While Capt. Tom at EMS12Lead.com might not be trumpeting his success, I will do it for him, as well as for the rest of my colleagues at Hilton Head Island Fire & Rescue.  This week we received another honor, the IAFC's Annual Heart Safe Community Award.  With a lot of pushing and pulling from Capt. Tom Bouthillet, and a lot of support and cooperation from other notables, including Fire Chief Lavarn Lucas, Deputy Chiefs Brad Tadlock and Ed Boring, Capt. Eric Lainhart, our medical control docs, Bo Sherwood and Van Gaube, and of course, Kelly Arashin, we received the award in recognition of the system we have in place in our community.

Between our bystander CPR education efforts, placement of automated defibrillators in the community and our advanced life support response system, individuals experiencing a cardiac event have a significantly better chance of survival than in the past. If an arrest is in progress, we dispatch additional Fire/Rescue companies, where all the line personnel are trained in use of the "pit crew" concept, to maximize the efficiency of assigned resources and to deliver a very high standard of care.  

It doesn't end there: our Fire/Rescue personnel have a number of tools we can use, including 12-lead EKG monitoring with transmission capability and the ability to provide therapeutic hypothermia if indicated.  Our system is also capable of identifying possible STEMI patients in the field and setting off an additional chain of events.

Our delivery of the patient at the Hilton Head Hospital Emergency Department is just one more step.  There, they will have already been alerted by the teams in the field and depending on the situation, have either already brought in a cath lab team, or are prepared to continue therapeutic hypothermia through as needed.  We have a great relationship with our emergency department personnel and we all work together as a team to provide the best possible chances for a positive outcome.

What's more is that the pertinent information is documented and shared through the CARES Registry, where we will be able to extrapolate data needed to help us improve our service.  We have identified methods for communicating good performance as well as performance requiring remediation.  And above all, the system is delivered daily by nine Fire/Rescue companies with extremely professional, caring, and knowledgeable personnel, all of whom are aware of the importance of excellent public service.

When we factor this in with our recent CFAI accreditation, which we have maintained through three cycles, we are pretty proud.  But even more impressive is that our personnel have maintained their positive attitude and professionalism despite comments made about their integrity by certain individuals in our community, rather than those individuals stepping back and defending what they should have known to be true.  Our entire force maintained this very same quiet professionalism even when held to a 1% salary raise last year (and that was not across the board) and no increases in years before that, not because they were afraid to speak out, but because they heard the concern of the community, especially with the economic situation being what it was, and they were willing to accept that and soldier on, when they had every right to be vocal and upset about the situation.  These personnel have also maintained their quiet professionalism among other challenges as well, challenges that will remain unsaid by us, because that's the kind of people we have.

One of the primary things we say to guide our people is to always "do the right thing".  If that means stopping and helping someone change a tire, or picking you up off the floor for the seventh time that week, or loading up your kids in the rig to take them to the hospital when we are transporting you because you have no family available, we do what it takes to make our "customers" happy.  And we say customers because it isn't just the taxpayers; we serve the visitors, the workers, the homeless, anyone we deal with.  They may be patients today, or the may be the homeowner on another, or the occupant, but to us, they are people.

We have an extraordinary amount of pride in our department, but a lot of humility as well.  I talk about all of our personnel because I am proud of them, but they don't go around bragging about it, so I am happy to tell you all about them.  We have very high expectations of our people, but we have fun too.  And while there are plenty of bad moments, the good definitely outweigh the bad.  The difference is that we try to let everyone in on the decisions (to the extent possible), we listen, we try to get them the tools they need (but they aren't spoiled, our budget didn't budge but a single digit percentage from last year), and we do things safely, with a lot of common sense applied rather than emotion.

So while we will be celebrating this new award, we already realize, it is recognition for what we have done.  For us, what we have done so far is never good enough.  We will continue to push forward and improve from where we are today, to keep looking at ways we can tweak this or adjust that to make our organization that much better.  We do not rest on our laurels.

If you get a chance to come to our Island, make sure you stop by a station.  EVERY station and Headquarters is open to the public and we encourage visitors.  We will always take the time to show someone the trucks, or to take a blood pressure, or just to talk about what we do.  We are an all-hazards response agency who takes the job very seriously and we like sharing what we do. Thanks to all of you at HHIFR; you all make me proud to be affiliated with you. 

Share on Facebook

A few weeks ago, there was a tragic sequence of events that occurred in a community in our county. While working a medical alarm, a City of Beaufort fire engine was stolen by a man, who in his flight, killed a pedestrian as well as struck a number of cars.  Talk about your "Swiss cheese modeling"; short of an astronomical syzygy, I'm pretty sure you can't find a better alignment of factors to recreate that event again. If you saw that in a movie, you'd think, "How stupid!  A man escapes from a military hospital, finds an idling fire engine, and escapes his pursuers. It isn't likely to happen."  But it did.

Things happen every day that defy logic.  Truth, as it is said, is often stranger than fiction.

Deep down inside, we might say to ourselves, "That could never happen here."  Or we feel it coming up and we suppress it, because we know, if we were ever to actually verbalize that, it WOULD happen.  But we are all guilty of seeing something happen and thinking that we are either too good, too well-trained, too attentive to the details, too big of a department, or even too remotely disconnected from "big city" problems for certain events to transpire. It just won't happen to us.

This is something that happens in families as well.  I know people who are perfect parents and their children defy any reasonable expectation of success.  I know parents who have no business reproducing who have amazing children.  I know fire or EMS agencies that I can't believe, due to their ineptness, that they haven't facilitated some major catastrophe. And I know the most professional organizations ever who have had arsonists surface among their ranks, or they lose firefighters, or they burn down an entire zip code. 

Unfortunately, right now public servants have a target drawn on their back.  Some of our brothers have actually drawn it on there for us.  We are in a profession (career and volunteer alike) that used to be considered trustworthy, honorable, valiant, and courageous.  We have a few mutts in our midst who have caused people to think otherwise.  The job hasn't changed, nor has the opinion MOST people have of public servants, but the fact is that when someone can paint "firefighters" or "EMTs" in a convenient picture and wrap it up in an emotional context, they gain attention.  And so long as we tolerate membership from those who give us a black eye, we continue to enable that perception.

Our business has enough danger, innuendo, drama, and everything else that we don't need to add to it by tolerating personnel with bad attitudes, carelessness, or poor morale.  We have to seek the causes of these problems and root them out.  We have to be positive and focused on the service we provide and how we improve that delivery daily.  We must reward people for doing things right and remediate those who do things wrong.  But even when we do all these things right, our team might have someone swimming below the surface, counter to our culture or our expectations, who is intentionally or unintentionally, just waiting to pop to the surface.

If you really want to change the minds of others, the first step in doing so is by exuding professionalism yourself.  Nobody is going to follow your advice if you aren't in front leading the charge. If everyone in emergency service had that mentality, it would be a lot easier to bring the rest of the world forward.  But remember, even in the best of situations, even with thorough planning and training and coaching, sometimes things go wrong with no real expectation.  Our job as leaders is to minimize the risk of those events occurring, be proactive and engaged, and to present alternatives that eliminate those bodies from lining up.

Share on Facebook

In this case the researchers are using the Green June Beetle, but given the size of the cockroaches (or Palmetto Bugs, as we like to call them in South Carolina) I have seen, we could probably equip them with a hammer drill and let them tunnel the victims back out of the rubble once they find one.

Cyborg insects are low maintenance, can get into very restricted and virtually inaccessible areas, and with these new developments, can be adapted for a number of different tasks.  Some of these cyborg applications could also be used for monitoring hazmats or terrorist attacks, doing pre-entry search and recon for SWAT teams, or spy work.  As far as our use of these creatures, the sky (or the basement) is the limit.

Never lose sight of this constant: Change is inevitable.  It''s how we deal with it that makes the difference. What we know today as the way we do business may be radically different tomorrow.

Share on Facebook

It may take extra time that you don't think you have. That time may seem very valuable. The shortcut you take may seem like it saves those precious seconds. But I have seen in my life, many times when those shortcuts have proven catastrophic, and in most of those situations, I look at them and wonder, had someone taken a few extra moments to do it right, what the outcome might have been.

While the historical issue between response to rescues in New York City is frustrating and sad, since it seems to me to be the confluence of a power struggle and turf battle, instead of celebrating a terrific save the other day, instead we have this tragedy to contend with, as shared with us by Dave Statter on his blog.

I have always learned and always taught that when lifting, we "crib to the lift". And while the spreaders are not the desired lifting tool, I have used them before and they have worked just fine. I preface that, however by explaining that I am also passionate about physics and when I have used spreaders, I also understood that the force applied must go somewhere, and if the load isn't stabilized, the force is going to create motion we don't want. In this case, the force displaced the object alright: lateral to the support (the spreader) and with nothing to support the load (cribbing) the load went to ground (and victim).

I don't care if you are FDNY, ESU, or anyone else. I have seen this very same shortcut taken before in departments that have had identically catastrophic results. I also recall other times when the load has shifted on the column, in one case, three stacked air bags.  In this case, the firefighter, who happened to also be the salesman of the lift bags and should have a little expertise in their use, himself was killed.

There's a lesson to be learned in every tragedy. Aside from the physical principles that apply to all of us here on this planet, there's another very important one. Driving recklessly, failing to wear your seatbelt, not wearing proper PPE, not paying attention to overhead power lines, and in this case, not providing an alternate column to support the load via cribbing, all might seem like they are saving precious seconds, but failing to do the right thing the first time, ended instead in tragedy.

Take a moment to ditch the emotion and be the professionals you are. Do the right thing the first time.

Share on Facebook

Being so focused on one thing, it is very easy to lose track of your surroundings.  If there is ever a scenario when situational awareness is completely hampered, it is at these moments.  Even if, as a leader, you were to "get up on the balcony" to observe from a different perspective, chances are that if your focus were so narrowed on one subject, you still might miss the subtle and even the obvious, when considering impact upon whatever is actually occurring.

Sometimes the challenges we face are so daunting or so in need of our engagement, that we forget to consider alternatives.  These issues may cause us to hone in on only the details that are immediately apparent to us, as they may jump right out and comand our attention, and cause us to lose sight of the process: to define the problem, gather the facts, consider alternatives, and implement the solution.  Instead we may become completely absorbed in whatever element of that process that causes us the most challenge and we may be paralyzed due to that restricted sightline.  And just as importantly, peripheral vision helps us to consider other factors as they intercept our path and instead of navigating away or turning to combat the issue head on, these factors take us completely by surprise.

Consider that while we may be too close to our problem to be objective, we may even not resolve that perspective by standing back from it, because we are fixed on the issue and unwilling to pay attention to subtleties.  When faced with a monumental challenge, it helps to step back from it, but it also helps sometimes to put the issue down altogether, to walk away from it and reflect, and then revisit the problem with fresh eyes.

Note: Thanks to my traveling companion for his insight and sharing his observations.  And as an FYI, depending on what Irene does, I'll probably be a little busy, so if you don't see anything on FHZ for a while, please stop back by because once I get time, I'll get caught back up again.  Thanks for reading.

Share on Facebook

In between class sessions here in Colorado, Chief Ron and his wife, Linda, and I took a scenic tour of Rocky Mountain National Park by way of the Western Portal, going up to the Gore Range before turning around and going back into town.  While the park is incredible and the vistas breathtaking, it occured to us that settlers going west centuries ago must have been awestruck coming off the plains and facing this massive roadblock.

We were also listening to a talk radio show at the same time and the moderator was indicating that we are never just given the keys to leadership, we have to earn them through trial and survival.  Only after being faced with hardship and making it through do you realize that these challenges fortify you for any battles ahead.

Sitting in an air conditioned car on the paved road and using GPS to find our path, it became apparent to me that the next time I am faced with adversity, I need to consider these individuals.  How daunting it must have been, going to a land unknown to them, packing up everything they had and moving it across the Rockies to forge a better life for themselves.  Yet they not only overcame those challenges, they led the making of a new nation.  What right do I have to worry about my petty issues? 

If you believe in what you are doing, nothing can stop you. Consider the triumphs of others when given impossible odds and realize that you can do anything you dream.

Share on Facebook

Do you want to recharge your batteries?  Teach.  Take what you have learned and share it with others.  You don't have to be a certified instructor to teach.  Even the lowest man on the totem pole can learn something and share it with others. Sharing knowledge changes the world.

Share on Facebook

According to this pilot, Chief H said, when there is a landing that isn't perfect, there is a culture of not pointing fingers that encourages the flight crew to report the event, discuss the factors, and to come up with methods to improve their performance.  Sounds a lot like a near-miss policy to me, but the difference is that apparently, there is absolutely no resistance to reporting these issues because there is no threat of repercussion.

Now we have the Secret List and the Firefighter Near Miss Reporting System, and in our organization at least, we discuss standard operating guidelines in post-event critiques, but I don't know that those concepts even go as far as what Chief H was suggesting they do in this airline program.  To me, it sounds a lot like common sense: instead of focusing on the situation that has already occurred, focus on the events we can fix or those we can grow to recognize and solve, and move forward.

But there is no way this kind of concept can evolve on many of these blogs.  Hell, if anything is seen, like a glove missing or God forbid, someone isn't wearing their SCBA, it becomes a litany of what a dumbass the individuals are and how is it that these people are even still fighting fire.

Now while our department is very strict about the use of safety equipment and insuring best practices are followed, it is hardly a slamfest out there.  If we see you don't have something, we suggest (pretty strongly) for you to go get it and wear it.  This happens pretty rarely because we have squared away people who have been doing this stuff fairly often (with the exception of some of the rookies, of course).  But really, we do make mistakes and there's a lot of times we laugh about it because once pointed out, everyone is pretty good about doing the right thing.

I'd hate, however, for someone to take a photograph of us when we rolled up on a scene, however, and someone just so happened to have missed putting a glove on.  In the case of a recent fire we had, there was significantly enough fire on the outside to cause the arriving officer to order a transitional attack.  His company deployed two lines to the exterior to knock down the rapidly extending fire, which they did without donning masks.  

The next due engine stretched an attack line to the front door and using proper PPE, made the knock on the inside.  Confined to the two rooms we found burning when we got there, nobody hurt.  Nobody was coughing or hacking and honestly, the most difficult part of the evolution was dealing with the mosquitoes.  But just on the chance there was a picture taken of those first few seconds, we'd have heard cries of "sissy" and "outdoor firefighter" from half the crowd and angry accustations of unsafe activity and amateurism from the other half.

Instead of showing the world you are the resident expert on firefighting (which I suspect half of the trolls would run crying at the sight of a real fire), why not use what you see on the blogs and posts to learn something from it and instead of sharing your incredible insight with us all, perhaps make some intelligent observations that could help others remember not to make those mistakes.  I doubt any of the haters are reading this, so I doubt it will have much impact, but perhaps, maybe it will.

Share on Facebook

Lo and behold, a quote from the author, Linda Holmes, describing the actions of the management team for Two and A Half Men.  From the article: "They [the management team] voluntarily ripped a key piece of machinery out of one of the most successful money factories on television.  Things actually got that bad."

That's not "#winning" folks.  That's stopping the hemorrhage. At what point in your wildly successful organization does the presence of a key individual become so dysfunctional that you just have to say, "Enough"?  Conversely, I know people who say they would work for any psychopath Chief if the money were right.  But there comes a time when a line must be drawn, as has allegedly occurred in Weirton, WV, according to a post by FireGeezer.com.  

It's tragic that there are people who are "in charge" who exhibit this kind of behavior.  While this individual may have some other issues we don't know about yet, I know of ex-chiefs of departments who have fought employees, threatened them, or just acted like total sociopaths. I know business "leaders" who act similarly to their employees.  Years ago, I had the opportunity to work for one of those psychopaths I refer to and frankly, I took the inconsistent, hypercritical, hypocritical direction for a period of time, then ultimately, parted ways.  I have always been considered a pretty decent employee, if I say so myself, but this guy made no sense to me whatsoever and I knew I could do a better job for someone who was a little more balanced.  So I left.  Ultimately, so did he, but that's a story for another time.

I tell you all the time about leadership and mentoring.  I am positive that even as a buck recruit you can influence and impress others where you can in fact, be considered a leader through positive contributions.  But there are just some people who happen to rise to power and are either corrupted on the way, or didn't have a good sense of values to begin with, who should simply not be in a leadership position.

And forgive me for saying so, but there are people who may have all the right intentions, but simply don't have the chops: they may lack command presence, or conversely, may be too overbearing.  But I can work with someone if they are pointed in the right direction and are willing to allow me to help them go in that direction.  But if we are diametrically opposed in our vision and our values, someone is going to have to change or go.  Unfortunately, in some cases, it might be the forces on the side of "good" having to leave because they can not positively influence the direction the organization is going in.  And no amount of money, fame, or awards will change that.

When you have just started out somewhere, it may be immediately apparent that this isn't the place for you and cutting your losses can be a little easier.  But aside from the investment you have made in an organization, when you have been in the business long enough that you have built up some chips and got your resume positioned correctly, it makes the decision tougher because you really do believe you can turn things around, if you happen to get the chance.  

Successful warriors are so because they choose their battles wisely.  They seek advantage in terrain, timing, and resources.  They attack when they see weakness and they withdraw when they sense resistance.  Just as a skilled butcher doesn't chop through the bones lest he damage his knife, he finds the joints and cuts through those at the weakest points, making the job easier and extending the life of his blade.  So should we seek our opportunities to advance and withdraw, to put forth ideas to improve the service we provide, or back off until the timing is right, or we have the right analysis of our idea, or we have the resources to fund the concept.  But when those elements aren't ever made available, a decision has to be made.  

As I asked earlier, at what point in your wildly successful organization do things become so dysfunctional that you just have to say, "Enough"?

Share on Facebook

A few shifts later, we did end up with one of these transports and the same crew was back on rotation.  I called the station to let the crew know what was going on.  I hung up from that and went back to my computer.  After a few minutes, I still hadn't heard the medic unit check in on the radio.  When I called the station to find out what was going on, I'll bet you know what the answer was. That day I learned a lesson the hard way.  The lesson: Don't give someone an order and then, when something unusual comes up, expect your orders to be followed without question.

Individuals who become supervisors, and subsequently leaders, must understand that when they play pranks like that, the result is that people don't see you as credible. I do have examples of officers who have been able to be pranksters and be credible, but they are VERY far and few between.  In retrospect, a friend and colleague who I consider one of the best officers I have ever worked with was one of those.  But my observation is that he had the ability to pull off pranks that didn't require his active involvement.  And while never calling attention to his ability to pull a fast one, he wasn't the class clown either.  

Conversely, there are those who when they pull off the joke, they have to be in the middle of it.  This obviously detracts from their respectability.  They are not seen as credible.  The crew just sees them as an extension of themselves, with some added paperwork responsibilities.  When it comes to playtime, these characters are right there in the mix, setting someone up for a "bunny tail", throwing someone else's car keys into a bowl of water bound for the freezer, or throwing a bucket of cold water over top of the shower door on some unsuspecting boot.  And what's even worse is that when the officer engages in this behavior, it also means that to be a good sport, you must be okay with being the mark in some of the practical jokes. Otherwise, the argument is that you can dish it out, but can't take it, and depending on how you react, you may very well end up looking foolish, which certainly isn't going to do anything for your respect.

There are ways to not be a prankster and not be seen as a tight-ass either.  We have a long standing "tradition" of wetting individuals with ice cold buckets of water when they get promoted.  The day I got the official letter, I overheard some of the crew debating the wisdom of wetting me, since I don't engage in that nonsense.  But when all the work was done that day, I finished up a report, walked out into the kitchen and said, "Okay, if you're going to do this, let's do it and get it over with."  

Each of the other six guys at Station 6 that day got a shot at pouring ice water on a newly minted chief officer (see the picture).  I'll admit it was cold and that it took my breath away.  But I sat there and when they exhausted their last bucket and they were all standing around, I shook the ice off my shirt and stood up.  I then asked, "You guys done?"  They all acknowledged that they were, I simply said "Thank You", went inside to my rack and changed into a dry uniform.  Then I went back to my office to finish up my evening reports with a smile and a business as usual attitude.

Likewise, if you have that kind of attitude and someone does take a chance to pull one over on you, the best bet is to maintain a sense of humor about it, but remind the entire crew that it isn't smart to prank the chief.  I've said something like, "Are you sure turning the heater on high in the chief's car is a good career move?", which gets some light laughter, but everyone gets the point.  Later you can take the individual aside and actually use it to discuss this very same lesson here with them, so that perhaps they learn from it for when they become an officer. 

When you are a leader, it requires you to not take yourself too seriously.  But if you are busy dreaming up new practical jokes rather than dreaming up new training scenarios, the likelihood that you will be given the respect you desire as an officer is going to be slim. Officers who engage in practical joking with their subordinates are only asking for reciprocation; the biggest downside is that reaction may come at the time you least want it to.  Best to leave the funny stuff to the kids and stick to being the responsible adult. 

Share on Facebook