make
The Canadian-made FireQ-RVS – or response verification system – is a communication system and service that connects volunteer firefighters through their mobile phones. Designed by a volunteer firefighter on Cape Breton Island, the system lets department personnel know which members are responding and how long it will take them to arrive. See story page 8.
wouldn’t normally write a story – particularly a cover story – about a product or service. But when Karen Gillis of Breton Smartek called me last summer about the FireQ-RVS response verification system for volunteer fire departments, she was convincing, and I was keen to meet the fire captain who created this intriguing software and app.
When I left Coxheath, N.S., after a three-hour interview and demo last August, I had been roundly convinced by Capt. Ian McVicar that FireQ is to the fire service what iPhone is to communication – a game changer.
The Coxheath Fire Department is part of the Cape Breton Regional Municipality Fire & Emergency Services; there are 750 volunteer firefighters in the CBRM’s amalgamated region, serving a population of more than 97,000 out of 36 stations.
Being a Cape Bretoner, of course, I knew there would be a connection
McVicar, it turns out, is part the McVicar clan with whom I went to school in Sydney, N.S.; his uncle, Art McVicar, owned the pharmacy in the Ashby neighbourhood next door to the house in which I lived in the early 1970s – across the street from the Ashby fire hall. I learned to ride a bike on the sloped pavement in front of the hall, and quickly got used to the sound of sirens –maybe that explains some things! That hall closed a few years ago after mould was found inside; the municipality has yet to rebuild due to a shrinking tax base and lack of funds.
McVicar is ex-military and talks faster than I could take notes – part passion for his product and the job, and part rapid-fire Cape Bretoner.
After years of arriving at fire calls and not knowing who else would show up, McVicar designed the FireQ system – a response, tracking, data management and communication program that simplifies every aspect of the fire department for firefighters and officers.
What’s more – and this may not have occurred to the developers – FireQ addresses a longstanding issue for municipalities: service levels. With municipal budgets continually strained and consultants recommending composite response models as affordable alternatives to career departments, it’s difficult to justify full-time staff in areas with low call volume.
The argument that a volunteer department creates more risk because of the uncertain response becomes moot with FireQ. Not only does the officer on scene or at the fire hall know exactly who’s showing up and when, the system is designed to reduce unnecessary responses to false alarms (see story page 8) so that volunteers – and their employers – grow to trust the program and will show up when they’re most needed.
As McVicar traipses to fire conferences to show off FireQ – he was in Grande Prairie in June at the Alberta Fire Chiefs Association show when I was there, and will be at the Maritime Fire Chiefs Association in Pictou this month (the 100th anniversary of the MFCA!) – more and more departments are testing and then implementing FireQ.
There is always talk at fire shows and conferences about the most significant change in the fire service in the last 10 or 20 or 50 years. I think we’ve found it. ***
Months ago, I approached Margo Tennant about writing a column on public education. I knew Margo through her previous job as an administrative assistant with Caledon Fire & Emergency Services. After accumulating all the necessary courses and training, Margo was hired in 2012 as a fire and life-safety educator in Brampton, Ont.
Like many of the people I approach about writing who I know can produce great content but need some encouragement to go public, Margo was skeptical. But I’m fairly persuasive, and over lunch and coffee and some calls and emails, I convinced Margo to put her passion to paper and offer the wealth of resources at her disposal in Brampton to our readers.
Margo’s debut column is on page 22. Please give her some feedback so she can tailor her column to the needs of departments from coast to coast.
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This column is not about Las Vegas, or gambling or the Golden Nugget hotel chain, but it is about betting on success. The golden nugget is a tool for use by of the fire service and may prove to be a game changer for your department’s training and operations.
At Salt Spring Island Fire Rescue, the nugget program may be one of the smallest changes we have made, but it has provided big results.
If you Google the word golden, you will find adjectives such as richness, radiant, and shiny. Searches also describe golden as the greatest value of importance, prosperity, favourable, and assured success.
If we explore the word nugget, we find terms such as great value, lump of something precious, bite-sized, and something small but excellent.
The two words – golden nugget – create a powerful combination, and the defining terms reflect the true meaning: a rich, valuable, bite-sized chunk that delivers success.
So, what is a golden nugget, and how will it lead you and your team to success? Let’s delve into how we at Salt Spring Island Fire Rescue have created this concept and watched it grow.
Each morning, the staff and any paid, on-call firefighters who were at the hall would meet for a few moments to lay out the day’s game plan and determine who was where and doing what. These meetings provided us with a much-needed kick-start to the day, but we all craved something, we could take away from the meetings to help us feel we had become better firefighters. This is how the nugget was born. I introduced the golden nugget as a simple idea to help give some more value, depth and collaboration to our daily crew meetings. Now, months after we introduced the golden-nugget concept, crews look forward to a new nugget each morning.
powerful tool for conducting a virtual walkthrough of a neighbourhood. These sessions often generate healthy discussion regarding strategies and tactics as we digitally walk the streets. The concept is to share valuable nuggets of information, rather than a slick presentation; the value is in the information, not the medium.
Since we started doing golden-nugget sessions, we have covered hydrants, buildings, wildfire plans, major-event plans, new tools, new technology, new apps, tactics, and road familiarization.
We introduced the golden nugget as a simple idea to help give some more value, depth and collaboration to our daily crew meetings.
Our initial goal was to cover a new topic at the end of each crew meeting, incorporating an element of training or pre-planning. For our golden nuggets to be successful, they must be topics that don’t drastically affect our daily duties.
We have found that short information sessions, running 10 to 20 minutes, that involve everyone, work best. Although these sessions are not meant to be full-blown training exercises, they often lead to more lengthy discussions that involve blearning moments.
Nuggets should be simple and specific to a single topic; nuggets can be geographical, or building nuggets, or pre-plan scenarios – the possibilities are endless. The beauty of a nugget is that you can revisit it months or years later to update the topic or re-familiarize yourself and your crews with an issue.
We have found that maps, drawings, and pre-incident plans all helped to enforce the learning and understanding. We mix it up: sometimes we use a printed Google map; other mornings we use the iPad connected with the Apple TV for a different media experience. The iPad does allow for some pretty interactive discussions and visualization. Google Maps is an excellent and cheap pre-planning and familiarzation tool. The street view function on Google Maps is a simple and
The nuggets really click when we take a few moments after the meeting and actually visit the location of the day’s nugget. So, if we review hydrants in a certain neighbourhood, we take the engine to see the hydrants and drive the roads. Visiting the locations enforces the learning, and the information becomes engrained in our minds if we need it at 3 a.m.
The key to the nuggets is to make them shareable. After the crew meeting, we create a short handout to share with all members. Not all members can attend the crew meeting, so in order to have the entire department on the same page, it is crucial that the message and the lessons learned be shared. A PDF can be emailed, posted in the fire hall, or uploaded to a secure learning management system. Be creative; find ways to grab the attention of your firefighters so they all have the opportunity to learn. A picture says 1,000 words, so make your nuggets visual: use photos, maps and diagrams.
You can also include links or QR codes so firefighters can further explore the topic. A QR code can lead to a video, a pre-plan, or a website that extends the learning from the nugget session.
Now that we have a small collection of nuggets we have created a binder for the lunchroom that contains all the latest nuggets. Accessibility is important; don’t let these valuable nuggets go to waste on a shelf somewhere. Show them off.
Daily nugget sessions will help you discover gaps in your operations, new ways to work, strategies for handling certain issues, and ideas about equipment. These sessions work in career halls, composite halls, and volunteer stations; the structure might be different but the concept is the same.
We have already noticed a difference in our operations from our nugget sessions; responses to a number of emergencies have gone more smoothly.
After each morning meeting, we assign a member to bring forward a nugget the following day. Empowering firefighters to take the lead produces a real team-learning environment. Make every day a learning day.
Arjuna George joined the fire service in 1997 and is now the deputy chief of operations on Salt Spring Island, B.C. Email him at ageorge@saltspringfire.com and follow him on Twitter at @AJGeorgefire.
by Laura King
Ian McVicar knows the frustration of waiting at a fire scene with no idea who else is responding or when the trucks will show up – if the trucks will show up.
McVicar is a volunteer captain with the Coxheath Fire Department on Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. He lives two minutes from the hall – closer than any other member – so on weekdays, he’s the duty officer and goes directly to the scene when there’s a call.
Until recently, that meant McVicar had no way to determine which of the department’s 24 other volunteers were responding to the hall or heading to the address in their own vehicles.
“I know that fear and horror, where there’s nobody coming and there’s no one to help, and that’s foolish,” said McVicar, who is ex-military and likes things to be in order. “When I’m leaving for a fire scene I
know I’m coming, but nobody else does.”
McVicar is a partner in a software company called Breton Smartek (www.bretonsmartek.com). With the help of a team of developers, McVicar has created a program and app that tell the duty officer – and everyone else who needs to know – which firefighters are responding, how long it will take them to get to the hall, and the level to which they are trained. What’s more, the system allows the duty officer to tell responders to stand down for a simple alarm call, tracks responses so chiefs can chart attendance and calculate time toward the volunteer firefighter tax credit, inventories all department equipment, and creates incident reports after firefighters clear the scene.
“In the last seven or eight years, every new person who walks into this department has a smart phone, and they spend tons of time in front of it,” said McVicar. “So I said, let’s connect the dots; we can build something so they can communicate with us – because our pagers are only one way –
without getting into $1,200 radios; they’re basically carrying computers on their hips.”
The system – called FireQ-RVS – requires an internet connection and takes advantage of GPS technologies, which is standard on smart phones. Apps have been developed for Blackberry, iPhone, Android and Windows phones.
FireQ-RVS stands for response verification system. Q is a play on the word queue – or list – of firefighters who are responding. There are similar response systems based on text messaging and email, such as I Am Responding (www.iamresponding. com) and Active 911 (www.active911.com) – both are American – that are used by Canadian departments and work well. Features include hydrant locations and management and web-based scheduling; some systems
ABOVE: The Canadian-designed FireQ-RVS system is GPS based and allows firefighters to use their phones to indicate their arrival time at the hall or the call.
offer free trials. McVicar says the advanced GPS and mapping technologies set FireQ apart. FireQ also has some additional categories for department and personnel management that are designed to improve communication and help fire chiefs and training officers save time and alleviate frustration.
“One of the things we’re really weak on in the fire department is administration,” McVicar said, “so we built in an inventorycontrol system, a way to manage training, certificates, and member data. One of the big things now is that you have to have 200 hours to qualify for the federal tax credit; somebody has to track all that time and the chief has to sign off on that.
“This system tracks everything you do –the calls you attend, the training – and creates a profile. We had a manual call log and we’d go through it and you’d have to look for your name and build a chart. The administrative burden was becoming too much.”
More than 30 departments in Canada and the United States are using FireQ. Four departments besides Coxheath in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality have signed on. In New Bruswick, the Grand Falls and Oromocto departments are clients. The Township of Tyendinaga in Ontario uses FireQ, as does the Chauvin Fire Department in Alberta and Williams Lake in British Columbia.
Oromocto Fire Chief Jody Price said his department has found three key efficiencies with FireQ: knowing who is responding to a call and the ETA helps firefighters who have already arrived at the station determine whether to hold a responding unit to wait for more personnel or dispatch it immediately; having duty officers receive text messages when members are responding helps the incident commander determine whether there is a need to call for mutual aid; and the “texting members” feature has simplified day-to-day communication.
In addition, Price said, the fact that FireQ is Canadian makes it easy communicate with the company to receive support and offer feedback.
“We initiated a trial run of the application with the volunteer component of our department,” Price said. “We were so impressed that we have ordered a second system for our career station.”
FireQ is subscription based; it’s $59.99 a month for a year, or $720, with unlimited text messaging – per department. The system includes email, text messaging and internet calling, and can replace land lines,
by
removing an operating-budget item.
“Basically, when I get a page now at home,” McVicar says, “I don’t have to do anything other than touch one button: Responding. The smart phone calculates my GPS location; it knows where the fire hall is so it can route out a map and calculate my estimated time of arrival and distance to the hall, and display it on the smart phones of members and on the FireQ system. So, for every one of my members who is coming, I see his or her qualifications, their name, the distance they are right at this moment from the fire hall, and their ETA.
“Once it does that, as the live call is happening, the duty officer – he’s the guy that does the size-up and calls for more help if he needs it – he knows who’s coming and how far they are from the hall. So this is real-time information happening, because we can’t afford radios for 25 guys.”
The responding feature has two options: responding to the hall; or responding to the scene.
The responders queue is created as members signal their intent to respond. The queue, which is visible using the FireQ phone app as well as the FireQ system in the hall, shows who is responding and other details: as responding members get closer to the hall, colour coding on the screen changes so the duty officer knows at a glance when he or she can roll the trucks; yellow means the member is less than one minute out, red means he or she has arrived at the hall; names of members still in white
are further away. The system also acts as a form of accountability – who responded, who went where, and who came back to the hall – which is valuable in bad weather to make sure all responding members arrive safely at their destinations.
Duty officers can also opt to receive a text messages from each responder. For the duty officer, the program acts as a planning tool for the call – once he knows who’s coming and the levels of training, he can determine who will do what on scene.
McVicar says the system does not interfere with 911 dispatch.
“In fact,” he says, “we have developed a 911 console tool for departments that are using this system. We’re finding that there is total chaos across the country, that there’s no consistency to 911. It’s a patchwork of delivery systems run by a municipality or a private contractor.”
In the last several months, Breton Smartek has developed a system through which FireQ-RVS can provide departments with the ability to receive text messages from their dispatch center’s CAD systems and re-transmit those messages to every member of the department.
In addition, McVicar says, FireQ helps members determine if a call warrants leaving work.
“You can look at the responders queue, and while you’re sitting at your office wondering, ‘Should I ask to go, should I not,’ you can get this information right at your fingertips. So I’m at my desk, the call has
come in, I know that firefighters 1, 2 and 3 are responding, so I’ve only got three guys moving on this call, so now you can make a better, more-informed decision.”
On the smart-phone screen, FireQ is segmented into tabs – the home screen, the responders queue, an availability tab, and a messages tab that allows firefighters to talk to each other.
McVicar says the use of GPS is the biggest bonus for departments. He tells a story about a motor-vehicle collision that a cellphone user called into dispatch; the caller said the MVC was somewhere between exits 4 and 6 – an 18 kilometre stretch of TransCanada Highway.
“It was the dark of night, 2 a.m., it was blowing a gale, it was raining, it was nasty, and there was no indication whether it was eastbound or westbound.
“We drove along the side of the road at 20 kilometres an hour with the search lights on, and somebody hanging out the window, looking. The other truck went way to the other end to come back to do the same thing on the other side.
“How do you describe where you are to a member who’s now trying to get to the trucks?”
Based on GPS mapping, the first member to arrive at a scene – whether it’s the duty officer or a firefighter – taps the on-scene button on the FireQ home screen. A GPS reading is taken, along with a snapshot of the location, and a message is sent to FireQ, which sends each member the exact location of the call in relation to the fire hall.
“So now we have a map, and each member who is in the responders queue gets a text message with a link to the scene,” McVicar said.
Another issue that FireQ mitigates is time spent responding to false alarms.
During the summer, the Coxheath department – which is part of the Cape Breton Regional Municipality Fire and Emergency Services – gets numerous calls for fire alarms being set off due to humidity.
“When we roll to them – they’re all out here in suburbia and everyone works in the city – so I will normally end up at somebody’s house and when I arrive, the minute I pull in, I know there’s no fire. It’s a quiet, locked house and you know it’s an alarm and you know it’s going to be moisture, and I’ve got guys behind me getting ready to leave work and get their clothes on to go tend to this call.
“I can’t call dispatch and say stand them
all down – it’s a live call and we’re on it until it’s done.”
The alarm company will send a keyholder, which generally takes between 20 and 30 minutes. The option, McVicar says, is to break down the door, confirm the false alarm, and put security on the door until the homeowner arrives.
“But I can’t do that,” McVicar says. “I live out here too. But I’m not going to make 25 guys wait, or worse, the trucks roll all the way out here and I send them back to the hall.”
Instead, McVicar taps the Stand Down button on his phone, which sends a message to responding members.
“We are better managing the resources we have,” he says.
“This is about filling in the gaps and better communication. FireQ, for example, provides the framework for removing nonemergency communication from being sent over emergency channels. These are day-to-day issues that every one of us as a volunteer has.”
For each call, the system can create an incident report based on a template that each department can customize.
The chief – or a designate – controls the system through a password and can insert information when new members join the department. All members can send text messages to a single member or all members either from the FireQ app or the FireQ system – for example, the training officer can send a reminder that there’s training at 7 p.m., and members can reply.
To use the system, departments simply enter information about their members –name, cell number, when they joined, qualifications, email addresses, which companies are they in, what type of phones they use. The system sends members a message with a link to the app to be installed on a smart phone.
In the membership profile, the system can track equipment assigned to each volunteer, attendance at training, and certifications with expiry dates – first aid and CPR, for example. This allows departments to schedule recertification classes and ensure that all members are up to date.
The response log helps the department track member activity.
“I can go in and search for a specific year,” says McVicar. “Sooner or later departments are going to get audited and Revenue Canada is going to come in and say hey, you just signed off that 24 guys worked 200 hours
for this tax credit: Where’s your proof? This gives the chief the ability at his fingertips to go in any time and look at the response log.”
The incident reports and response logs are also helpful when insurance companies or lawyers come calling.
“We never get a phone call the next day to say, What happened, what were the conditions, what did you see? It’s always someone from an insurance company calling about six months later . . . Now we can go in and find every call we were on and even print or email the insurance company a PDF. The chief can be sitting at home doing this.”
And, in Nova Scotia, where the Office of Fire Marshal is back on track after some restructuring, the system allows departments to easily track types of incidents and other data that will be collected.
For fire departments, where equipment gets moved around, distributed and re-distributed, lost, broken and replaced, the system is a godsend; it tracks warranties and expiry dates and which items have been distributed to which members or which trucks.
McVicar, for example, is responsible for truck No. 9 and can go into the system and see every piece of gear on that truck. A recent check showed two missing adapters for connecting forestry hose.
“Probably the last time we used them we left them or forgot them. I didn’t notice because you don’t need them every day. But at 2 a.m. when it’s blowing, dark and cold and you need them, you’re up the creek without them. We took the inventory list, we did a complete check of the truck, we found they were missing, couldn’t find them, and reordered them for the truck. Before, I would have missed that until we needed them.”
The system includes links to how-to videos and even overrides – if the power goes out at the fire hall, information is stored on the server and will upload once power is restored.
“I come from a budget-challenged department,” McVicar said. “I know what it’s like to do the impossible with nothing; our budget is peanuts.
“Being a firefighter, I want to build a better mousetrap. I wanted firefighters to have the most accurate information possible when responding to an emergency. This is what we’ve envisioned so far.”
As more departments come on stream, McVicar says the system will develop to meet more needs.
“What else can we do? How far can we push this?”
Nelson Mandela said “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” If this is so, does it not mean that education is a firefighter’s best tool for saving lives and property – more powerful than a Cummings diesel engine, stronger than a set of jaws, and reaching further than any search light or master stream?
I’ve heard many firefighters from west coast to east wax philosophically about book smarts and street smarts and years of experience versus certificates, diplomas, and degrees. Yet if we take the fire service out of the picture and just ask a general question about success, opportunity, and a chance in life, most firefighters will recognize the importance of education to those goals. Ask the guys and gals in the hall the best way for their own kids to guarantee – as much as there is one in life – a future that has promise, fulfillment and an opportunity to succeed and move ahead in the world; that’s right, they will all say more education.
We all seem to agree that education is the golden ticket into the chocolate factory. Funny how education is the key for everyone else, but not just for us hosers! Our culture and belief systems are changing at a snail’s pace. However, we still have a major attitude problem in the fire service toward higher education.
No one is saying that firefighters’ years of service, seniority, and experience are not worth anything. In fact, I routinely watch and learn from guys with five, 10, or 15 more years than me on the job, but that does not take away from the fact that years of service do not equate to experience, as the latter is a subjective term, and both measurements are poor indicators of one’s ability to do the job. The best balance is a combination of training, years of experience and education in the form of formal degrees, diplomas, and professional development.
of fire fighting in the burn tower. Before that training takes place, the firefighters must learn the dynamics and chemistry of fire. Having that foundational education allows them to understand why they need to get their butts down to the ground when the thermal layer flips and the steam comes down on everyone. But we never seem to go back to those foundations, or push our education to the next level of higher understanding.
Jay Shaw
I’ve heard many firefighters from west coast to east wax philosophically about book smarts and street smarts and years of experience versus certificates, diplomas, and degrees.
The reason I am so pro education is because there is a big difference between education and training, and how both are applied to our work. Training is what we do to learn or practise a task such as a search, or using a command board, or a PPV fan. Education is the formation of critical-thinking skills in areas of expertise in which you already have training. When you combine this type of education with several years of experience, the result is enlightenment to the point at which critical-thinking skills can be applied to form new ideas, opinions and methods that are clear, concise and on target. Training is clearer when you can process the information being taught from several viewpoints; this allows you to better understand the details and the reasoning behind them. A great example of this type of learning is when probationary or new firefighters are given their first taste
You can give a man a fish – which equates to ordering someone to do a task without understanding why or comprehending the methodology – or you can train him how to catch one himself. This, of course, would involve showing the rookies the videos and training to understand how and why fire will reach a certain temperature and then flash over. But if you also educate firefighters about the reasons why and how the fire started in the first place, they will then start to see past the end of the hoseline and understand critical concepts such as the relationships between fire-suppression and fire-prevention activities. This kind of teaching results is higher education; we are not doing this consistently in our fire halls.
We’ve all heard the fish story, but we’ve forgotten the third and most crucial part: if you don’t educate the fisherman about the importance of conservation, fish species, water pollution, and spawning grounds, you will eventually have a bigger problem.
I believe that in the near future firefighters will be required to embrace advanced education that those who desire to learn and see beyond the end of that hose will have more opportunity to advance than those who choose to not observe and understand the fire chemistry through the flames. Bettering yourself through higher education should not be threatening to others. No one makes our income levels in other industries anymore without some sort of higher education. Some departments, including mine, have started programs to allow their members to access certain university programs. It’s time to get on the bandwagon, or at least figure out why there are no fish left in your sea.
Jay Shaw is a firefighter and primary care paramedic with the City of Winnipeg. Along with multiple fire and emergency-services courses and certificates, Jay holds a master’s degree in disaster and emergency management from Royal Roads University and is an independent education and training consultant focusing on leadership, management, emergency preparedness and communication skills. Contact him at jayshaw@mts.net and follow him on twitter @disasterbucket
There are very few ingredients in the cooking world that offer such pure pleasure and are as diverse and complex as cheese.
From enjoying the endless varieties on their own to the excitement of discovering new dishes to cook, cheese is an ingredient to savor.
It is not uncommon these days to peer into the cheese case at the local supermarket and see hundreds of different shapes, sizes, colours, moulds and smells. How do you even begin to decide what to choose to enjoy or experiment with, especially if the only cheese you grew up with came in a yellow and blue box of macaroni?
By learning about and focusing on the basic styles of cheese, the type of milk used (cow, sheep or goat), the country of origin, and the aging process, you will be able to discover the world of cheese, learn which types you enjoy or can’t bear to smell, and understand which cheese is best suited for what.
Patrick Mathieu is a 13-year veteran of Waterloo Fire Rescue, where he is acting captain. He has won several cooking competitions and has helped raise thousands of dollars for charities by auctioning gourmet dinners at the fire hall. Contact him at stationhousecateringco@yahoo.ca
Ingredients
• 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 large egg
• 1 tbsp water
• 1/4 cup panko bread crumbs
• 2 tbsp ground almonds
Directions
• 1 (8-ounce) slice manchego cheese about 1-inch thick
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1/4 cup slivered almonds, lightly toasted
• 2 tbsp coarsely chopped parsley
• 2 leaves Boston leaf lettuce
1. Set up 3 bowls: 1 with flour seasoned with salt and pepper, 1 with egg and 1 tbsp of water and seasoned with salt and pepper, and 1 with the bread crumbs and ground almonds.
2. Preheat oven to 450 F.
3. Cut cheese into 2 equal pieces. Dredge the cheese first in the flour, then in the egg wash, and finally in the bread crumbs.
4. Place the cheese on a cooking tray, drizzle with olive oil, and season with salt and pepper. Bake in the oven for 5 to 7 minutes or until golden brown and the cheese is soft. Place manchego on a Boston lettuce leaf and immediately drizzle with more extra virgin olive oil or your favorite flavored oil (chili infused is a perfect pairing), and sprinkle with slivered almonds and parsley. Enjoy together!
Ingredients
• 1/2 pound chunk Halloumi
• 2 tbsp picked oregano leaves
Directions
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 grilled lemon, juiced
1. Brush the cheese with olive oil and place onto a medium hot grill for 2 minutes on each side, or until marked.
2. Remove and slice into 1/2-inch pieces. Sprinkle with oregano. Drizzle the olive oil on top and squeeze the lemon juice over the cheese.
3. Serve with the olive salad.
Olive Salad – ingredients
• 1/2 cup jumbo black olives, such as Nicoise, sliced
• 1/2 cup large green olives, sliced
• 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 tbsp minced shallots
Directions
1. Combine all ingredients and mix well.
• 1 tbsp finely chopped celery
• 1 tbsp minced fresh parsley
• 1 tsp minced fresh oregano
• 2 tsp minced fresh basil
• 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
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With thousands of varieties of cheese, it is next to impossible to compile a list of favorites. I enjoy the classics such as a stretchy fresh mozzarella, creamy Brie or melty Monterrey Jack. Below are some of my preferred cheeses and the suggested uses, which I believe everyone should at least know about and hopefully taste and experience. Cheese, like so many ingredients, is subject to each person’s senses, but as was the case when I converted my brothers to bluecheese lovers from skeptics through a chimmichurri flank steak and
Ingredients
• 1/4 cup fresh lime juice
• 2 tbsp honey
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup canola oil
Western canada (calgary) 1-403-279-5095
Mid-West USa (Detroit, Mi) 1-866-877-6688
Directions
For the Salad:
• 3 tangerines
• 1 small fennel bulb with fronds
• 2 Belgian endive
• 2 heads Boston lettuce, torn
• 8 ounces Roquefort, crumbled
• ¼ cup toasted walnut pieces
• 8 large sea scallops
• 1 tblp clarified butter
• 1 tblsp vegetable oil
• Sea salt and fresh cracked pepper
• Juice of half a lemon
1. In a bowl. Whisk together everything except the 2 oils. Continue whisking while adding the oils in a thin stream. Keep whisking until well combined.
2. Cut off peel and outer membrane of tangerines and cut out segments. Save the juice for a nice shot of vitamin C.
3. Core and thinly slice fennel lengthwise placing in a serving bowl. Separate endive leaves and cut into thirds; add to bowl. Add lettuce and oranges. Pour dressing over top and toss to coat. Top with Roquefort and walnuts and set aside.
4. Heat butter and oil in a pan on medium-high heat. Season scallops with salt and pepper and lay them clockwise, so you can remember which ones to flip first.
5. Flip scallops when they turn golden brown on the bottom. When both sides are a nice golden brown colour, add lemon juice to pan, making sure to coat the scallops with the lemon juice. Top endive salad with seared scallops and enjoy!
blue cheese flatbread – you’ll never know how delicious it is until you try it. Let’s get something straight: there are absolutely no bad cheeses. Limburger – which has a strong and rather unpleasant odour – is close, but even it’s delicious!
• Roquefort – A sheep’s milk blue cheese from Roquefort, France, that uses the mould from its caves to produce this amazing, very sharp and nutty cheese. I enjoy it as is but it pairs very well with nuts and honey, so check out my recipe for seared scallop and endive salad with Roquefort, toasted walnuts and honey lime vinaigrette.
• Smoked or aged cheddar – The best brands come from Canada (I love Cow’s brand from Prince Edward Island) or England. Usually made from cow’s milk, the better ones are aged at least one year. The colour can range from ivory white to straw to a deep caramel colour. Often sharp and crumbly, I love my cheddar added to soups, grilled cheese or other sandwiches and casseroles.
• Parmigiano-Reggiano – Real parmesan cheese does not come in a shakable container; believe me, you will discover the difference! This dry, hard, crumbly cheese from Italy is well aged and has a great crunch and a deep nutty flavor. Don’t be afraid to try it on its own but of course it is perfect grated on salads and pastas. Don’t forget to save your rinds for adding flavor to soups.
• Manchego – What Parmigianno is to Italy, Manchego is to Spain. It is made with sheep’s milk and has a rich buttery and deep salty flavor. Enjoy as is or check out my recipe in which it is breaded and fried!
• Queso fresco – This is a soft, Mexican, fresh cheese, meaning it hasn’t been aged. It is usually made from a combination of cow and goat milk. It is very light with a salty sour kick and is one of the best cheeses to have on hand to sprinkle over salads, grilled vegetable, and, of course, Mexican dishes such as tacos and enchiladas.
• Emmental – This cheese is what many people think of when they hear “Swiss cheese;” it has the holes and everything. It is a firm cow’s milk cheese from the mountains of Switzerland. It is a great melter and is perfectly suited for fondue, grilled cheeses, or grated over casseroles and soups
• Chèvre – The French word chèvre translates to “goat,” and is used to refer to any cheese made from goat’s milk. Bright and briny with a lemony flavor, chèvre is sold in vacuum-sealed logs, sometimes flavored with herbs, spices, or garlic. Chèvre is great crumbled in salads, breaded and fried, or served in sandwiches. And it makes the best macaroni and cheese.
• Halloumi – This semi-hard, unripened, brined cheese made of sheep and goat milk has a very high melting point so it can be fried or, even better, grilled. Halloumi is a great addition to grilled vegetable kebobs.
Honorable mention: Gouda, Gruyere, Camembert, Provolone, Cojita, and Marscarpone (for dessert)
My dilemma is that my list of favourites, which I intended to cap at five, continues to grow. Hopefully, with this bit of insight and, perhaps, with the help of your local cheesemonger, you can navigate the world of cheese. Allow your taste and senses to guide you and don’t be afraid to try something new, because in the world of cheese, there is only best and a little less than best.
listen up, clean up and step up
Your first year on the floor as a career firefighter is filled with challenges, rewards and things you wish someone had told you before you started. It’s important to know how rewarding this job has been for me in my short time as a career firefighter and how, already, it has improved my approach to life and work.
It is imperative to touch on something to which my generation, specifically, has not paid enough attention – the hundreds of years of tradition in the fire service. One thing I learned from reading former Lewisville, Texas, fire chief Rick Lasky’s book Pride and Ownership is that we know very little of that tradition. I was brought up in a firefighting family; I thought I knew more than most, having spent a lot of time in the fire hall. But, as Lasky’s book pointed out to me, I had no idea why fire trucks are red, what the Maltese cross stands for or how the pike pole got its name.
In our profession, thousands of people have laid down their lives. In a fire house, tradition is important. So why are we not encouraged to learn the finer details of these traditions? We need to learn about major line-of-duty deaths; all the information you could ever want is just a click away and we owe it to our fallen brothers and sisters to use that information in a preventive manner. The flip side of all that technology is the shift toward more texting and emails and fewer conversations – those invaluable hours at the table listening to officers talk about the old days.
ing a good first impression. Unfortunately for some, first impressions may dictate whether the first year is difficult or enjoyable. Outside of the four ups and the basics, there a few things rookie firefighters can do to stand out. Take pride in your work and your equipment.
Remember how hard you worked to get to where you are. Remember how many people applied for your position and remember what you did to get this job. Now that you have the job, go above and beyond to show the people who hired you that they made the right choice. Think about your fire house and your rig; it is called a house for a reason. It’s important to treat the fire house as if it is your own home and take pride in doing extra little things.
Matt GerVaiS
‘As a junior, anything you can do to help at a scene is important.’
It should be common practice to be respectful to your senior firefighters, your officers, and the public. I read an article years ago that talked about the four ups: shut up, listen up, clean up and step up. Shut up should be obvious. When you are new, the last thing you want to do is say the wrong thing to the wrong person or have someone take something you say the wrong way. Earn your opinions and earn your right to joke with the team.
Listen up applies to the wealth of knowledge around you. Listening translates to learning. Learn from the guys who have spent more time running calls than you have been alive. Listening helps you do your job better. If the senior man is complaining about something, make sure he never has the opportunity to complain about it again. Show that you’re willing to listen to advice and learn from your mistakes.
Clean up is the most basic. As the junior, you should expect to do the dirtiest work – so do it with a smile on your face.
Step up is where you really show you that belong. When the phone rings, answer it; when someone is at the door, open it; and when the department needs a volunteer, be the person for the job. This attitude translates to calls as well as off-shift work including parades, special events and group outings.
As trivial as these things seem, they will go a long way in mak-
For the first little while as a new firefighter, I was having trouble filling some of the down time. This down time offers a chance to do the chores that are beneficial for you and your crew instead of sitting on the couch and watching TV. Take the rust off your hand tools with the wire wheel of a bench grinder, or put some linseed oil on the handles of your tools. This shows your crew that you care – and it keeps your hand tools in good working order.
Consider your truck. That truck is your family vehicle. It’s condition and the condition of your equipment will greatly impact your success at a call. Do you know where all the equipment is? If you waste 45 seconds opening compartments to look for a tool, you’re not only hurting your team, you’re also hurting the taxpayer who helps to put you on that truck. What if your family is in distress; is everything in the condition you would want it?
As a junior, anything you can do to help at a scene is important. If you don’t have a job at the scene, look for ways to help – bring a crying child a stuffed animal or try to salvage what’s left of some pictures at a house fire. Good chiefs will tell you that good public relations can make their jobs a lot easier. The more you can do for residents, the more likely it is they will back the chief or support your department when you want council to approve another truck or some station renovations.
Make sure you pre-plan for every call. Learn about a new street or the type of building construction for that new pizza shop.
Most importantly, have a good attitude and have fun. The fire hall is and will always be a place of good humour. Being a happy and positive person can be infectious and will make your time at work much more enjoyable.
Matt Gervais is a career firefighter in Guelph, Ont. He completed the pre-fire service program at Algonquin College in Ottawa and was a volunteer firefighter with Ottawa Fire Services for three years before joining the Guelph Fire Department in 2011. Contact him at Matt.gervais@guelph.ca
How do we help every member of the fire service educate the public about fire safety? Ontario Fire Marshal and Chief of Emergency Management Ted Wieclawek asked this question at the 21st annual Fire and Life Safety Educators’ conference in Sudbury in October 2013. Words like these inspire me every day to become a better public educator.
My journey began in 2003 when the fire chief of the composite department where I worked as an administrator asked me about my future goals in the fire service. The answer was easy for me: education and more education. I wanted to contribute to the safety of my community. I was given the opportunity to see my goals start to come to fruition when I started to assist our department’s education officer by preparing handouts for school visits, setting up fire safety displays in department stores, and teaching ropes and knots and cooking safety at summer camps for junior firefighters. I was encouraged to take the public fire and life safety educators certification at the Ontario Fire College. By the end of 2006, I had completed the course and was thrilled to join the ranks of other public fire and life educators in Ontario. My ability to reach and teach the public changed dramatically in 2012 when I applied for, and was hired by a career department – Brampton Fire and Emergency Services.
This position provides wonderful opportunities to educate residents to be responsible for fire safety in their own homes. However, we all know that reaching certain groups is extremely challenging. In Brampton, a growing, diverse community like many other Canadian towns and cities, communicating with new Canadians and those whose first language is one other than English is something we think about every day.
do we reach attention-span challenged university students? How do we explain mandatory CO alarms to new Canadians? What is your department doing to make sure families in your communities have homeescape plans? Let’s share our best practices through this column so we can all put proven ideas to work.
MarGo teNNaNt
‘We know that learning is for life and that if we get the right messages to the right people in the right formats, the lessons will have meaning.’
As public educators, we cannot stress enough the importance of smoke alarms and escape planning, ensuring that people understand that homes burn eight times faster than they did 30 years ago. We have all encountered situations in which people have experienced small fires in their homes and their first reaction is to try extinguish them – and they believe they can. Occupants attempt to put out fires using extinguishers or garden hoses, but the modern, synthetic materials burn so quickly that the fire fight becomes a losing battle. We know that in the 1980s residents may have had up to 15 minutes to evacuate, considerably longer than they do now – clearly, in many cases, they don’t understand.
So, how do we use the myriad tools at our disposal to get across our fire-safety messages to the right people? Do seniors use social media? A Pew Internet Research Project in 2013 found that in the United States, 65 per cent of people between 50 and 64 use social media and 46 per cent of those 64 and older do so. But how do we target those people? Do they use Twitter? What Internet sites do they visit? How
We all have the same internal challenges too: budgets, staff cuts and time. Forming partnerships with external agencies with similar interests in the community such as school boards, seniors groups and public health departments help us reach more people.
Brampton has a population of more than 500,000; 47 per cent of residents are new immigrants. Sparky and Stop, Drop and Roll work brilliantly with elementary school students. But we need to communicate those messages in languages that parents can understand. By working with some of the diverse groups in Brampton we have delivered presentations aided by translators. We distribute fire-safety pamphlets in a variety of languages in libraries, some fire stations and at city hall.
Culture is another big challenge in our city. Women make up more than half of the population of Brampton, but some cultures are uncomfortable with female family members speaking to authority figures, including firefighters. Removing barriers by being visible in the community and attending multicultural events promotes good public relations.
Here in Ontario, education had been mandated by the fire marshal as the first line of defence against fire fatalities. There have been more fire deaths in Ontario to this point in 2013 than there were in 2012. It appears that the most vulnerable are those 65 and over. We know that learning is for life and that if we get the right messages to the right people in the right formats, the lessons will have meaning. Everyone wears seatbelts, right?
As American musician B.B. King famously said, “The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.” It’s our job, as public educators, to teach the lessons. But we need help.
And that’s why it’s crucial that we involve all firefighters – not just public education officers – in this quest to prevent fires and save lives. We need to create partnership with firefighters in our own departments to deliver consistent fire-safety messages. What are your department’s strategies for doing that? Next time, I’ll share my department’s philosophy for making everyone a public-educator.
Margo Tennant is a fire and life-safety education officer with Brampton Fire and Emergency Services in Ontario. Contact her at margo.tennant@brampton.ca
Large commercial gyms cost money to maintain. If you belong to a well-run establishment, the owners likely update facilities, equipment and technology all year round. Almost all these gyms exist for one reason: profit. That’s why I’m always surprised at the start of every year when I walk into the big-box commercial gym I belong to and get my first glimpse of the new workout machines the owners purchased for the coming year.
Have you ever stopped to look at some of these things? Seriously, some of these contraptions are ridiculous. It’s seems every muscle – no matter how big, small or insignificant – has had something built for it. (It’s true. Google the words face trainer to see just one example on a very long list).
My gym does not have a face trainer, but honestly, some of the newer pieces of equipment are not that far off. Some of these state-of-the-art training machines more closely resemble furniture than gym equipment; it’s as if someone took a recliner, removed the cup holder, and added a weight-stack.
Seeing all this new gear show up makes me appreciate the old-faithful type training apparatuses even more, particularly my favourite piece of training equipment, the power rack. This single piece of equipment has contributed more to my fitness level than any other.
I’m guessing you’ve probably noticed this trend in your gym – it’s a lot easier to find an empty power rack than an empty bench press. While it’s never really a shock to see empty pieces of equipment around a large gym, I do find it quite strange that a power rack can sit empty as often as it does. I love that there isn’t a line up to use the power rack, because, in my opinion, it’s the most versatile piece of equipment on the floor of any gym.
Squats – Simple and straightforward.
Pull-ups – Use this “upper-body squat” as the catalyst for your upper-body workout. Be creative. Alter the tempo from slow eccentric movements to fast explosive reps.
Brad LawreNce
‘Designed initially for performing barbell squats, the power rack has evolved into much more of a full-service station.’
A power rack is the free-standing barbell squat rack. Designed initially for performing barbell squats, the power rack has evolved into much more of a full-service station. Over the years different height increments have been added, allowing users to perform several exercises. Modern racks include chin-up bars and dip attachments and many other features. With a little creativity, you can get a great full-body workout all from inside the rack. And, all the added technology has provided a much safer working environment, especially if you’re training by yourself.
Aside from a barbell squat, all other exercises in the rack are all free-weight based, meaning your supporting muscles and core handle the stability of the lift. Every exercise you perform engages and strengthens your core muscles. Many exercise options are also multijoint, multi-muscle movements; these movements demand more exertion from your body and produce greater amounts of growth hormone and a better, longer metabolic boost.
Bench press – Slide a flat bench into the rack and boost your push power.
Barbell row – This is a great power exercise; have your palms facing the ground when you grab the bar to better isolate your back.
Inverted row (off the barbell) – This is a great alternative to pull-ups, and a great, safe eccentric option for your back.
Deadlift – This is one of the best exercises for the posterior chain when performed correctly.
Dips (with dip-bar attachment) – Lean forward to shift the load onto your chest and this becomes a very effective movement.
Notice a pattern to these exercises? Each exercise takes a lot of effort, but makes you strong. This is merely the start of a long list of good power-rack exercises. Be creative and you’ll have no issue finding a balanced, full-body routine in which all exercises can be performed in the rack if necessary.
We all have ups and downs in the gym, good days and bad days. About five years ago I decided if I showed up to train on one of those down days I was still going to make the best of it, and I promised myself that the bad days weren’t going to cost me in the long run. I did this because to me, there’s no more defeated feeling than leaving the gym knowing you just had a brutal, waste-of time-workout. To amend this, I decided whenever I came in to train feeling I was in for a sub-par day, I would warm-up and head straight for the power rack. I would start by loading the barbell and performing a set of squats. Those 45 to 60 minutes started to become the least creative workouts of my life. Many times, I would just do set after set after set of squats. You’d be surprised how much better you can feel after four or five sets. From there, I had the option to continue with more squats, or branch off and train other areas, but often I just stayed in the rack and did squats – I still do this and will continue to. Some of the down days became my best workouts of the month.
This training philosophy and the power rack have saved many borderline workouts for me, and will salvage many more. I encourage you to challenge yourself to make your down days into good days. Try my method, or find your own personal strategy to make your bad days great. Happy training.
Brad Lawrence is a firefighter with the Calgary Fire Department and a certified personal trainer
Email Brad at bradmlawrence@gmail.com
By Mark van der Feyst
When rescuing a firefighter who has fallen through a fire-weakened floor to a basement or sub-level of a building, remember to stabilize the area around the hole in the floor. Interior doors can be quickly and easily removed from their hinges and used as stabilizing platforms.
Also, remember to appoint an operational commander within the structure to oversee the rescue and liaise with the incident commander. The operational command person can also act as the safety officer to ensure that other firefighters and rescuers do not fall into the same hole.
As mentioned in April, the two main tools that can be used for rescue are rope and a charged hoseline. Ground ladders can also be used but are not always practical in sub-level rescues: sometimes ladders are not readily available or there is not enough room for a ladder to be brought in and positioned down into the hole. Also, the injured firefighter would be required to climb up the ladder, meaning he or she would have to be conscious and able-bodied.
We will discuss the use of ropes in sub-level rescues in October. Here, we’ll explain how to use a charged hoseline, which is usually readily available in sub-level rescue conditions.
To rescue a conscious firefighter, lower a section of the charged line down through the hole so that it forms a horseshoe shape. Once the hoseline has been lowered far enough, the firefighter can grab it and position himself so that his chest is across the hose; he then uses his arms to clamp the hoseline tightly to his body (see photo 1). At this point, members of the rapid-intervention team (RIT) pull the firefighter to safety.
In this type of rescue, there should be at least one firefighter on each side (see photo 2) raising the hose; depending on the weight and size of the firefighter being rescued, two firefighters per side may be required.
All firefighters involved in the rescue must use a dynamic power lift, which means an intense amount of energy is exerted in a very short time.
Once the RIT members get the firefighter up to the top of the hole, another firefighter can grab him and pull him to safety. Remember that there will be an SCBA to contend with; this can impact the rescue if any parts get caught on the edge of the hole.
When the firefighter’s waist is level with the hole, rescuers must make sure he will not fall back down. Position the firefighter so that he can bend at the waist when he is pulled out of the hole. This makes the job a little bit easier as the body will naturally bend in a certain direction and will not create further discomfort or harm. Still, there is a good chance that the firefighter will fall back into the hole because of his center of gravity and the weight of the SCBA on his back. If the firefighter starts to fall backwards, little can be done to prevent him from doing so. To prevent the firefighter from
Photo 1: A charged hoseline is an ideal tool for rescuing a firefighter who has fallen through the floor. Once the hoseline has been lowered far enough, a conscious firefighter can grab it, position himself so that his chest is across the hose, then use his arms to clamp the hoseline tightly to his body.
falling backwards, firefighters should pull him out of the hole with their backs toward the landing area (which creates an unnatural bend of the body); this ensures that the firefighter will not fall back in but rather have the weight distribution pull him towards the safer area.
What if the trapped firefighter is unconscious? Can the charged the hoseline be used as a rescue tool? Absolutely. A RIT member can be sent down to the sublevel using the hoseline like a pole slide. The RIT firefighter grabs onto the hose with his hands above the hole in the floor while lowering his body into the hole, wrapping his legs around the hose and then walking his hands down the hose until he is below the floor surface. At this point, the RIT firefighter can slide the rest of the way down.
Once the RIT member reaches the unconscious fallen firefighter, he can start to package the firefighter for removal using a piece of webbing and the charged hoseline. The RIT firefighter ties a handcuff knot with the webbing so that the two loops will fit over the arms of the fallen firefighter. The two loops will be cinched tightly around the firefighter’s arms, with the arms over the hoseline. The other end of the webbing is then tied around one of the firefighter’s legs – either leg, with any kind of knot. No special knot is required, just something to prevent the webbing from coming undone.
When the rescue preparations are
completed, the hoseline should be between the firefighter’s arms and his leg and ready for hoisting (see photo 3). The RIT firefighters then pull up the hose, with the unconscious firefighter secured by his arms and one leg (see photo 4). Once the unconscious firefighter has been pulled up through the hole to waist height, he can be pulled backward out of the hole to safety.
These hoseline rescue techniques work well only when they are practised ahead of time; doing so is simple and requires only a charged hoseline, a piece of webbing and a hole in the floor.
In October, we will discuss the use of ropes for conducting the same type of rescue.
Mark van der Feyst is a 15-year veteran of the fire service and currently works for the City of Woodstock Fire Department. Mark is an instructor teaching in Canada, the United States, at FDIC and in India. He is a local-level suppression instructor for the Pennsylvania State Fire Academy and an instructor for the Justice Institute of BC. Contact him at Mark@Firestar-Services.com
By Randy Schmitz
ost of you who follow this column can identify a theme, which is how to become more efficient and reduce time at a rescue scene
A lot of my columns focus on processes, concepts or options that can make rescuers’ actions more efficient so that we get trapped patients out of vehicles more quickly. For example, if I already know where to disconnect the 12-volt power, I don’t have to use precious time searching the vehicle for the battery to make it safe for me and my crew to work. If I have a heads up about the location of the roof-curtain cylinders, I can strip the trim in the immediate vicinity rather than taking all the trim off prior to cutting the roof, or, perhaps, placing my spreader tips in a place that could contain a high-pressure vessel. What about avoiding the seatbelt pre-tensioner when I want to make a cut on a B-pillar? If I know where these components are located, I can save critical time by not having to search the vehicle in order to work around them.
What if I had all this information at my fingertips on an iPhone or via an iPad or Android tablet?
Studies show that 74 per cent of people use the Internet from their phones, and that smartphone users overwhelmingly choose apps as their way to access the Internet.
Picking up on that trend, Mercedes-Benz has developed an app to assist rescuers in that critical time of need. This square symbol (see photo 1) with black and white sectors is often used by magazines and other print advertisers, for instance, to direct readers via the Internet to a specific web page. With the appropriate app, every smartphone and tablet equipped with a camera can read QR codes.
Rescuers whose smartphones have a barcode scanner app installed can instantly access Mercedes’ self-proclaimed “not-sorescuer-friendly” components. Mercedes puts its QR codes on stickers attached to the fuel filler access door (see photo 2) and on the B-pillar on the opposite side of the vehicle (see photo 3). The opposite-side QR-code locations make sense; rarely are both sides of a vehicle damaged in a collision.
This concept is already in use in Australia on an SUV called the GLA. According to my sources at Mercedes, the QR-code stickers will soon be offered free to every Mercedes-Benz vehicle made since the early 1990s.
The information accessed through the QR code includes design details such as a rescue map that shows the location of the airbags, the battery, the tanks, electric cables, high-pressure cylinders and other components. In the case of hybrid models, these maps also carry the location of the additional batteries and high-voltage cables (see photo 4).
The letters QR stand for quick response. The codes were so named because the purpose was to create a code that could be “quickly read” by handheld devices. (Although these barcodes have recently increased in popularity, they have actually been around for well over a decade).
Most smartphones come pre-loaded with a QR-code scanner; if your phone does not have a scanner, just search for QR code reader apps and pick one to download. This link provides a list of QR-code readers just for the iPhone: http://news.cnet.com/qr-code-readers-foriphone and has, in my opinion, the best for QR code reader apps for
The information accessed through the QR code includes design details such as a rescue map that shows the location of the airbags, the battery, the tanks, electric cables, high-pressure cylinders and other components.
the iPhone including NeoReader, Optiscan, QR App and QuickMark.
You can find Android barcode scanners at http://www.androidtapp. com/barcode-scanner/. This link includes a review of the barcode scanner Android app and a video that shows you exactly how to use the app.
So once you have downloaded the app of your choice, all you really need to do is open it and go to the scanning screen. Hold the phone in front of a QR code. You will see a red bar scanning the code. Most apps also highlight the four main squares of the QR code, and then automatically open the URL. Scanning is very easy, so start scanning these QR-code stickers on the B-pillar or fuel filler door to find out the information they contain. As long as the 3G or 4G network connection to your smartphone is reasonable and efficient, there should not be any delays receiving the information promptly (see photo 5).
Also, an upgraded QR-code, called Model 2, was created so that the code can be read smoothly even if it is distorted in some way. QR codes that are printed on a curved surface or are distorted because of the reading angle can still be scanned efficiently by referring to an alignment pattern embedded in them; even if you are scanning a code on crushed metal, you can still receive the information.
All new Mercedes-Benz cars will come with QR codes, and, in the coming months, the company will offer the stickers free of charge to owners of all Mercedes-Benz cars. Once there is irrefutable data on how effective this system performs, other vehicle manufactures will likely follow suit and implement QR codes, particularly since Mercedes-Benz has relinquished the right to patent registering in an effort to the system available to everyone.
It’s not a bad idea to go down to your nearest Mercedes dealership and test the QR-code concept on your phone to ensure it is compatible with your device. Rescuers can look forward to using this technology to advance road safety and better patient outcomes. Adopting QR codes is another great example of German engineering and innovation. Way to go Mercedes-Benz!
Randy Schmitz is a Calgary firefighter who has been extensively involved in the extrication field for 21 years. He is an extrication instructor and has competed internationally. He is the education chair for Transport Emergency Rescue Committee (T.E.R.C.) in Canada, a T.E.R.C. & WRO International extrication judge and a tester and evaluator for manufactured prototype products for extrication equipment. He can be reached at rwschmitz@shaw.ca. Follow him on Twitter at @firedog7.
Tools that make rescuers’ jobs easier and more efficient
By Randy Schmitz
Itest a lot of products for companies; not all of them get good reviews. I am all for innovation, and when it comes to the fire service there is no shortage of that. Some products are brilliant, while others are simply an alternative to an existing solution.
First up is a task-specific command board for motor-vehicle collisions, manufactured by Rescue Innovations/Tactron (www.tactron. com) out of the United States. New technology is changing the way we do business when it comes to MVCs. The incident commander, extrication officer and patient managers each have separate duties to perform. The list of benchmarks to remember can become overwhelming. These boards list the important items that need to be addressed at any taccident. There are three boards in a set, each
listing the pertinent information to assist with command roles.
Incident command board
1. Benchmarks: dispatch time, 10-minute timer
2. Scene safety, patient status (minor, critical, deceased)
3. Hazards, resources listed (air lift, heavy wrecker, utilities, hazmat, Department of Transportation)
4. Vehicles involved, traffic control, lighting required, responding units
5. Layout area of roadway/intersection; on the opposite side of the board is a Velcro tag area for units and assignments with time frames
Extrication officer board
1. Scene safety, number of vehicles involved, 360-degree outer circle survey, 360-degree inner circle survey
2. Block wheels, patients’ status (minor, critical, deceased)
3. Mechanical extrication required?
4. Establish extrication plans: rapid, Plan A, Plan B, on which vehicles?
5. Undeployed SRS airbag system, stabilization (basic or advanced), interior stabilization, battery disconnection
6. Stabilization rechecks, reassessment of plans A and B, clean work area diagram
Patient manager board
1. Patient contact, patient status (minor, critical, deceased), level of entrapment
2. Best access into the vehicle, rapid extrication, undeployed SRS airbag system, patient updates
3. Interior duties, hazard lights, interior extrication considerations
4. Opposite side of board: vehicle identification, number of patients and their location within
5. Patients: gender, age, vitals, breathing rate, respirations, heart rate, transport, unit, destination hospital
All three command boards have a protective rubber edge and a lanyard. I like the
Task-specific command boards list the important items that need to be addressed at any type of accident scene.
lanyard because it allows the responder to have a free hand. There is also a notes section for adding other information. Permanent markers, dry erase markers or grease pencils can be used on the board. The board is outfitted with a rubber insert for the writing utensil so it won’t get lost. For $66, I highly recommend these boards.
I thought the Auto Brace 2 mechanical strut system by HJR Equipment (www.hjrequipment.com) was like any other adjustable strut system, until I started using it.
This system can be used as a one-person operation. It can be carried from the truck to the scene and set up by one rescuer. It is comparatively lightweight, which is great for situations in which there is limited manpower. I like the portability – the system features an easy-to-grip handle and the rescuer can carry two struts at one time relatively easily by using a carrying bracket.
Once you are ready to set up the struts, there is an adjustment that allows the strut to stand free until you deploy the ratchet straps, which are permanently attached and deploy easily. You can connect the two hooks on the straps together and tighten them with a handle crank. This locks the strut head connection in place. Typical setup times are comparable to those of most other strut systems on the market, but the Auto Brace 2 requires less manpower. (See photo page 32.)
All of the struts have finely machined
metal components with high tolerances that make tasks such as changing out strut heads easy. Lock pins for the adjustable sections are attached with flexible yet tough wire so they cannot be dropped and lost in snow or mud.
The Auto Brace 2 comes in two sizes: the 2-S stored length is 82 centimetres (32 inches), extends to 150 centimetres (59 inches), and weighs 10 kilograms (22 pounds). The 2-L stored length is 120 centimetres (47 inches) and fully extends to 236 centimetres (93 inches). It weighs 12 kilograms (26.5 pounds). The device costs between $1,950 and $3,700.
Typical set-up time for one firefighter is about 90 seconds. Both the long and short struts are rated to 907 kilograms (2,000 pounds) with a three-to-one safety factor at any length. The Brace 2 has a patented rewind system for the 8.2-metre (27-foot) ratchet straps. The rewind system is built onto the struts for quick and easy deployment.
Built by Infinity Bridge Inc. (www.therattool.com), the rescue access tool, or RAT, weighs 7.7 kilograms (17 pounds), so this tool has a lot of leverage to get the job done. The RAT acts as a mechanical spreader designed to be placed with accuracy into margins as small as eight millimetres (0.3 inches) where standard extrication tools may not fit. The concept is to expose hinges and Nader pins, and to displace sheet metal to gain access for traditional extrication tools.
By inserting the hardened tip, called the stinger, into the space between a door edge and the vehicle body, this piece of equipment can make short work to gain valuable purchase points. There is no need for a backup power supply, as the RAT is operated on mechanical advantage and hand power. The stinger is inserted into a narrow opening and is rocked back and forth to widen the area. If there is no pre-made margin for the stinger, it can be used to pierce sheet metal to create an opening. Once the purchase point is made, insert the screw tip on the opposite end of the tool and crank its handle to engage the screwing action to further enlarge the hole.
Other uses for the RAT are being studied, for instance, breaking hardened steel locks.
The RAT is listed for $995 USD on the company’s website.
Heat stress is the body’s reaction to the environment. This occurs when the body’s core
temperature rises above safe limits, and can result in a racing heartbeat, profuse sweating, dizziness, reduced energy and slowed reaction times. This reaction reduces safety, decreases efficiency and lowers productivity.
During periods of heavy exercise, the body can generate 10 to 15 times the amount of heat that it does at rest. Extra heat is transferred from the body’s core to the skin, where it is released via sweat and evaporation. High humidity reduces the body’s ability to cool through evaporation and contributes to dehydration. The Drager comfort vest (www.draeger.ca) helps to maintain cooler core temperatures and reduce the severity of symptoms often caused by heat.
The vest can be worn under protective clothing. The vest, which costs around $400, claims to reduce the wearer’s body temperature by three to four degrees. I wore this vest in 27 C weather during an extrication training session and still felt the cooling effects after two-and-a-half hours.
The vest uses a salt-crystal mixture cooling packet, which contains sodium sulphate decahydrate. A benefit of this system is that you don’t have to put this vest in a freezer to return the cooling packets to effective temperatures. An ambient temperature of 22 C prompts a phase change in the packets and they solidify. Simply lay the vest flat and in 30 minutes to two hours, it’s ready for use.
To get the maximum cooling effect, the vest should fit snugly around the wearer’s body. The vest weighs just 2.3 kilograms, and ranges in size from small to five-XL.
An Australian firefighter friend of mine, Gerald Van Rongen, told me about the Rescue Snips (www.rescuesnips.com).
If you have followed my column, you know I’m not a fan of cutting glass for obvious reasons, namely the fine glass particles that are created from most cutting tools that may find their way into the lungs of emergency responders and patients. I simply choose other methods. However, I do realize there are times when the best course of action is to cut the glass; in this case, the tool I prefer is the Rescue Snips.
The fact that this tool looks and acts like a tree pruner is no indication of its performance. I tried this tool on a standard windshield and found that the Snips created only a limited amount of dust and the dust didn’t fly around as it does with other types of glass cutters; the particles simply dropped straight down onto the dash. The tool also was great for cutting
Drager’s comfort vest can be worn under protective clothing, and helps to maintain cooler core temperatures.
While the hand-operated Rescue Snips do not replace a rescue air chisel, the tool is great for departments with limited budgets and minimal compartment space.
June. Paratech (www.paratech.com) has been a regular supporter and sponsor of our event since it began in 2009. In the lifting pit where I was instructing, we had a loaded bulk hauler trailer on its side, crushing a pickup truck. The objective was to lift the trailer off the truck to create enough space to carefully pull the truck out of the collapse zone, then extricate the patients. The initial lift was successfully completed with two 18-tonne (20-ton) lift bags, which were supporting three 6-by-6 timbers stacked together. Lift-an-inch, crib-an-inch protocols were followed, and crib stack platforms were used to block up areas for support. The lift was very successful, but this method can take time.
The same group then performed with the HydraFusion struts. Load ratings were calculated and regular long-shore Paratech struts were in place to support the load. The rams are operated by a hydraulic hand pump for smooth operation and give the operator good control with each pump of the handle. With two rams opposing each other at a 60- to 80-degree angle, the two operators brought the load up evenly as they pumped in unison under the extrication officer’s command. With a nine-tonne (10-ton) lift capacity per strut and a 40.5-centimetre (16-inch) lift height, the load was brought up to a sufficient height for removal of the pick-up truck in less than half the time it took to perform the same actins using the lift bags.
I found the load to be more stable using the struts than using the lift bags. Also, setting up the rams requires far less the space than is required for the lift bags. The rams come in three different lift ranges: 10 centimetres (four inches), 25.4 centimetres (10 inches) and 40.6 centimetres (16 inches).
plastic trim and seatbelts, and was useful on single layers of sheet metal. This hand-operated device does not replace a rescue air chisel, but for its portability, size, weight and user friendliness, it is a great tool for departments with a limited budget and minimal compartment space.
One phrase sums up my opinion of the HydraFusion strut kit: game changer.
I tested the HydraFusion struts at the 2013 Big Rig H.O.T.S. program in Nisku, Alta., in
The two-speed, 10,000-psi, single-action HydraFusion pump comes with a three-metre (10-foot) kink-resistant hose and gauge, and weighs five kilograms (11 pounds). I particularly like are the fact that the adjustable carrying strap that can be placed anywhere on the strut. The large pump control knob to manage load descent is also a good feature, and the handle itself has the ability to be locked off in case of accidental release. The kit comes with a five-year warranty against manufacture defects and workmanship. Again, prices vary depending on the kit.
Randy Schmitz is a Calgary firefighter who has been extensively involved in the extrication field for 19 years. He can be reached at rwschmitz@shaw.ca. Follow him on Twitter at @firedog7
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First
• Provide advanced first aid including first response, preparing employees for transport, and providing all required documentation to other emergency response personnel
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In January of this year, Bell Canada actively promoted the use of social networking to raise awareness and funding for mental health initiatives and raised almost $5.5 million. This was Bell’s fourth annual Let’s Talk day. I thought it was the first.
I’m not sure how I missed it the last three years, but this year I was actively tweeting, re-tweeting, posting and sharing. This year, it was personal. I am one of those people Bell talks about in its campaign.
In November, my family doctor had me take a stress leave from work, which also meant a leave from the fire department since it’s the same municipality. Although I understood, I felt that I had just been removed from one of the things that made me feel good about myself and my life and gave me the opportunity to help others. The fire department is a positive outlet for me and that’s exactly what you need when you are trying to redirect your focus away from the stressors in your life.
As stressful as the fire department can be, it’s a different kind of stress than the stress that was affecting me at work and personally. When we respond to calls, it’s almost as if we flip a switch and kick into help mode. You go to the call, do what you need to do to help someone, and then you go home. You don’t take the rest of your life with you to the call. This may not be something that is easy to understand for those who are not involved in emergency services. However, I understood the need to take a break from everything. I didn’t like it, but I understood it.
I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do with the time off to “help myself,” aside from trying to de-stress. My mindset was that I would just find a way to fix it; typical firefighter mentality.
sort of peace.
I also took great comfort in and from my two black labs; they would snuggle up beside me and look at me as if they could see into my soul. It was as if they understood the gravity of the situation even when I didn’t understand what was going on.
The fire department is a positive outlet for me and that’s exactly what you need when you are trying to redirect your focus away from the stressors in your life.
I read books about dealing with stress, anxiety, and depression. I did things I thought would relax me. I even went to see a naturopathic doctor in addition to seeing my family physician. I tried a couple of naturopathic remedies for stress and anxiety and changed the way I eat to help my body function better based on my blood type. I even used the employee-assistance program at work to see a therapist in hopes of learning strategies to deal with stress.
In December, I returned to work. I was unsure about going back, but I decided that I needed to just bite the bullet. Neither my doctor, nor I, realized the depth of my stress and anxiety. I worked two partial weeks and ended up off work again two weeks before Christmas.
It was then that the downward spiral picked up speed. I sank into a depression that kept me in bed for almost five days. I had no interest in anything and would spend long periods of time doing nothing. I ate very little. When I couldn’t sleep, I would sit in the living room and watch the snow fall. It was one of the only things that gave me some
My poor husband felt helpless, as did I. Not only did he have to watch me struggle with something that he didn’t fully understand, we as firefighters are in the business of helping people but neither one of us knew how to help me. It made me wonder what to do when the helper is the one who needs helping.
It was a life-skills counsellor I had worked with over the past couple of years who recognized the severity of the situation. After a brief conversation on the phone, she instructed me to see my family doctor ASAP. Not only was I dealing with a deepening depression and a paralyzing anxiety disorder, she recognized that I was also experiencing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
When I went back to see my family doctor, my husband went with me. I had trouble remembering things and wanted to make sure that I told my doctor everything I had been experiencing. I pretty much needed him with me whenever I left the house, just to feel safe and secure.
My family physician too saw that my symptoms had gotten worse and confirmed the depression, anxiety and PTSD. I’d lost weight, I was pale, and I was despondent. The good news was that he was able to give me something to help me get through it.
I had been being adamantly opposed to medication to help me cope when I first went off work. I did not want to be that person – the one that couldn’t help herself, the one who couldn’t handle it. I didn’t want to need help. I was ashamed and embarrassed by my perceived inability to navigate my own life.
What I’ve learned is that everyone needs help at some point, in one way or another. Ultimately, my quality of life and wanting to be a healthy role model for my two daughters were the deciding factors. I had a lot to be thankful for – a loving husband, and many wonderful people in my life, and I was missing out because I was unable to feel the connection to anything due to something beyond my control.
As we all know, life is about connections. Connections to our family, our work, our experiences, and even the ups and downs.
And I’m not ashamed, I’m human.
Jennifer Mabee-Grigg has been a volunteer with the Township of Georgian Bay Fire Department in Ontario since 1997. Email her at jhook0312@yahoo.ca and follow her on Twitter at @jenmabee
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