and we we do this and we're able to get we're able to be better.

You know, we're all pulling on We're all pulling in the same direction. But let's all get on the same rope. Let's make sure that you're learning all the things that we need to do.

And that comes through training and education and even you know, we talk about safety on the fire ground. Safety is a by product of your training, you know. And I had this conversation with.

So many people.

I didn't go to a fire and say, oh I got to be safe here. My training is what dictated how I operated at that fire ground and because I was well trained, because the people I worked with were well trained, that they were able to operate more safely just because of that. So training wasn't top of mind. A safety wasn't top of mind. What was was training and education and doing the job at hand, saving the savorable people and.

Knowing, yeah, there comes a risk of that.

Because we don't always know that a basement of a hardware store and Queen's going to have illegally stored combustibles is going to explode. We can't count for that, but we could account for ourselves through our training, and that's

Anyway, enough of EVR.

Es a good point because the I don't know if you guys caught it, I'm sorry for you. You mentioned safety earlier. Did you guys catch that piece of debris that fell off and then took the firefighter out? That was on Instagram? It wasn't paying attention. There's a lot of people on scene, and I think the facade fell down from a two story home if it was took out a couple of guys. So you're talking about the safety element, just paying attention, taking a step back being

Yeah, and that's why they have to look at the fire through the lens of safety.

When I was in safety chief, I was the same. That was my job.

That was so you have to know your job, do your job and be trained in your job. But I don't want my five. I want my five brice to be well trained and do their job, which makes them safe for on a fire round because they understand BIA dynamics, five behavior, they understand building destruction, and they understand all of that by virtue of their training.

Okay, so if you buy this book, let's say happen to buy this book, you could also talk about it

Man.

So go to the website, right the website www dots thirty fives dot.

You don't even have to sign into it, so you.

Know, if even if you know what, you can't afford to buy a book, you don't want to buy it, whatever.

It is, go on website.

Learn something today that'll save you that may save yourself five minutes ago.

I look.

You ready, you know what I'm gonna take. I'm gonna let Chief leave because that's what Louis usually does.

And yeah, that's why I kind of told him it was going to be his show, not I was.

Yes, so GOODHD, Chief introduce our guests for you for us in a minute.

So we're bringing in Assistant Chief Kevin McGee, son of.

Which the department.

Again, Chief, you were kind of drowned out by the applause, which department.

Prince William County, Virginia.

And Chief McGee is going to talk about chapter eleven in the book, a fire that occurred on April sixteenth of two thousand and seven that took the life of five fighter Kyle Wilson. And we're so appreciative to have you here cheap. But before we get into that, we're gonna bring in we're gonna bring in the other chief who's in the back. But also you gotta He explained how what his name, his last name means backstage, so explain it to the to the listeners what your last name means?

Well in Gaelic, when you have somebody last name starts with mc min that designates son O and then the g e E he is in Gaelic fire. So my name is son of Fire in Gaelic.

Yeah, I meant to be a chief all son of fire.

That was very nice.

I like it, but I can't do it.

What we're gonna say, Well, you're gonna hit me, put me up on the private all right, you're ready to bring it the next guy, Yes, he's basically waiting. He's basically waiting in the back.

I could see him. Was like, now he's smiling, Chief Leaves dealing with his wife.

Yeah, all right.

So we're bringing in John Bostonson, who is going to talk to us about chapter twenty two and the two firefighters that lost their life in the training fire, so on July thirtieth of two thousand and two.

So both of you, gentlemen, thank you so much for being here.

Rather than flip a coin, we decided that we would we would go with chapter eleven since it is.

Earlier in the book. But hey, before we start, I just want to do a quick shout.

Out to the Saint Petersburg Fire Department. So I was almost late tonight because somebody were ended my vehicle. I'm down to Florida speaking at an event tomorrow, and just a shout out to the brothers and sisters who responded.

It's a really good care of me and my family. So thank you for to those folks.

So the same all over the world.

Chief, They truly are, they truly are so yeah, so thank you to them.

And all right, so let's turn it over to Chief McGee.

Did we hit the pledge real quick?

It's actually pledge, Yes, that's we gotta get patriotic stand by on that guttle.

Here we go.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic, for which it stands, One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

All right, Chief McGee, the stage is your sir, thought us off.

Okay, Well, thank you chiefly and your team for inviting me to participate tonight, and thank you for the opportunity to tell our story in the thirty Fires that you should all know. It's an obligation that we took in Prince Willan County Department of Fire and Rescue and our fire and Rescue system to share the lessons learned from a tragedy that occurred to us on April sixteen, two thousand and seven, with the first and only firefighter fatality

Go to that absolutely to want to address a newcomer to the Okay, you want to start with our first slide.

So Technician one Kyle Wilson was really what we considered as a star. He excelled in his recruit school. He was in his probationary year assigned to a busy engine company and during his probationary year was involved in the incident of marsh Overlok Drive on April sixteenth that took his life. And as you can see from what we have in the bottom, we will never forget and we're going to continue to do everything we can to prevent

Next, wait to skip aside. There you go.

So on the morning of April sixteenth, there was a nor'easter or storm storm that was ripping up the East coast and we were caught in the middle of that. This location was right off Thetomic wherever we had sustained winds of twenty five miles an hour with many gusts that were forty eight miles per hour, and it actually it felt more than that. Temperature was forty five degrees. It was right around six o'clock in the morning. There were nineteen nine one one calls received and these were

Next copy of those So I was asking us a question if we can, if you want to address it now so we don't get too far ahead. He was asking, can you have the chief explain a reason or the reason for a chief from Montgomery and Fairfax Counties on the committee?

Was there a reason for Yes, we thought that was very important to have a cross functional team that was not only familiar with how we do things in Princellian County, but we wanted to be able to extend beyond our borders. What were some best practices outside of our jurisdiction, and to make sure that and we didn't have a concern for this, but we wanted to make sure that we eliminated any thought that would be biased from dimin having

Okay, all right, perfect, thank you.

So the first alarm assignment was three engines. The wagon is basically another engine the tower medic unit. I don't think the ambulance responded in a battalion chief. We had a heavy rescue that responded that was self initiated as well as a safety officer, and that was acceptable practice at the time.

I'm assuming that was obviously prior to the job the incident or at the dispatch of incident.

That was an initial dispatch. So the first enngine company arrived retortat fire on size b C. This was at six eight five twelve arrived right behind wagon five twelve, which they were the first year company. The size up was performed. It was early morning. There were carved in the driveway on the street in front of the residents. There weren't any lights on in the house, so it was still dark. They felt that the house was still occupied and as a result, they immediately called for a

Yeah, pretty big homes there.

It was a six thousand square foot house. This was a layout of the basement area. So it's two stories with the basement and so we can go to the next five.

Let's see the third s op taking two and a half into a private dwelling like that seems like a rather large hose line.

Now it was not, but they were looking at the extent of the fire, so it.

Was amount of the fire load there and they decided to stretch two and a half.

Yes, okay, big fire, big water.

And at the time the fire was on the side c It was an exterior fire that was working its way up the side of the house. So going back to the first floor, I just wanted to point out one thing. You can see that morning room. The occupants evacuated out of the house. US out of that back door and left that that back door opened, which a significant impact on the incident.

That's what the flow pass. Okay, so second floor.

Here, second floor, you can see the layouts, and so the crew, the tower crew were focused on evacuating since their size of indicates to them that people would still be sleeping. So let's uh, let's search the bedrooms. So then the Italian chief arise at six eleven Tower. Five

There.

At some point there was a smoke explosion. The officer was in the hallway, the firefighter was close behind him as far as we can detect, and the officer got caught up in a hallway table and was because of the smoke explosion, was thrown into the stairwell mm hmm. And then the the firefighter lowless contact with with his officer.

I'm sorry yeah, And so.

Mike and five twelve's officer reacted to change conditions and noise believed to be UH. The stairs burned out. At this point, there's a lot of fire that's working its way through the house. The wind is coming from side sea through the house. It's into the attic space. Part of the smoke explosion was the oxygen getting into that thick black superheated gas in the attic space and that second floor causing the explosion. We can go to the

UH.

Several other crews engaged, including the Repid Intervention team, and at this point it was like a bloke torch coming through that stairwell and crews climbing over each other. A crew would try to advance up the stairwell get pushed back. The backup engine company crew would crawl over them, only

Oh okay, I was going to ask about.

That, so.

Observed.

Okay. We talked about the cruise seeing the white helmet, evacuating the the fire.

Off the truck company officer. The may day was at six fifteen. The past alarm was sounding, but because of the ambient noise on the incident scene, nobody heard it.

Really cruise re entered the structure.

That was a short amount of time that that happened really quickly. Man, that went the ship fast.

Oh. It was incredible when you think about six six thousand square foot lightweight construction.

Homes with.

Highly flammable contents synthetic materials. The BTU production was incredibly high.

Did they have a hose line in place in the beginning when when the smoke explosion.

Yes, and it's okay.

It wasn't. It still wasn't enough with I mean it was like a blow towards coming out of side A and the structure.

Well, yeah, I was just going back to a twenty five mile winds, a gust of forty eight miles an hour. That and that back door. You said was left open, correct, okay.

And so you already had a breach in the attic space. You know when you have these outside in fires. It's working up the side of the house, up the vinyl siding and into the openings and the soffits and right into the attic space, which again is lightweight construction, so the structural integrity is very questionable. So there was a safety officer on the scene. He noticed that there was the uh partial collapse of the roof and called for evacuation of the structure and the cruise went to a

So next, well we don't have nothing, okay, we.

Go, so we'll show you where specifically where technician Wilson was located at a determination of the cause of death. It was thermal and in the lation injuries his pat The The only thing that was different or not in place when Kyle was found was his helmet that was approximately six ft away. His SCBA was worn properly, his face mask was still on, and his bottle was empty. The face piece was destroyed and the ozon, the self contained breathing apparatus was melted.

Okay, hope, sorry, you get that.

And the tower company officer had partial thickness burns on both ears and one finger. So this is the master bedroom layout. And there was a sofa that was in front of the window, and Barbara Wilson was found on the sofa. We believe that if that sofa wasn't there, he most likely would have made it to the window. But that obstruction just made it much more difficult and confusing in zero visibility conditions.

Just kind of holds true to where people say where they find victims, how close they ought to exit ways if you will, Yeah, just kind of ties into those those things. All right, there you go, nice picture of the house.

So I will give a tremendous amount of credit for the extremely difficult decision that safety officer and the incident commander to call the evacuation because the firefighters who were attempting the rescue of Firefighter Wilson would have certainly given their life to find him, and because of that call, they followed their orders and those lives were spared. So, as I mentioned earlier, the line of duty death investigative report had I think about two hundred and eighty some recommendations.

Needed to be.

Done at the national level. And I think that I want to give a great deal of credit to the International Association of Fire Chiefs and the Safety, Health and Survival section of the i f C, because they, when I approached them with I needed your help to address these national level recommendations, they stepped up and as a result, nationally recognized n f standards were changed. The self contained breathing apparatus standards now have base pieces that are much

It was just the higher temperatures.

Yeah, So major factors that we identified was the initial arriving fire fighting force was inadequate, the size of.

The fact that we can go back to that I don't know what the heck happened here, stand by, sorry, there we go.

The size of the fire development and spread was, as you had already mentioned, was incredibly quick and something that we need to address. The high wind impact on fire development and spread. The size of this structure, as well as the construction components and materials rappid the intervention and firefighter rescue efforts, as well as incident control and management.

So much.

Did they determine the cause of the fire chief.

It was officially it was undetermined, but we identified the origin as the mulch along the back of the house. This would be consistent with carelessly discarded smoking material. And you know, even with at the time we had just in Virginia gotten legislation for the self extinguishing cigarettes which initially were called firesafe cigarettes, but twenty percent of the

Two.

And we'll show the next slide this, These are the kind of structures that are being built not only in Princeleiam County, but around the country.

This he's a massive yeah.

Wow. So also.

The time temperature curve and were we were at each point.

Hey, Kevin, can I ask you real quick, can you go back to the last slide? And thanks for having me on late.

I had some fire department business to take care.

This is so symbolic because these houses are going all over the country, growing all over the country, and areas that were rural all volunteer and they just keep popping up. And when we look at that, we see how the community has changed. But how is the fire department changed services?

Yep, exactly.

And I know you, Kevin and your and the chief there before you had been pushing this. I know we were doing the same thing changing and there was a lot of resistance and it took this poor kid losing his life, which I guess is a positive because so many line of duty deaths do not necessarily leave to change, lead to change, and this one has led not just locally but nationally. But when I see pictures like this, if you take the house out of the way, that's what was there.

It was farmland, it was rurally.

But they're building all these areas up. But the fire Department's got it. As one of the one of our hosts said, it's got to change, it's got to keep up with the growth.

And it took Kyle Wilson getting killed, quite frankly, to be that wake up call.

Uh.

And who knows what you'd be dealing with today if it weren't for that. So to see that I know his family and you and others, his loss mattered, is I guess what I want to say.

And I would just add that I think it's incumbent upon the leadership of fire departments to inform they're elected officials, who are the policymakers, on what our capacity is to address these kinds of emergencies and what the implications are if we don't have the proper resources. And this is coming all across the country. I mean, we're we're seeing all kinds of new housing product that's coming out zero lot lying homes that you can reach your arms out

You know, the challenge we have too is the human factor.

If you tell the sanitation department you're staffing is cut, there will be more garbage on the street. If you tell Parks and Recreation, we're not going to mow the lawns as much, the lawns are going to be higher on the ball field. You put two people on an engine or five people on an engine, their desire to do what they can to help people. It's such a huge issue for us, more than any other profession. And

So I'll share a tip with you, a fire chief tip, and I hope that most chiefs are doing this already.

And you got to be this. You got to be the squeaky wheel. Sometimes you have to be persistent because sometimes, like you said, they have so much on their plate that the keep that fresh in their mind.

Yes, and I was told by my boss, was county executive, that the elected officials want me to dial it back just a little bit. So I found new and better ways to communicate with them.

That's not the finement, the more scale.

That's a big point, right, they don't know if if they don't know what's going on. You know, we're the ones that have to advocate for our staffing and for equipment and everything and has been mentioned these bigger houses with smalllines. Is that this this is a problem everywhere. It doesn't matter where you are, from New York City to rural communities. These are these big mc mansions with

About all of these topics.

So to hear the changes that have made, to hear that that h that this young firefighter's death, uh, you know, led to significant change is important. I know this is a heavily studied fire and every firefighter should absolutely positively no fire.

There's there's one additional important factor that I just want to touch on here that's not the presentation, if I have a minute, is how we take care of our people after a tragedy like.

This fits right in that.

Your department is at risk when these situations occur with posts incident, stress disorder, other psychological issues, a pulling back on the risk tolerance that your staff has. We couldn't get staff to take promotional exams because they realized, if I take this new responsibility and I'm on one of these incidents, I don't want to be responsible for an incident where somebody loses their life.

And so.

We had to address how we allow people to step out of their comfort zone into a growth zone. So it was like, we're not going to We're going to train you and develop you to be an officer before you're an officer, rather than put you in an officer position, than develop you and to have critical incidence, stress management programs and say behavioral health support for for our personnel

M I appreciate you bringing that up, and I think you know there's a reason for the saying the heaviest tool on the fire ground is the flashlight, and you know for the for the officer and the recognition of making sure that we train our officers to be officers before their officers is such an important point and something that is missed so often where it's you know, we we have to we have to change that and not you know, we got to be brilliant at the basics,

So I appreciate you bringing bringing that additional points up.

I just wanted to make one point about the psychological effect.

Uh.

I don't remember where it was. I was at a job one time and a little girl died in the attic and the guys from the truck company couldn't get to her. It was just blowing out the windows. And I remember guys coming down rowan as the toughest guys you've ever seen, crying in the streets saying, I couldn't get to it. I just couldn't get through. I just

I couldn't not have been prouder of every firefighter and every fire officer on that incident scene, as well as the dispatchers that are public take the communication.

Ce Kevin, let me ask you a question.

We have a part of the clip of the may.

Day that we're going to attach so beavers can click on it. Okay, would it also be appropriate to play a little bit of that now as you wrap this up?

Or would you rather not?

Sure? Sure?

Sure? Please do have aunt.

Yes, that's the time stamp you sent me.

Correct, Yes, that's what I got from Billy.

Yes, all right, give me one second here can said here.

Mm hmm o, my.

Farewell, ye.

Conquer I don't know where I am.

Calling.

That gives a great example of what they were going through. And thanks for keing that up, Fellas. We will link that to the story we'll have it of course on the thirty fires website, but I think the guys from getting Salty you can add that to this link as well. There shouldn't be a firefighter in this country that does not start that power point video from the beginning to end and watch that. We all, we do at all

And that's it right there. Thank you for being with us, Kevin.

Thank you honor to be with you in the sheriff.

That could you know, come get me, kills me?

Yeah, so I got the website.

Mm okay, thanks for putting that in the chief. Thanks again for joining us today.

We superitiated and we.

Honor our fallen by by remembering the lessons and reinforcing the lessons that they provide.

And you've certainly done that tonight for us, and we are grateful for that.

Thank you.

Kevin.

You're gonna stick with us as we break and then go to Bart's program.

Yes, yes, sir, all right, so we did. We did a brief into introduction of Bart. But Billy, you want to as we transition into chapter twenty two and say a few things about our next guest.

Well, first of all, Bart is one of the original Fools when they started the Fools group years and years and years ago, and that could be a whole nother Getting Salty program.

Because he's got a it's a great story.

But Bart I met through teaching, through FDIC, through other stuff, and then one day he led a training fire and he was that's what he's going to talk to us tonight is about how a training fire full well intentioned, purest intentions. Definitely, let's train. I mean, it's hard enough to get some officers to train, right, let's go do something here. Here Bart is going above and beyond and things went horribly wrong, and I'll let.

Him pick it up from there and tell his story. If that's yep.

Cool.

Thank you, Chief Leaving, Chief Goldfitter for having me on here and the Getting Salty podcasts too, So it really means a lot. And like Chief Leeb said that we try to honor our phone brothers and remember them the best that we can. This is my way of doing it by being able to be a part of the book and being on a podcast. And sometimes I get to talk around the state of Florida because of our fourteen oh three law that we have and I'm asked to speak about that, but again, thank you guys, And

So we had and.

We walked everybody around the structure at that time, showed them where the exits were, where the windows were. They knew where the fire was going to be. The scenario was given to them that it was going to be a search and rescue and fire attack.

Program.

So and then also for our setup we had in that area, we had municipal water, We had a five inch line supply line laid to the attack engine. Two inch and three quarter lines were pulled off of that, and we had a eighteen hundred gallon tanker that was our wrint line, and we had the line off of that tanker for the rent team.

It was charged.

Also Lieutenant Nickel and Firefighter Beg were part of the search crew. And then we had a crew and a backup crew on top of the WRIT team and the RIT team consisted of two people. The attack team was it was two and then we had the backup line was also two. We had three safety officers inside the building at the time of ignition. So kind of if again pull up the picture of the house, if you would go onto so that's that side a at the building.

The fuel load.

Consisted of hay pallets. There was a mattress placed in there. There was other fuel load that in that room which to turn or play a factor into the into the fire later which happened to be. There was wooden closet doors there, the carpeting was still on the floor, wood.

Molding in the room. Things like that.

Rooms, all the rooms were intact at the time the windows were intact in the building.

Again, a walkthrough was done.

If you look over to the left, just to the right of that left window, that's the main entrance into the into the house. So that's where all the crews made their made their entrance into the building. So as we said that, we had the three safety officers in there, and safety officers were part of the ignition team as well.

To the right.

There was again the hv AC closet and then another closet was there. So the kind of leave that up for a couple of minutes when the fire was ignited. After everybody was briefed they were in prior to the ignition. Again, the emergency evacuation signal, which was the ten blasts on the airhorn was given to everybody. They knew what the evacuation signal was going to be on top of radio communications. So once once everybody was in place ready to go

In the In that hallway was prior to the.

Fire room is where the safety officers were staged, and they kind of made contact with the safety officers as they were entering the hallway and entering the fire room. Shortly after the search crew was sent into the building, the attack Team one was sent in to go and back them up and protect them.

I asked you a question, did the safety officers have thermal imaging cameras or the way?

Now at that time, our department did not have thermal imagine cameras and that actually the strange thing was that we got some vendors that were supposed to bring us some and they were running late. We were supposed to have two cameras at that time and we didn't have it. So so again the attack team followed the search crew

Started hallways at dead end going down towards the front of the building too. Yes, it's only it's one way in and all the way down. It's very confusing at the top between the bathroom and the living room into that hallway.

Yes, yes, it was one point.

Did you did you suspect something was like really wrong, chiefly like when.

When I wasn't getting reports from the search crew and when I saw the condition to change rapidly. And then one of the safety officers got hot and he came out and I asked him, I said, do you know where the search crew is? He said no, So again we tried getting him on the radio, and then we started telling the other people inside the building, you know, look for the search crew.

As that was going on.

Again, there was a lot of confusion there in that little little hallway congestion. Shortly after that, the rent team was sent in took their hose line in, so they thought they had the fire knocked down, but still nobody had seen the search crew and one of the members of the rent team broke off and went to the

Turned it white.

Yeah, after they got in there and got knocked the fire knocked down, if I remember correctly, the one of the members from the search team or the writ team, and one of the guys on the initial attack line were in that room. They found Lieutenant mikel He was closest to the fire. Again, its severe burns, thermal thermal challenge to his s c b A all that. He was rapidly removed from there. And I received that report

On was his air pack and stuff that intact as well. I don't know if you mentioned that.

Yes, every space and everything was on.

Yeah, that's what I was told. I've never got to see his face, beast, but I have seen his gear, but you know it is gear or gear and s c b A strapped and the bottle received a lot of thermal challenge to it, I want to call that. Shortly after that, one of the safety officers who had come back out went in that window where the outside vent person had taken out.

Again.

There was like steam coming off the floor, was smoking things like that, and that's when he found firefighter bag and he was rapidly removed from the from the fireroom and outside of the outside the building. So and you know, as things are going along, you know, I requested we call her ambulances, rescues, requested to rescues and helicopter on the way, just kind of seeing the condition that they

Wow, what was the total time?

You know, like I said, it.

Seems like hours, but I think about fifteen or sixteen minutes.

Wow, you know, so it happened fast.

Yeah, And as we were talking earlier, we were I got to go to NISS to see them do one of the studies they did or one of the tests. So they actually did a mock up of the room. Because every everything, everybody had their idea of, you know, what caused it to fuel load, you know, the carpeting, the mattress. The mattress seemed to be a big, a big thing that everybody was kind of honing in on.

You know.

It helped me understand what all went in that on in that room, by going tons to see the reenactments that they did, learning a little more insight into the into the science and and everything like that.

So you being there and going tons, what what is your general feeling of what took place there?

I think it was a combination of the fuel load it was originally set, the that that window was a hurricane or a commercial grade glass. I think that might have had something to do with it. And again the fuel loading of the room itself, like the louver doors for the air conditioner or the closet again, the carpeting.

And all that. I think a combination of everything.

The room just flash and that was it.

Yes, yeah, so see I could see that.

So we have to take everything, have to come out of a structure. Now we can't burn we burn down here now thanks to NFPA fourteen oh three, Well that's has to be ripped out. You can't burn anything. You have to take everything out of the house. So a chuir, structures are not as fun as they sound.

You can't really and that really this fire was the impetus for a lot of that change and a lot of the law. And you know you mentioned in Florida in many states, they can say fourteen oh three, it's actually law in Florida to conducted training, and it was because there was a bill passed in their honor, Was that not right, part.

Yes, yes, one of our.

One of the people from the community kind of got a hold of the legislatures and pushed for it real strict and again it was in honor of John in Dallas, and so we wouldn't have this tragedy. Again know, not only in the state of Florida, but other other people across the country have also taken that law and made it law in their state too, you know. And again fourteen oh three was updated a couple of times since then. Just like Gonzam said, it's it's it's very strict and and everything else.

And yeah, it's a it's definitely very stringent. Even with that last incident, and not to get off topic, but the last incident that just happened to Mimmy Dade during another training incident where we lost a couple of guys, it's, you know, there's some more change that you know. Now they're holding people more accountable, you know. So it's just another element to that fourteen oh three where it's probably some more change will come from their incident.

Right, And that that picture of that house, it's very deceiving. It doesn't look that big for the outside. It's like a bungalow.

Yeah, just taken several days after the after the incident.

That's when the Fire Marshal's office. That's one of their pictures when they started the investigation. Okay, well, I would say that it's later on that day or whatever they had it started boarding it up and then and then open it back up to get some more pictures.

So my apologies my my video.

My internet is a little on stable, so I have my camera off, but I can see what's going on in here. So this, yes, when you think, when you think about fourteen oh three, right, So it's one of

So you know, we know that these things happen.

And they're difficult, but we are super appreciative of you being able to come on and spread the word.

Thank you.

Yeah, it's kind of been my goal to honor John in Dallas the way, the best way that I can and is that to talk about the incident and you know, share with everybody in the fire service, because there are still people I know that I hear stories that, well, we got a house to burn, and y'all all come, and you know, it's hard to believe in twenty twenty

Hey, Bart, it's almost there's almost an understanding that something bad out a house fire, as Kevin spoke about earlier, this is a training.

Event, and I guess.

Let's talk, if you don't mind, for just a minute about the behavioral health aspect. This took down a lot of people, more than just the two guys that lost their lives. Can you share a little bit about that, what the department did then, what you think they would do today, anything like that.

Yeah, after the fire, we were all taken to one of the firehouses, and cism and all that was not It was just getting started in the Central Florida area, and they had some people that I think thought they knew more than what they did, and this was kind of their first big incident.

So I know that.

It didn't go well. They they gave it the old school try, but I can tell you that I got up and walked out several other members.

And it did not go well.

Since then, the department has a very very good CI s M team, And again that's all around Central Florida and across the state of Florida, you know. So and we have the health and safety collaborative that's through the fire chiefs and everything else. And Goneza, your past chief was a big initiator initiator of that. So you know, going back to then things weren't good. And I can tell you when when I was referred to go talk to somebody from the EAP program, I was ready to kill him.

When I left. He did not understand, did not and he was not good for me.

And I think, yeah, I got a little bit of help after that, But the biggest help I got from my brothers and sisters across the United States that kind of knew me and knew when things weren't right, and and just talking about it really helped. And and even today it still helps to talk about it because there's there's days that you know, I still think about that fire. I think about John and Dallas. John was a pretty

But you know, it's still still a little sore for some people.

And again, you know, go out and get educated and for for those involved in line of duty bests or any fire fatality. We've changed our a way of thinking in the fire service that you know, yeah, I asked them, is an important thing. Get out and talk to people and get somebody. You know, there's people that will listen to you, you know, whether it's your peers or we now have professionals that know what our job is and

Or you know you you you you touched on something there. First of all, this was there for the grace of God to go.

We no question about it.

This fire training was run a thousand other times that year and a thousand other places, and unfortunately yours is the one that went wrong. That's exactly how the training was done by every It was we didn't know, we didn't know, right, Okay, And again it's just the same with Kevin's situation. As horrible as it is, the loss has mattered. There are firefighters, no question, alive because of

Losses are, but what do we do with it?

Then helps many of those who are living on to know that we are making a difference, and you certainly are. And to those who you know, it's like it's like talking to somebody about high rise.

If I want to hear about higher as you talk.

To him and he'd done if you want, because he's been there, done that, okay, and he tea which is that you want to talk about single family dwelling fires with things that are terribly wrong, you talk to Chief McGee because he was there. He's been there, done that, and it's the same thing with you. So and I know this is an emotional.

Beyond.

I know I speak for all the guys and getting told he was so glad you hit and I taught about this.

But the troops have got to understand this is in the game.

This is not bullshit. And God help anyone who said to you what they said to you, because they've never walked the bent an inch in your shoes. And you're still around, You're still teaching, You're still making a big difference.

That's a big deal, brother.

For sure.

And you know, through the hurt comes learning and hopefully healing. For you, guys, we appreciate you sharing these stories so guys can learn from it, you know, and you know, like Billy said, it's for something, you know, it's to pass along these tips. And I thank you, know Billy and Chief Lee for coming up with this idea of putting all these stories together. Great idea who was it was. It was you had to be you billy right. Yeah,

He was actually being driven around the city with a chauffeur.

Is he still I can't see him?

I don't know.

I'm still here.

He's still here, he's writing.

Said.

One more point of the mental health side. Having the services in place for when you have a traumatic incident is critically important, But just as important is how you prepare your people from the beginning and doing the psychological first aid because our emergency response personnel are exposed to constance dressers, the little ones and the big ones, one after another after and to prepare them to have resilience is extremely important.

That brother, Yeah, amen to that. And I'm going to add on to that.

The First Respondent Center for Excellence has some no course training in that regard on our learning management platform and you can go to First Respondent first Respondercenter dot org and log onto the learning management system.

There's a stress first aid. There's a couple of new ones coming out, so.

You're right, we have to go upstream and make sure that we're taking care of our brothers and sisters long before they need.

It, and that's what we're trying to do.

So thank you for bringing that up, because it's okay to not be okay, but it's even more important that we make sure that we are building resiliency into our firefighters and we do that from day one when they join our beloved profession.

So thank you again for.

Being out there and talking about this and and really both of you guys to taking a lead to make sure these stories are not forgotten and these firefighters are not forgotten.

Just to throw something else in there, you know, we talk about you know, I've kind of been in the fire service. I'm trying to catch up the billy, but I don't know if I'll ever do that. But things are things. People are different now, you know. And you know, for us older guys that have been around for a while, the things that we have seen that you know, and I guess over the years that it's you've seen it. It kind of in the way we were brought up. Maybe it didn't affect us is as bad as it

Or the one that's like a cross plus minus? Yeah, plus a minus.

I've heard so just so you know, yeah, yeah, And but we have to take that into consideration again. You know, it seems like the world is more violent and we're going to more you know, more incidents that were exposing these younger guys too, and we have to you know, like Chief Gee said and Chief Leep said that, you know, we have to take that into consideration these days, the way the younger generation is because you know, at first, I started laughing because I had somebody on the job

Well, then I'm going to add one to chief leads and actually to Chief Gee. When they said you have to start when they come in the job building resilient resiliency, I say, you start on your own kids at home, Stop building resiliency. Start teaching them so they're not you know this way when they get to that point. You know, it has to start before they get on the job. Yes, I'm trying to work with Gonzo the best I can, but I think he's a lost course. I don't know.

A great point.

Bart.

You bring up the generation, and it's really important for the company officer to understand it doesn't matter if.

You like or don't like this new generation.

This is what you got and you need to if they weren't molded as Cube said, if they weren't molded right at home, you got work to do it the plous But we have to understand that stress is real. And I do the same squints like you said. Somebody says PTSD, come on, will you Kidney, But you know what, it's their PTSD and his bosses.

We got to make sure we take care of that right.

The man behind the curtain. Anything else for you to say, sir, yeah, pay no attention to that man the black screen.

I do want to say one other thing, if I may, Billie, I want to thank you and recognizing for what you did to support my department in the National Fire Service when if you recall when I came to you, you were in the leadership position in the Safety, Health and Survival section, and I approached you because you were somebody I knew since you were chief in the neighborhood department, and uh, when I shared with you, we have some work to do at the national level to make it

Not at all.

He's a good guy, got a great mustache too.

You know, I think there's a cartoon out there something.

I'm not going to do it. If we have to queue it up, but dude, you believe you do it, so good tonight. Trampone man just going to call them trampone.

All right, So we're going to continue with this, right, gentlemen.

Yes, yes, so you asked earlier.

Of course, Frank and I and thank you Kevin very kind. There was no options to help push this and make some change. Frank and I started this when we basically just as friends talking on the phone. Hey, how come you know, why don't the firefighters know about this?

Don't know about that?

I looked at one of my crews, Oh, there you are, Hey, he's there, and uh, you know. One of the key ones was I said to a crew of firefighters, well this is just like what happened in Hacketsack. And they looked at me like I had three heads that the name Hackensack didn't click. And that was the idea of Frank and I spoke and I gotta tell you and this is a nonprofit venture with all of our proceeds and being donated. But what's important is it's it's really

But yeah, we got Amazon.

We got to think from Amazon it's a best seller. That's a big deal in the Amazon world. So and look it was Frank and I came up with the idea. But just like in a fire, here's a couple of chiefs, but the job gets done by the people on the fire ground.

Well, this job got done by the thirty one.

Authors who participated in this book to share their stories, like Bart and like Kevin.

Chapter seventeen's exquisite. I'm just going to say that one more time.

That's the one we hear more.

Oh there you are.

I don't know if you wanted to really so we have okay goods. I couldn't.

I could not do that more than he's more than a glorious Mustang.

Somebody scanning through the internet and they said it must be getting salty.

Sorry, sorry, I just had to do that.

I want to thank you all for coming on again tonight.

As always, and yes we have war planned.

Adding to that amount of times he's been on the show, he's the most prolific guest and now co host of the Get Insulted Experience podcast Whenever louis out and Billy and Bart and Chief Beginni. Thanks for coming on than what are we gonna do this again next month.

We gotta get a date, yeah, Frankel coordinator.

Yeah, I'm the I'm the coordinator of that. So you know, coops, you know you'll you'll send me some dates.

Right, I know how it works.

You just started the fire school, Mike.

No, not yet.

Early next year.

We're thinking either January or February.

They haven't give me a date yet, young face. We're just staying Billy. What would be like to be in his shoes right now, just stepping into the fire service right now, like twenty four years old. Oh, I'm jealous.

I love you have the job for right now before you even.

Here, it already does. Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, hell of a firefighter for thank you, Chief.

I appreciate it.

Stole away from the love of cops.

Man he wanted to be. He was die hard still.

By cops just could never do their job. I don't know how they do a shoutout to them as well.

All right, so we will see you guys probably next week, I think. Right. Oh, we got to do the shoutout Johns. Please. We had a gentleman pass away. Wasn't allowed to do aty death, but it was a sudden death. He was a big fan of the show, loved the fire service. Go ahead away, buddy.

It was City of William's Sport by Michael Bashan. If I am pronouncing his last name correctly, he died. He's had nine news on the job. I'm gonna pull up his picture now or share it with you.

Uh.

He is a Mike who's lieutenant on the sequeltomb a wealth of knowledge, so he's gonna be one of the smartest and best firefighters they had.

So rest in Pea's brother.

Yes, so that's him.

And obviously in honor of our guests tonight, I have a little, uh, couple of little pictures. I don't have those two gentlemen.

And then we have that kid looks so young man, So rest in peace. Any last thoughts before we head out, Chief sleep Billy.

Anybody Merry Christmas and happy and safe New Year, and take care.

I got all I want for Christmas. This is all I wanted and I got it. That's it on Amazon. Get a lot of Amazon. Keep on learning, keep on learning.

It is speaking of Christmas time. This Christmas time, you guys need to get out and get your till.

Go to www. Dot getting. Don't go into the guys, we're talking back. I'll get your address so we can tell you that they're free. Fine and love free stuff, my chief, fine, love stuff. All right, until next time. You know what I say, Stay low and go.

Thank you, guys. Have a good night. I'm gonna say see you in the top floor tonight, Mikey take us home baby.

All right, I'll be with everyone. Be safe, have a good night, and ladies and gentlemen, beat byes and toys are dropping. Transmit the signal seventy three what

Good henyone