Direction of attack

[Saint of Quench]

We all know that pictures only show a snapshot of a moment in time. That being said take a look at this grouping of pictures that I got off of Firehouse.com concerning a house fire from Sorrento, Louisiana. My opinion of what I am seeing but I don't think that a car fire that started in a garage should have extended to the rest of the home. I say that becaue the water is being sent from the outside into the garage and would seem to push the fire from burned to unburned. I thought we were taught to go the other way. I have no idea what staffing was or the method of deployment, but this doesn't seem to be the most ideal way to fight a fire of this type. All constructive opinions welcome.

http://cms.firehouse.com/content/article/article.jsp?id=31466&sectionId=45

[roofhook]

From the pictures, it looks like there is a second story to this house (or at least a very high roof area. Most likely with some sort of room build into it.)
From the fire spread and construction of the house, I would say all if not the majority of the fire is going to be in the attic area.
I would direct my attack from the unburned side trying to find an attic access or make one by pulling ceilings and attacking the fire from underneath.
You can see the pictures are not in order, but you can see how the "outstanding" firefighting is not making headway.
A couple well placed hoselines ahead of the fire and some proactive truckwork by opening up the ceilings and walls to get to the fire, this structure could have been saved
This is typical rural firefighting.

[MG3610]

Its hard to be an armchair quarterback, you dont know what happened there, but it is very easy to identify a few issues that might have contributed to the not so favorable outcome.

First, look at the crews attacking with a fog stream, this is surely a good fire pushing tool due to the air that is introduced, I'm still not convinced a well placed striaight stream pushes fire, I think thats more of a myth...but anyway. The fire is laughing at them, can't you see it. Secondly, The one photo shows a fireman shooting a stream from a TFT auto nozzle, he is holding it by himself and the hose is bent sharpley behind him, this says right away, that that line can't be flowing much more than 100 GPM, otherwise he wouldnt be able to manage it like that. The bottom line here is that there isnt enough water being applied to the fire to darken it down quick enough and they don't seem to be getting ahead of the fire, ultimately trying to play catch up in a no-win race. This fire was probably at a pretty advanced stage upon arrival, but thats just a guess. To say with conviction that the building could have been saved is inappropriate, unless you were there. I could gueess your points are valid, since I have witnessed many ill equipped and improperly led fire attacks. Probably no hydrants, trying to "conserve" water, lack of agressive firemen that would go in to "get some" etc.....

In my opinion the best way to get this type of fire is to get between the nasty bad shit and rest of the house, take a hold of it, open up the ceilings and walls and flow some serious water, otherwise don't waste anyones time. Maybe a good case for opening the roof too, because it appears the fire travelled the attic until it reached the opposite gable end. But im still more of a fan of getting inside and getting water up into the ceilings, unless something obstructs you, its a very successful way to kill the fire that has breached the ceiling into the attic/void spaces.

[roofhook]

You make some valid points on the water supply and fire streams.
The biggest myth (IMHO) in the rural fire service is the fact that you have to conserve water and you cannot use large bore streams on an initial attack.
You must apply more cooling agent to a fire than the BTUs a fire produces to extinguish the fire.
If using your basic fire flow calculations, you determine that you need 300gpm to control the fire and your hoselines are flowing a total of 200-250 gpm..you are doing nothing but prolonging the enevitable ( nothing left but a chimney and driveway)....now smack the same fire with 500gpm and watch it go out.
The main thing is you have to go and "get it"...you have to place your hoselines between the fire and the unburned area, you have to gain access to the fire via truck work and you must have enough fire flow to extinguish the fire.
A good blitz attack may have slowed the fires progression to the point where thier inadequite fire streams may have extinguished the remaining fire...

Scary part is they are probally back at the station high fiving each other and talking about the big one they just had :eek:

[Lontal]

Well, as usual it is very difficult to Monday morning quarterback a fire when you only get a few pictures of the game. I looked at the images a little differently, trying to figure out the proper sequence. Doing so led me to think that the fire had already extended well into the attic (or 2nd floor) space of the house by the time the crews began the attack. I don't think, based on the pictures, that they pushed the fire into the house. Nevertheless, the fire still should have been attacked from the house side and not the garage side. Maybe then they could've saved something useful.

I recently was first to arrive on a similar fire. The Monday morning quarterbacks also moaned that there should've been a more agressive interior attack. They just didn't accept that the roof was collapsing as we made entry (forcing us to back out). Well, this time we were vindicated when the photos taken by the arriving 2nd in pumper clearly showed the untennable situation early in the fire.

[ENGINEDUDELT]

Looks like they may be a little SKEEEEERRRREEEEDDDD of the devil. Just a thought. But, it is hard to be the Qback like you said.

[Grumpyoldman]

No one's skeered anymore, they're just being "safe" as they provide "customer service."

[Iceman]

Us Grumpy Old Men Agree............

[RES2CUEFF/PM]

Let's just hope the family has a good home owner's issurance policy. It just doesn't look like those crews are able to get a handle on it. Without understanding all the dynamics involved, it's difficult to make a judgement.
IF you look at the Pensy fire too, similar outcome....burned it to the ground. Oops!