Forcible Entry

Unlock the secrets behind successful forcible entry in firefighting with insights from Captain Dave Colson, a seasoned expert with over two decades of experience. Ever wondered why embracing failure during training can be a game-changer? Captain Colson shares his journey from novice to master, emphasizing the value of making mistakes in a controlled environment to prepare for real-life emergencies. We promise you'll learn how to turn failures into stepping stones for skill mastery and operational readiness.

Effective communication can be the difference between life and death in firefighting. Join us as we explore essential commands like "hit," "drive," and "stop" that ensure precision and safety during operations. Captain Colson also delves into the critical assessment process of door size-up and various techniques for different scenarios, from residential to commercial buildings. Discover how understanding these nuances and maintaining a flexible approach can make all the difference in successful forcible entry.

The fire service is built on tradition, mentorship, and continuous learning. Captain Colson shares personal stories of mentorship that shaped his career, highlighting the importance of humility and feedback. We discuss how fostering a positive environment within the department can motivate the team and enhance overall efficiency. If you're passionate about firefighting or looking to boost your skills, this episode is packed with valuable lessons and practical advice from one of the best in the field.

Chapters

• 0:00 Firefighter Training and Forceful Entry
• 7:08 Effective Communication in Forceful Entry
• 16:08 Door Size-Up and Entry Techniques
• 22:53 Efficient Door Forcing Techniques
• 30:49 Importance of Proper Forceful Entry Training
• 39:55 Tool Tuning and Mechanical Advantage
• 49:40 Door Forcing Techniques and Risk Management
• 57:16 Advanced Door Forcing Techniques and Tools
• 1:00:58 Importance of Basic Forceful Entry Training
• 1:07:34 Mastering the Basics
• 1:13:33 Learning and Growing in Firefighting
• 1:21:01 Mentorship, Growth, and Tradition
• 1:30:06 Creating a Positive Firefighter Culture

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

we have to learn that. That's okay, especially in the training scenario, the training thing. That's where we want. We want to get destroyed out there, we want to make all the errors and the mistakes and the failures out there, and those are opportunities for us to learn and get better, and that's what it has to be. The focus on is when we're out on the training ground. We need to fail. We need to fail miserably sometimes, because that's that time to stop back, reflect, get some input from others that are seeing things that you're not noticing or doing.

Speaker 2: 0:30

Welcome everybody. Copper State Fireman Podcast. This podcast is for firemen burning the ships of complacency, laziness and excuses. We're promoting love and passion for the job, encouraging eagerness and mastering the craft of the fire service. Remember the information, opinion, values, recommendation and ideas are of the host and the individuals of this podcast and are not affiliated or endorsed by the fire departments, organization or companies. The individuals work for. This podcast is for general information use only. Brought to you by the Copper State Fools and sponsored by Solid Foundation Team LLC. Let's go. Copper State Fireman Podcast, season 1, episode 2.

Speaker 2: 1:20

Today we have the honor to sit down with Dave Colson. Talk about forceful entry, techniques, culture, everything this man wants to talk about. So Dave Colson is a captain 21 years in the American Fire Service. He's a paramedic, hazmat tech, technical rescue, so all-hazards fireman sitting in front of me right now. Instructor for Arizona Fire School, he's been a recruit training officer and a training captain. He's been part of the logistics deputy chief for super bowl number 49, uh, canine search and rescue handler, which is which is crazy, because that's not a very common thing, especially out here. It's been a mentor and instructor for glendale community college fire academy. High school fire science program instructor, been a program manager for the cadet program, part of the wildland team and the honor guard. So Dave's been, he's had his fingers in pretty much everything so far.

Speaker 2: 2:09

Career highlights, firefighter of the Year Professional Service Award. Worked on a number of promotional processes, internal and external, and the hiring process. He's been a high school baseball coach. Prior to the fire service. He was actually a bus driver, which hopefully we talk about a little bit today. And then he's super proud of having a strong family support system. More importantly, his wife, amy, has stayed married to him for this whole entire crazy fire service career. And the other thing Dave's super passionate and proud about is crew members working underneath him and him helping them to promote and advance in their fire service career. Forceful entry, unless I missed anything, brother.

Speaker 1: 2:47

Oh, thanks for having me. I'm excited to do this. It's going to be fun Cool.

Speaker 2: 2:50

Perfect. So just tell us like forceful entry, man, we could talk about it forever, right, and you are the guru. I can't think of anybody else that knows more or is more passionate about forceful entry, so talk to me. So what do you feel like? Right now is the most important thing that we can start teaching guys about forcible entry.

Speaker 1: 3:11

Most important thing on forcible entry I mean number one it's willingness to get out there and try. I think that is the most important thing. I believe we don't know what we don't know, and at no point did I come into the fire service and know a lot of stuff about forcible entry. I came in as everybody else was taught in the academy and just over time it somehow gravitated to that and started doing a lot of research on it, a lot of research on a lot of reading, a lot of training on it, and that's kind of just where it all kind of starts with stuff in. And when it comes to what the future holds for other guys and getting into forceful entry, it's number one just be willing to go out and try, be open mind to be learned stuff, because we don't know what we don't know. So that's always step one just get out there and start trying things, listen to people.

Speaker 2: 4:05

Yeah, I agree, and that's huge in the fire service, because we are always, for some reason and I don't know where this started we're embarrassed to fail in front of our friends sometimes, and I don't quite get that Like, if I'm going to fail, I'd rather fail in front of you than fail in front of you. Know, grandma Smirkins, who's never met me before? No-transcript.

Speaker 1: 4:30

We have a large fear of just as you're saying failing in front of the guys that we work with because we hold them, I think, up into such a high standard as well, and we want to also meet that standard. We're all type A people. We're in this job for a living. We want to be front and center doing our job and doing it well. So sometimes, if things don't go right, we have to learn that that's okay, especially in the training scenario, the training thing. That's where we want. We want to get destroyed out there. We want to make all the errors and the mistakes and the failures out there, and those are opportunities for us to learn and get better. And that's what it has to be.

Speaker 1: 5:05

The focus on is when we're out on the training ground, we need to fail. We need to fail miserably sometimes, because that's that time to stop back, reflect, get some input from others that are seeing things that you're not noticing or doing, and that's going to open us up to be successful when that next evolution or growing to it. So when we have that day and it's that Super Bowl and we're having that big fire that we need to get in there, we need to go make a grab that we're on our game, because we've been handed the worst things already and we failed on those things. We've learned them. Now it's game day. Now it's time to go in there and do our job and do a great and look and look like the professionals that we are, because we're working our butts off to to hit that home run in the bottom of the ninth when when the game's on the line. So that's what we're prepping for every single day.

Speaker 2: 5:53

Oh yeah, that's a great analogy, especially for any of those sports guys out there. Every everybody understands exactly what you mean by that. So, with that said, if I am sitting down in front of Dave Colson and you're teaching me forcible entry for the first time, right, what are your striking points? Talk to me about your class. Talk to me about what you make sure that your students take away when they leave.

Speaker 1: 6:12

So, kind of start ground up on it. When I start with that, I start talking about number one, the equipment we use, the tools we use. We need to understand the tools that we are using and how to use them in a way that makes it beneficial for us. I'm not going to get into an in-depth thing of about exactly certain brands of tools, but there are very good ones and there are ones that are make life a lot harder in in our endeavors to be successful in whatever the evolution is that we're about to come to. So, understanding the tools, understanding the finer points of it to make us successful, If we, if we start harnessing that, how to increase mechanical advantage, increase the force that we're putting in there, understand when we need to move and change the plan that we're going to or or add into a second piece into that plan. Those are all things that come from the baseline of just understanding the equipment that we're working with. After that now it's the communication piece.

Speaker 1: 7:13

The communication piece I I preach it all the time when it comes to the fire service. I was just talking with the recruits last week and we were talking about some search stuff and it was very much. I say, hey, everything in the fire service comes down to successes and failures are based a lot on communication. When we communicate well, things go well. When we have horrible communication, things go poorly. So when coming back to the forceful entry world, that is all about we have to speak the same language. We have to understand, when I'm given commands, that my partner's understanding what those commands mean if we're working in two man operations. So we have to speak the same language and and be able to go back and forth with what we're doing and what we're talking about.

Speaker 2: 7:58

All right. So before we move on the communication aspect, because obviously that is something that's thoroughly important across our entire profession oh yeah, education, right. So when you talk about forcible entry, communication, talk to us. So what are, what are, what's the same language?

Speaker 1: 8:12

so talking about. So when we talk about the same language, uh, first thing is our commands are hit, drive, stop, wedge, little help and what. I'm gonna slow that down and come back to it. When we talk about hit, if I'm the guy on the halogen, you are the one calling the commands. You're understanding what's going on with that door as best you can, you're feeling the door and you're also the one who's going to get hit if you have somebody who's not paying attention on the other side. So you're making the calls. So when we say hit, that means your partner is going to strike that tool one time. And when we talk about one time, it's because you're going to, you're planning on having a lot of manipulation in your, in your tool, that it's not going to be in that same target after it gets hit. You're, you're working towards a goal and there's going to be a lot of manipulation. So it has to be one strike and then you, that tool, that target, is going to move around.

Speaker 2: 9:06

So basically what you're saying, dave, is when you're telling if you're running the show and you're on the halogen, it's you and I right, and you tell me, hey, steve, hit right, so I'm hitting it once, and then what are you doing with that tool?

Speaker 1: 9:20

So you're basically saying that at that point you're manipulating that tool. Yeah, we kind of skipped over what our actual operations and our goals are. We went straight into the communication piece. But we'll bounce back into the goals. The very simplest objectives when it comes to forceful entry is gap set force, and we need to create that gap. We need to set our tool and then we put the force to it. So now, jumping into that communication piece, we're trying to create that gap. We're trying to create some sort of opening that we can actually start to get some work done and get our tool set into that door and then we can actually put some force into this thing. Because if we try and put a lot of force and we don't have a tool in a good position, it's coming out right back at us. We're not getting into that building, we we're gonna have a tool flying out of that, whatever gap that we've made, and we're gonna be starting all over from scratch.

Speaker 2: 10:10

So so, in between those hits, as the halligan firefighter, what are you looking at on that door, like is there? Are you looking to expose that jam and see that lock-in mechanism? Are you trying to see the, the material, the doors, could I mean? Like?

Speaker 1: 10:30

so when we kind of talk the order of the class, we're we're going to come back into that stuff when we start talking about size up. Um, and this is where I kind of roll with hey, let's teach guys about the tools. So understand that now we're going to talk about the communication aspect of it and now we're going to get into start actually looking at the door and what our operations are on that stuff, and all of it comes to the size up. That I'm sure we'll get to after we start talking about some communication stuff, but depends on what my plan A is going to be going into that door.

Speaker 1: 10:57

Am I attacking right at that lock? Do I have to work away from the lock and start working myself closer? Is the jam something that I can work off of? Is it sturdy? Is it wood? Is it metal? How much is it going to give me? So all of those things are going to play into it, how I'm trying to manipulate that tool in there and we might start working with the ads, we might start working with the forks. It all depends on what that door is and that's going to come into our size up of starting to break it down to really give what is my game plan. To start with plan A Okay great, all right, so continue.

Speaker 2: 11:31

I know I'm hopping all over the place, that's all right, it's good info, so back to your communication, right? So we did hit.

Speaker 1: 11:37

All right. So we got hit. So that means I want my partner to hit my tool one time. Now our goal is to get a gap once we start getting a gap in there. Now we're trying to set that tool. So when it comes to that, if we have a good spot and that tool is not going to have a lot of manipulation, I'm going to tell my partner to drive. Drive means repeated hits that are right on point, hitting that button on that thing. So we're getting maximum force of energy sorry, maximum energy getting delivered through that tool into the gap of the door and trying to get to our landmarks of those tools and so that actually is set efficiently, perfect.

Speaker 1: 12:17

After we get that tool set, now it's time I'm going to be calling stop. So stop is stop very obvious, because I don't want to start moving around. My partner thinks he's still on a in that drive mode and then I get hit with a tool. So we're going to drive that thing until you call stop. Your eyes, as the halogen guy, should be watching that door 100% of the time you're watching your tool. You got to know what, what's going on with that door and see what's going on where, the depth of your tool, how deep it's going in there and get to those landmarks that you want to get to so that you can call that stop. And now our job is to now put some force into that door.

Speaker 1: 12:55

Next one, if we're, we kind of talked about a little plan A. Now reality tells us plan A doesn't always work. We might be getting into plan B, plan C, plan X, y, z. I mean the door is going to be the door that we're getting handed to us. So we got to be flexible in what we're going over there. So there's times out there that we have to change the way we're operating with our halogen into that door. And the best way if I start working on creating a gap and now I'm thinking I was using the ads, now I want to move over to working with with my forks, or I want to change the angle of the bevel if I was working with the forks, or flip my ads a different way.

Speaker 1: 13:35

Whatever I want to remanipulate my tool, I don't want to lose all the work that I've already done. So, calling for a wedge, I'm asking my partner hey, wedge this door. Either, either use an aluminum wedge, use the axe and put the point part of the axe into there so you capture all the progress that we've already made. Now I can pull the halogen out of that door. We can change it to however. I want to now manipulate that tool. I'm going to get reset to wherever I want to go. Whether it's a different location, different end of the tool, put it back in there. I'm going to get reset to wherever I want to go. Whether it's different location, different end of the tool, put it back in there. I'm going to let him know. I'm ready. I'm going to push that, take the pressure on the door which allows him to pull his ax out or his wedge out, whatever he's using to capture the progress.

Speaker 1: 14:16

And now we can get back to work, whatever our next part of that plan is. If we work through that whole thing, we created our gap, we drove that tool in there, we set the tool and now we're into the force and I go for the force and the door doesn't open. But do a quick check in my own head. I'm looking at the door, I'm looking at my tool. I know my tool's in a good spot. It's where I want to be. I feel like everything is good, except I'm not able to deliver enough force to compete with what the door's holding me back on. So now, if I ask for a little help and it means I want my partner to get in here and we're going to double up our force by putting two of us on here we're going to work together so my energy can now be matched up with their energy and we can hopefully force the door on there.

Speaker 1: 15:08

If that doesn't work now, we've got to start going into those additional plans. How can we increase our force with some other things, maybe adding different tools, maybe extending it out, make it longer to increase that leverage that we have. So those are all things that are going to play into those things. But number one, going back to the beginning of this, it's all about communication. When it comes to working with a door, for those, however long couple seconds, minute, however long that door takes it, you got to have good communication in there. And the fire ground is loud, it's busy, there's radio traffic going on, so we got to be very to the point, understanding what we're asking people and just be smooth with that stuff. We got to work together, we got to train together If we already speak the same language and we know the positions that we're going to be at right away, we can get after it really quick and be successful in that little piece of the operation of the big picture of the environment we're at.

Speaker 2: 16:06

Perfect, I love you. You touched on so many different things in such a small little topic of just communication and we kind of branched out really quickly. So I'm going to give you the opportunity to kind of go back to the beginning here and kind of just run through your class. So you talked real quickly about the size up, right. So let's basically start at the beginning. So tell the audience what you're talking about when you say, because everyone in the fire service knows the size up, right, but you're talking about sizing up a building or a door, right.

Speaker 1: 16:34

Yeah, guys, look at me weird when I get in there and I start talking about a class and talking about tools to our communication. I said, okay, now let's step back. Now we're going to start the size up, size up of the door. If I'm coming out of the truck where, no matter what the scene is, I start sizing things up. Life as an officer you are always sizing things up, depending whether you're first and second and third and whatever it may be. But now we're going to focus that a little bit. Smaller into my plan is I need to get through that door in front of me. So as I'm approaching, I grab my tools, my partners grab their tools, whoever's grabbing the tools as we're walking this building, I don't care if we're 10 feet away from the building or 100 feet away from the building. I like to talk about starting in a broad spectrum. Number one what is the building? Is it a house? Is it commercial? Is it a house? Is it commercial? Is it block? Is it wood framed? So I start big and start narrowing it down as you're getting closer. This size up is just going on in your head and it should be second nature. So understand that building as you're getting closer Now your focus gets a little smaller. Now you're looking at that door door. What type of door is it? Do I have a wood door? Wood frame, metal door, metal frame? We start building these things and all of them are adding to that little Rolodex of is this going to be an easy door? Is it going to be a hard door? Now, as you get a little closer, is this door swinging inward? Is it swinging outward? Is there a locking mechanism that I can see? Is it in the standard locking mechanism spot that is the opposite of the hinges, right in that waist level where every other standard lock door handle is on a house? Okay, these are clicking off things that are like okay, I'm getting a standard challenge of a door. But now, if you're, as you're, coming in here and you're seeing that, you're like oh hey, I'm also seeing a second lock, or I'm seeing a plate in a higher spot, or I'm seeing carriage bolts or weld marks on the opposite side of the door. As you're approaching this door, that should be start raising red flags like there could be some secondary locks on this door, some additional security things trying to keep people out.

Speaker 1: 18:53

And going back to the beginning of that size up of those things built in when we talk about from afar, from the building getting closer and closer. If we're on a commercial or strip center or something, understand what that occupancy is that we're going into. If we're on the front side, what's the entrance going to be on that versus being on the back side? Because after hours, not a lot of stuff do they ever want coming through the back door of business. Business hours that might be where shipping and any deliveries, all of those things, might be coming through there, so it might be less. The chances of the security being higher on the back are more extreme versus the front, because nobody can usually see if you're in the back of an alley behind a building versus somebody trying to break into a business in the front door and it's a lighted up parking lot. So, building all those things when it comes to that size up in there, those play in.

Speaker 1: 19:47

So from that big to that small and then right as we get into that last part of that door, now it's I sound the door or shock the door I hear a lot of people call it. So, looking at those things, after we've determined you know what is the building, what is the frame. What is the door? Which way is it swinging? What are the locks on there? Are there additional locks? Are there extra security things in there?

Speaker 1: 20:09

Now, shock the door, sound the door. It's going to give you that secondary feel. I spent a lot of years on a ladder truck. It's just like sounding a roof. If you have a lot of experience on it, you're hitting something that's solid versus hitting something that's not. So I sound high, middle, low, low, middle, high does not matter what your order is, but it's going to give you a good little reverberation of that door that can tell you if you are having a lock, an additional lock up high. Is this door pin high, door, pin low? Is it only locked in the middle or any other things on there? Sometimes it gives you a little bounce off that door. That gives you a little bit of working space to start with as well. So it's got a couple of added bonuses that could come to you when you shock a door, sound a door.

Speaker 2: 20:54

All right, so that's great, so that's a really good setup. I think a lot of guys kind of miss that key component of that size up, like of course we all size up the building. We size up, like of course we all size up the building, we size up the fire, we size up the rescue profile or whatever your department happens to call it. But again, as you're saying, as you're getting closer and closer, you're looking at all these additional hints right, outward, inward swinging, things like that. So I wanted to talk to you about a couple of things that you did mention. So you said, let's just talk about the most recent the sounding of the door. So I know that what you're talking about with that value, the information that that door gives you back as you sound it right, is pretty audible and you can feel it really well in those inward swinging. Some guys will argue it's a waste of time to sound an outward swing and what's your opinion on that?

Speaker 1: 21:42

Definitely not a waste of time.

Speaker 1: 21:43

I mean, when we start talking on it's information, that is all we're looking for, is information.

Speaker 1: 21:51

Even if you sound it lightly or sound it like you're trying to beat a hole through it with one shot, it's giving you information and that's really what we're looking for.

Speaker 1: 22:01

Because if you've never hit a door that has a lock down low or down high, and then you just start working and you're working through the standard location of a lock and that you're like I'm winning but I'm losing, and your brain is just so focused on the lock that you can see and you're not recognizing that it has a secondary point of securement, whether it's down low, down high, somewhere else, drop bar, whatever that may be, you're going to be delayed and you're going to be delayed and, at the end of the day, those delays of us getting inside the building are delays for us getting to a victim and that's, at the end of the day, that's the job.

Speaker 1: 22:42

I don't care how I get through that door, as long as we can get through that door, as long as we can get through that door fast, efficiently and get to the person that's on the inside, because, at the end of the day. Mrs Smith doesn't care what our training is, what our stuff is. All they care about is us getting in them, getting them out, getting their family members out. That's at the bottom line. That's what they expect from us.

Speaker 2: 23:09

Absolutely. I wholeheartedly agree with you and actually talked in our previous episode about that too. Everyone always wants to know, like, hey, what does the public think or expect from us? Right, I'll tell you right now. They think we're trained in everything. Yes, they do, and you know that you have longer on the job than I do, and it is one of those things where they expect us to go find their loved ones. If they're trapped, put the fire out, right, and then bonus would be we're nice when we leave, and that's I mean. It's that basic right to just do our freaking job.

Speaker 2: 23:35

There is no that the public doesn't know about. They don't know about what gap set force is right. All they know is that, if you got in the door quickly and it and it looked good. So when you were talking about that, though, you were talking about those secondary locking mechanisms, right, which segues into something I really wanted to talk to you about. So when you are able to identify, or you believe that there's a secondary lock, either high or low, whatever the situation is. So your opinion, where do you attack first? Do you attack where you know that primary lock is, or do you try to work on those secondaries or this third locking mechanism.

Speaker 1: 24:08

First, I don't have an always on this. Everything is we live in the gray, our world is 100% gray. So I can't say one thing. And tomorrow I could end up on a job and have a door, I could do something completely different, because whatever I sensed on that and my size up told me was try something different. Or if you're listening to this and you're like, hey, this is what Dave said and I did it and I learned a faster way, well, I will first say I am not the all knowing of everything on Forrest Blountree. I'm a guy who apparently buys too many halogens and likes hitting things.

Speaker 2: 24:44

The ex-baseball player in New York. Yeah, that's what it is.

Speaker 1: 24:47

Yeah, but when it comes to it, if I'm looking at a standard lock, if I'm thinking drop bar or a lock down low, ultimately I'm just going to take what the door gives me. If I can start that process and create that gap near what I believe is the main lock, that's where I'm going to start at. If I can't even get into the seam over there and I got to start working in a different area, I might have to start working low and that might be attacking a lock down low versus going high. So all of those things it's really going to come to whatever the door gives you and that's that's.

Speaker 1: 25:27

The one hard thing I feel like I've learned a lot with training people is the challenge to push people to constantly try different things, because when we start working with training doors, people learn the training door and they're like okay, I'm good at this. It's like you're good at this door because it's a training door. You can defeat it the same way every time because it's the exact same Real life. We don't know always what we're facing. I love taking some good pictures of the most random, homemade, expensive locks, just the things that people do to secure their places. It's very interesting to me, because some of them I look at I'm like, all right, that's going to be fun, or that's going to be easy, or, oh man, that's going to. That's going to work, us, that's going to suck.

Speaker 1: 26:16

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 26:17

Like man, I hope I don't run across that door in real life.

Speaker 1: 26:20

Yeah, Hope there's another door nearby. I mean we've all had all of those things, oh yeah. But I mean we've all had all of those things, oh yeah. So it's just. I mean it's one of those things of we float in the gray and we got to understand that size up and now start thinking of what are those challenges that I'm anticipating in here.

Speaker 1: 26:38

If I'm seeing some carriage bolts in there, do I want to try and drive them out before I ever get into the door? Maybe that's going to be great. Maybe I do that and I drive bolts out to get to the other end of the door and realize there was nothing on the back side. I'm just wasting time. So I mean it's one of those things of we got to be flexible. We got to just float in that gray area, see what the door is going to give us and start working. And then the biggest thing I look for is don't be so focused on that plan. Your plan's got to be sitting there, going, going, going. But if you're not making headway, you got to be able to switch to a new plan very quickly.

Speaker 2: 27:17

What's your very quickly in Colson's brain.

Speaker 1: 27:20

So my very quickly, I'm going to 10, 15 seconds of going in the direction I want to go, but being unsuccessful. Okay, and I say that I'm not saying, hey, we're going to create a gap and we're going to set this tool in 10 seconds every time and if we don't, we're going to stop and change it. No, I'm saying we're going to create that gap, we're going to set our tool, or we're not even able to get a gap doing a certain technique. We got to change it up. That technique we got to change up. We got to start working with the tool on a different end. It's that forward progress.

Speaker 2: 27:56

Yes, making effective forward progress, this is working. Yes, okay 100%.

Speaker 1: 28:01

When that forward progress is slowing down, we got to start looking at something else. How can we do it? And sometimes going back to something you were trying prior because you may have weakened that door. And now you're like, hey, okay, now I think I can get my ads into this area, versus before I couldn't. But now things have changed a little bit, so now I'm going to. I might go back to plan B when I'm now on plan F, but I think plan B will now work because of the effects that we've already had on the door.

Speaker 2: 28:31

That's good. So when you, when you talk about the, hey, we're in the gray, there's always, there's never, always a never, never. I love that because that's a hundred percent true. So when you talk about being efficient and making sure we get through this door, so what do you say to those guys that are like, hey, boss, let's kick the shit out of this thing, right? Like, hey, dude, have you seen my donkey kick it's money, right? So what do you say to those guys? Because no lie, I've been that guy before.

Speaker 1: 28:58

We all have. We all have, I have too.

Speaker 2: 29:02

And obviously, as we get older, as we get more experience, as we're bent or as we are fortunate enough to have senior guys or guys that are just really good at things, teach us and we learn more, right? So what do you say to the guys that are just like boss? I'm going to kick it bro.

Speaker 1: 29:18

So I'm going to jump back into my baseball life. Ok, love it Playing playing summer ball. In college it was a wood bat league and I grew up bo jackson was the man.

Speaker 1: 29:32

he's still the man yeah, he's still the man, yeah, and we all we've all seen the videos of him getting mad, snapping the bat across his leg and I mean he's, he's just a monster. Yeah, he's a monster, just awesome. And mine was not a fresh bat had a slight crack in it. I'm like, all right, I'm mad because probably made a whatever struck out who knows, uh, went to snap a bat across my leg. How'd that go? Uh, it went. I mean it went straight to my leg and it hurt and that bat did not crack.

Speaker 1: 30:03

But what do you think I did? I swapped it again. What did you get? I swapped to the other leg. I mean I didn't want to hit my right leg anymore because that thing was too painful, yeah, but now I just had to go full commit, like I never tried this before and it didn't work. But I'm not going to stop now because I already started this process. So now I'm going to the left leg and I snapped that bat and it hurt. And now for the rest of the game, I mean I did, it didn't hurt as bad because it did snap, uh, and I felt cool, but for the rest of the game I had two legs that hurt so you did yeah yeah, it wasn't that good, uh.

Speaker 1: 30:37

So now let's bring that into reality of the fire service. So it hurt worse on the first leg when I hit it because there was no give in the bat, it did not break. So if we come up to kick that door, we don't do a size up and we're just like every door I've ever kicked has always flown open, because every door I've ever kicked was an easy front door to a residential house that is 30 years old and has never had any additional locking and whatever it may be, if that's your experience every time and you kick it and it opens up every time, but you never do a size up. And then you come up to a door that has some additional stuff to it or it's just a well-built door, holds on strong and it doesn't go. All of that energy is going somewhere and you gave it to the door and the door said I don't think so, it's giving it back. And now that energy is going to your knee, your hip, your back and man, one of my firefighters a couple years back he was dealing with some back issues and I mean it was painful for me watching him. We got 25, 30 year careers that we got to get through. We got to take care of our knees, our hips, our back.

Speaker 1: 31:48

When you start having issues with that, beyond the everyday wear and tear we already do to ourselves. If we're doing it because we thought it looked cool, but now we have a back issue, we're dealing with the rest of our life. That ain't cool and it's not efficient. I'll tell you, mrs Smith doesn't want to see us kick her door. She wants us to get in there and do that. But we look way better when we come up with tools on the first time. We walk up to that door because we're planned, we practice, we come off the truck ready to work and we size up that door in every step that we're getting there and we put those tools to work, whether it's one man, whether it's two men. And we fly through that door in every step that we're getting there and we put those tools to work, whether it's one man, whether it's two men, and we fly through that door in a matter of seconds, with a lot less energy, zero impact to our own body. And now we're ready to go inside the house and actually do the work because ultimately, that door is just oh, that's starting the game Like it's. That's our ticket to go inside and and do what we're here to do.

Speaker 1: 32:47

We didn't get hired to be firefighters to break doors. We got hired for firefighters to go get people out and save the property. That's the big picture of it your equipment, understanding the doors, you're going in and you can be fast when you're good at it and doing that. That's what Mrs Smith and the community wants to see from us. They want to see us fly through and in three steps, never make a change in our stride. And we've popped that door all the way open and we're flying through that house. So those are the big things when it comes to what I believe why we shouldn't be kicking doors. I've watched guys kick doors One there was no size up because there was an outward swinging door and I straight walked up to him like hey, what are you trying to do? And I'm like I'm going to get in here, cool. The door swings at you Like let's step back, what are you really doing, bro?

Speaker 2: 33:43

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 33:44

So I mean, it's one of those things. So we have a drone program that we started in my department. I think we're about a year. A good friend of mine he was kind of doing the pilot, building the whole presentation to take forward to our administration to get this program off off the ground, and he's like hey Dave, do you mind? Do you mind taking a look at this? Just go through the whole PowerPoint, pick this thing apart and just destroy me so that I'm better prepared for that. I'm like, of course, man, I gotcha. And so he's.

Speaker 1: 34:18

The very first page of this is a great work in fire. It's a uh strip, it's a really. It's like a three, four unit single story apartment. So pretty standard in our city. I mean, they're probably sitting at 1,200 square feet each apartment. One building doors are just lined up down the way and drone footage. It was great. I guess I don't know, I was so so zoned in. You got apartment a that has the working fire, apartment b that is right next to it. They.

Speaker 1: 34:51

I watch the second crew come up, try and make entry guy comes up and kicks it and I watch him just hobble away because the footage was really good. And yeah, it was. He did a good job on that drone footage. But I just watch. You know, guy a kick this door and hobble away from the door. He goes around the corner. I see him just kind of hunkered over for a little while because the footage is framed back. I see about I don't know.

Speaker 1: 35:17

45 seconds later another guy come up, try to open the door. It's locked. He steps back, he kicks it, doesn't open and he just goes off to do some other job. See a third guy come up All of these are different people off different crews. He comes up, he kicks the door door, says I don't think so again and this guy at least was like all right, we still have to get in there. He returns to the truck, grabs a set of irons, goes in door correctly and goes in and I'm so. I'm just watching this thing on the drone powerpoint I'm supposed to be looking at and after like looking at the forceful techniques after like an hour he calls me.

Speaker 1: 35:57

He's like hey, all right, give me all your feedback on this, how to look. And I'm like dude, did you see this first fire? Great job on the drone stuff. And I start going and talking about doors and I'm like I'm like man, we need to. You see this first part Great job on the drone stuff. And then I start going in talking about doors and I'm like man, we need to get out there. We need to get guys training more. We got to start understanding, hey, how do we actually go through doors when nobody's coming up with tools? And I go on for like 15 minutes.

Speaker 1: 36:20

He's a very polite guy, so he, let me just do my normal rant, yeah. And then he's like Dave, I don't care about the doors, I want to know about the PowerPoint. I'm like, oh, dude, I didn't even make it past slide one. And I'm like I'm sorry, I'll call you back in a while and start all over, but so, yeah, it's. I mean, it's just, I get a little sidetracked when it comes, because it's one of those things like we are professionals, when it comes because it's one of those things like we are professionals, we got to operate like professionals. And it comes down to training and I don't fault any of our guys. I will say my my training academy, and it was. I had a great training academy, I had great training officers, but the only forceful entry you learned was take a sledgehammer to a door and hit it. Yeah, and keep hitting it till it opens right, yeah keep hitting it didn't open.

Speaker 1: 37:02

Well, you didn't swing hard enough. Hit it it more. Yeah, keep hitting it, keep hitting it, it's going to open eventually. Okay, nobody, even literally nobody even said, hey, what about if the door swings at you? That was never even a conversation. And I don't fault my training officers because, like I said, they were awesome. I learned so much.

Speaker 1: 37:22

But our region was very weak in forcible entry for a long time and I don't know how that was. Well, part of it was I think we all had one certain halogen. That was not good. So probably guys were very unsuccessful. Anyways, our knowledge base just wasn't there. And when I got home on a ladder truck, my knowledge base wasn't there.

Speaker 1: 37:48

I mean, I remember sitting with my captain, we're going behind buildings and I'm like all right, how are we going to go through this door? And this was before I even had a problem with learning about forceful entry. This was just. I'm a guy who says that door looks hard and it's going to kick my butt, and I remember the stuff we would talk about and it was very clear. None of us really knew what we were doing.

Speaker 1: 38:11

So then it kind of that started that ball. I feel like, oh man, none of us are really that trained on this, knowledgeable on this, and I started reading like the FDNY Forceful Entry Manual is probably one of the best readings out there when it comes to forcible entry because they have so much experience on it. To start with, they have done such a good job when it comes to documentation of the history, the how, the why, the techniques, the different types of locks. I mean, it goes so deep. So if somebody ever wants to read one thing about forceful entry, and one thing only, the fdny forceful entry manual is by far the one thing.

Speaker 2: 38:50

If you're only going to read one thing to read uh, it's not a short read, but sometimes you get hooked no, no, it's a good one for sure, and I mean, obviously it's just the nature of the business that they work in. They it's mostly apartments, it's high rise, mid-rise, you name, right, but it's the freaking slums. Everyone locks all their shit with multiple locks, right? So those guys had to get really good, really quick. Oh, yes, yeah, so I agree wholeheartedly, like if you're talking about tip of the spear, especially when it comes down to forceful entry. Yeah, absolutely, find the literature that Dave's talking about and school yourself up on it.

Speaker 2: 39:27

So, along the forcible entry line we talked about, you know the anatomy of the doors, right, what the door gives you. I love that, because that's been coming around a lot lately when we start talking about what does the building give you, what does the roof give you? So now we're using it for doors too. What does the door give you? Because, again, like you said before, we operate in a gray right Depending, attached to that house or that commercial building, right? This is my level, or my plan A, b and C, and then I'll start expanding off of that. So, with that said, though, you talked real briefly, so I want to talk about it now. You talked about markings on the tools halogens that weren't successful. So let's talk about tool anatomy a little bit. So tell me about the mechanical advantage, tell me about the markings the guys that mark them. When they don't mark them, why do they All that fun stuff?

Speaker 1: 40:08

So tuning your tool is what we're referring to, and when we say that, I'm trying to think of it. The first tool that I know came out of the box, tuned, I believe, was the Maximus bars and great tools. They come out open the box, ready to go. You don't have to do anything to it. Prior to that, it was tuning your tool. So their search and destroy would put out a great, a great paper on tuning your tool that breaks it all down on how to do it, why to do, what's the advantages of doing it and we'll talk about the simplest things of without getting too deep into it.

Speaker 1: 40:40

But the markings on your tool, a gap, a gap line and a set line on your ads and on your forks those are things that I focus, especially teaching, whether it's recruits to senior, experienced guys, like it's about, those are the two most important things to understand on there.

Speaker 1: 40:59

Understand those lines because they are guidelines for us. And when we have a million things going on through our head because we are on that, that big fire, and my job is not just to get through that door, my job is to get through that door, search that building, find the fire, find the victim, pull that victim out, all of those other things, and you may be running command in that same motion, all of these things going on. The last thing I want to wonder is man, how, how deep am I in this door with this hal again? So the lines are great because they add that added piece to help you out and just give you, give you a little support in what you're doing. Um, so the gap line, gap line, the, when we talk about the depth of a door, this average depth when it comes to hitting that door jam is inch and three quarters before we hit that middle jam on there.

Speaker 2: 41:52

Is that the same for inward and outward swinging typically?

Speaker 1: 41:55

Well, yes, but if it's inward swinging, we're on the side with that piece in there. So merely interesting on it. But yes, it's the same depth, just whichever side you're standing on the door. So if we start going in there and we feel like we're coming up to some resistance, we didn't start kind of moving and manipulating our tool to reach around the door and we feel like we're hitting something solid. And if we can look down and say, hey, we're just at our gap line, now we got to start thinking, hey, I need to start. I might be a little behind the eight ball and I haven't started manipulating my tool to get around the door and I'm not in a spot that I can force it because my tool is going to come flying out, because I'm not into that set position. So now we feel like we've gotten past whatever, get past that first line, and now we're driving our tool. Driving our tool, uh, sitting, sitting on, depending if you put two lines. Some people don't always put two lines when it comes to the ads. Some put a single line, uh, but now putting that thing all the way to that set line. So if you have two lines, it'll be the deepest line in there. Uh, when we talk about the forks, it's an inch and three quarter. Uh, for that gap line, our set line is basically going to sit right at the crotch of that tool, which is five inches on majority of all all Forks out there. And so when we get somewhere near that line, that's just a reference point to tell us that our tool should be in that good deep location, that we can now apply good amount of force into the store and Hopefully we're now pushing enough force it's going to overcome the force holding the door, uh. So we're going to use those lines to our advantage, uh, working with them, just to make sure that our tools are set that we can, we can get that force in there. Now, the second part of that is using those lines, but also understanding what is the strong parts of these tools.

Speaker 1: 43:44

Uh, I'm going to say the strongest. I'm an ads fan. I always start with the ads. It's what I prefer, easier to get into a lot of spots. It is the strongest movement of the tool when we start talking about crushing a door but you're limited at an inch and a half to two inch to. I think the widest one out there is like three and a half to two inch to. I think the widest one out there is like three and a half inches. Um, so it's going to limit how much space that you can actually create, but it is the strongest movement of that tool. So if I can only give we're talking just a standard pro bar, which is kind of the old iron horse of, uh, haligans, um, if by force on that thing is a 15 to 1 mechanical advantage of it, so if I only give 100 pounds of force, it's delivering 1500 pounds of force into that tool, into that door, creating that gap. I'm only going to get it inch and a half to two inches. A pro bar would be a two inch gap right there. Uh, if we drive that thing a little deeper, where it actually gets a little smaller on our, on our ads now it's actually an inch and a half it tapers down. That gives us a 20 to 1 mechanical advantage if we actually bury that thing a little deeper into that inch and a half area. But it's also you only have an inch and a half of room to play. So great for gapping, great for just crushing the door, creating that.

Speaker 1: 45:02

Some sort of opening get started sometimes if we can get it the right spots. That's all we need to get the door open. Got to take what the door has given us. Now if we start prying with our ads so we're not in that crushing motion, we're now getting the ads behind something and prying. Now we're working with our five-to-one mechanical advantage of that ads and start working our tool that way, which now my hundred pounds of force is five hundred pounds of force going into that door, so still stronger than anything. I'm gonna deliver, it's gonna, it's gonna maximize my ability with it. So it's playing with that. If we switch and we start working on the fork, the fork and now our fork, using ourks, getting that prying, making that thing a lever in there, it gives us a six to one mechanical advantage, prying with our forks and it's just getting those tools into that right spot, understanding the manipulation of that tool to get there and now how to deliver that energy into the location that we want to get to. I always tell guys, when it comes to forceful entry understand those basics, understand your tools, understand the commands, understand the mechanical advantage of the tool, but ultimately it's going to come down.

Speaker 1: 46:19

It's got to be hands on. I can't tell you I can't watch a YouTube video and then go open a door if I've never touched it before, I know. I try and work on my car all the time because I love working on cars. I watch YouTube videos. They did this thing in three minutes to replace something that took me six hours. And as much as I love Instagram, youtube, they give you so much information. But you now got to take that information and you got to get hands on with it. You got to play with it, you got to test it. You got to. You got to try it, because we can't start it on the fire ground. It's got to. It's got to start in a sterile environment so you can actually make those mistakes, fail, so that you can learn.

Speaker 2: 46:56

Yeah, I mean, it's a university YouTube, for sure, it's good for a bunch of different things, but kind of, like you said too, too, like you have to understand that whoever's teaching or showing that technique or whatever it is on youtube or instagram, whatever the case might be, that's specific typically to their region or or the doors that they typically come across. So, again, like you're saying, nothing replaces that hands-on because we might not have that style door, that style lock that's prevalent out here, or whatever, and vice versa from east to west. So you're absolutely right, like you, there's nothing that limits the um ability of just getting your hands on and practicing and practicing. But when you're talking about the markings and then the, the depths of the markings and then why they exist, it makes sense. But I know guys have asked like hey boss, what happens if I, what happens if I drive past that last marking? Am I, uh, is it? Is it still gonna work? Or what am I losing or gaining by going too deep or deeper?

Speaker 1: 47:51

so it depends on which end you're working with. Uh, I mean, obviously let's talk to forks, for example, because that's typically, yeah, forks. So the risk of driving too deep is if you put those shoulders past the door and they and that door closes somewhat and you're not able to force it. You're now working with a lever that can only do one thing and that's push from the middle. So you're, you've shortened your lever, you've lost your mechanical advantage and you're probably not getting your tool back out without using some sort of other tool to create space to pull that thing out. So that's the biggest risk of going too deep with the forks.

Speaker 1: 48:27

Going to the crotch is the standard. It's a very simple location to find on any tool. Our majority of forks out there are six inches long. The crotch sits right at that five inch mark. So it's just an easy, identifiable location. And if your tool doesn't come pre-tuned to just cut a mark in, if you don't make it all the way to the mark, if you're in a good spot and you've got a good bite on that door and you're still set, that's okay. The mark's purely a guideline. It is not a rule hard and fast that if you don't get to this line. This door ain't open and it's not saying that it's a guideline just to support the work you're doing. That you can understand like I'm in that general vicinity and I feel like my door, my tool is set in this door and if I put some good force to it I should win.

Speaker 2: 49:20

Hopefully I win. Good, and that's exactly what I was kind of looking for, because a lot of guys so they'll get stuck on that, like when we start talking, especially anything that's not, uh, common practice for that individual, you know say someone hears this and they start tuning their tools. That's, that's freaking great. I hope that does happen. But with that said, it's like them now, taking that information, say, hey, dave colson says we have to go to the crotch every single time. So yeah, it's okay if you go past, right, but remember the risks, right.

Speaker 2: 49:51

And again, if we go a little shallow, it also again, like you probably were referring to, like what does that door give you that day? Or what is that building giving you? So say you're successful, you go through all your steps of your gap set force, you a student of the game, you're successful. And you and you open that door, what's what's the next thing you're teaching your guys? Like, what's the most important things that follow that? Because you already said from get-go, that's that's our hallway, like we're running down the tunnel, it's a super bowl, right, like they just introduced us. The work hasn't even started, nope, so what's super important to you?

Speaker 1: 50:23

so number one I'm kind of talked briefly on it already is our job. Our job is go in there and get them like. So I'm typically not on air when I'm forcing a door, but that door opens up. Now we gotta still start building and this is where it comes to be a student of the game, not a student of just forcible entry, student of our craft. We want to be a master of our craft. So now it's open up that door, now it's starting to read that smoke very quickly.

Speaker 1: 50:49

All these things happen with experience of going very instantly like, okay, I'm not gonna stand up in a chimney and suck smoke, it's okay, we're gonna get down low, we're gonna look for that neutral plane of that smoke and hopefully we got a good neutral plane there now. I'm now looking inside that building. I want to stay below. I want that good air that's going in to keep my head there and stay below the bad air, bad smoke coming out. And now we're going in, we're looking for life. So it's called life, fire layout and I'm open up that door and we, we kind of talk. A lot of people, majority when you start looking at that firefighter rescue survey. A lot of people, majority when you start looking at that firefighter rescue survey, a lot of people are working towards the exits is where they may become overcome and down. So if we open up that door and then I stop and I don't think and I'm not a smart thinking, educated firefighter and I now step back and I mask up and I'm, we'll say, not having my best day and it takes me 30 seconds to mask up but there's a victim, a foot and a half inside the door, what am I really doing when it comes to being professional and willing to actually risk a lot to save a lot? Getting into that risk management profile? So we're going to open up that door. Look for that neutral plane. Now I want to look for life. I want to be in that clear, fresh air and I'm going to hook my foot on that door and I'm going to get inside that building.

Speaker 1: 52:13

And I'm hooking my foot because if I don't, I'm going to probably go farther and I don't want to go farther. All I'm looking for is that immediate grab that's right by the door, right behind the door. So I'm going to hook my foot in there and I'm going to do a layout and sweep and try and see if I can feel anybody. Don't sweep with the tool, because if you hit a body, if you hit a chair, if you hit a wall, it all still feels the same. With the tool, and that's hoping that you don't take the spike end and drive it into somebody. Yeah, that would be a bad day right there. So, get in there. I'm gonna go as far as I can. Yeah, I'm gonna hook my foot in there. I'm gonna give a good sweep, see if I find anybody. If I don't, okay, I I've gotten the habit of every time I do that I pop that door, my halogen goes to the hinge side of the door and I'm hooking the latch side of the door. I do that for a reason because I have the space. I can get a little more farther out to that side. Typically, the door is going to swing open and it's going to go to a wall if there's a wall on that back side. So I'm going to do that as soon as I don't find a victim. Now, checked off my life there was no life right there that I'm going to make a grab Now.

Speaker 1: 53:26

I'm going to see if I can see the fire. What is that? What is that smoke doing? Can I get a good look down that. Can I see the fire? Is it heavy? Is it giving me some whatever information it's giving me for a little knowledge of where am I going and what is the volume of smoke, what's the pressure, what's the energy? Can I just see? Is it a contents fire that I can see right from the front door? So I'm going to get that information. Then I'm going to go to that layout and my layout I'm looking for is the building. What am I looking at? When I see in there and granted, I'm only four feet inside this door laying on the ground, but it can give me a good idea of at eight feet there's a wall and we're going to turn and it may be a ranch style house running long ways. It may be a apartment running deep, it may be a trailer that's has just a room to the right and a bedroom to the left. I mean it's giving you all of that information, hopefully in that very short time that you're in there. After that, I'm getting my checked for life, checked. See what I could see with fire, see where that fresh air was going to, hopefully to the seat of the fire. Got a good layout of the building.

Speaker 1: 54:39

Now it's time, get out of the way. And if my nozzle guy obviously if my nozzle guy was standing right behind me, ready to go, I'm going to pop the door. I'm going to get out of his way. He's going in. But if he's not ready to go, I'm going to do my light fire layout and then I keep my halogen on the hinge side of the door. So I'm going to hook that door with my halogen and I'm going to pull it back closed.

Speaker 1: 55:00

And I want to hook it with my halogen because that forces me to keep my halogen in between that door and the door frame so that, no matter what door you're dealing with, it can't relock. And the worst thing you can ever do is open up a door and then let it close and it somehow relatches on stuff. And if it was a hard door which it probably is if you had to relock, it relocks and then you got to do it all again. It's just demoralizing. So we're going to close that door, keep our tool in there. So there's now we're only sitting with like a one inch gap in between that door and have that door control. We don't want to feed that fire, we want to understand the flow path. We don't want to change all of all those things until we are ready to make entry in there and go do that full search, go search for the fire and go put that fire out.

Speaker 2: 55:51

Yeah, and I can attest to that. My first door I ever forced was a metal inward-swinging apartment door and I kicked it. It actually worked. It went flying open and then went it right. It actually worked right, went flying open and then went flying shut and relatched and locked and it was one of those things where I'm like I was so excited and so upset all within a second and a half, and I'll never forget my lieutenant behind me was like, well, that was fucking dumb, bro, do it again. And I'm like, yeah, boss, I'm like shit, yeah, you it again. And I'm like, yeah, boss, I'm like shit, yeah, you're absolutely right. And guys, I feel like guys kind of forget about door control sometimes and again.

Speaker 2: 56:28

Hence is on that professional firefight that we talk about. When we use our tools, we can control that door minus the kicking. We're not going to blow up, blow it off its hinges and then have a uncontrolled flow path, which we all know is very important when it comes down to, um, the modern day fire service and modern day fire tactics, so kind of what that said. So we talked about our bread and butter tactics for forcing doors. There's this new thing coming around right now and I'm curious on how you feel about it.

Speaker 2: 56:59

So a lot of departments are going with battery poweredpowered extrication tools, right? So they're amazing for multiple different reasons, but in the forcible entry world now. So we are no longer tethered by 100 to 200-foot hydraulic lines, right? So what do you think about the crews that are going to those commercial buildings where they're forcing multiple doors? How do you feel about the technique of a crew say two firefighters or an officer and a firefighter literally setting gaps, and then those battery powered spreaders are coming in behind and just exploding those doors. What do you feel about that?

Speaker 1: 57:34

Yeah, I'm, I am very much up. I I have not gotten the opportunity to do that, but I'm sitting across the table from somebody who I know has uh, if we're getting sent to the back of the building. I work on a heavy rescue truck so we get that job a lot when there's a lot of doors and so it's one of those things that we need to bring everything that potentially is going to benefit us into that job. So bringing a minimum of two sets of irons, bringing a New York hook or a Lockwood hook, bringing something that's going to help us increase that mechanical advantage and that reach, those things are key when it comes to we have a lot of doors to open, not just the standard house fire front door and go. So we have backside of buildings metal doors, expected extra work into this task where we just got assigned. So bringing those things, bringing a saw, bringing extrication tools I'm all in If that is going to be supportive in the work that we're getting done there, then it's got to be an avenue that we're willing to look at and an avenue we're willing to try. That's a hard one to get on some of the training doors we have and that's where it comes when we, anytime we have a acquired structure, something in your, your region or your jurisdiction that's going to get torn down, making those relationships with with either construction companies or for I work in a city uh, just with our, honestly, our legal department, um, how do we get some hold harmless uh agreements that when we know about it going on or they're going to tear down that strip center, how can we make those relationships to get in there and actually get some hands-on stuff to practice that stuff?

Speaker 1: 59:18

So I have not gotten the opportunity to use the extrication tools uh, for us. We've just recently gotten the opportunity to use the extrication tools. Uh, for us, we've just recently gotten the battery operated one. So our tether just recently got cut and but I love the idea. And then we also have the uh hall matro halogen out there that's coming into play that has a basically a rabbit tool built into that.

Speaker 1: 59:38

So so these are all things that our job is always evolving and needing to look outside the box and other options, because I know there's definitely times that if I just go in with irons, I may get through the door, but if I come in with irons and also, hey, my other guy is sitting behind me with some spreaders and we got a good gap and I feel like we can pop, get the tip of that thing in there and pop this door. Let's go for it, and there's other days that that might not work. So being able to put work through plan A through Z is key. On it and using the different tools that are at our leisure to put into play. If you happen to have the hall mantraotro Halligan that has a little rabbit that may aid you in certain things. It may not help you in other ways. So just learn in the tools that you're given, play with them. Open up those opportunities, just really to see how successful you can be in so many different ways.

Speaker 2: 1:00:39

That's really good. So the main reason why I ask that is well, like you had said before, I have had a chance to do it and it was very successful in the doors that we tried it on Obviously not saying that it's going to be successful in every door, but for me personally, and I'm sure you feel the same, but I want to kind of have a conversation about this. So we talked about playing basically A through Z. Right, with my plan A through Z, it never includes going back to the truck, no. So it's again like hey, what's your staffing model? Show you how many dudes do you have to carry stuff right? So what is logically, the what can you actually get to, say, a couple hundred feet behind a building or down an alleyway or whatever, where you can't fit a piece of apparatus on what you want to do?

Speaker 2: 1:01:23

And I really wanted to talk about that just because I know in the fire service, especially when you get a new tool right and I'm just talking about the battery operating, because that's probably the biggest change in the fire service as a whole right now that everyone's jumping on board with because they are amazing tools.

Speaker 2: 1:01:38

But, with that said, you're going to have those young guys, especially when they're like boss, I'm going to do this every time, right? So what do you say to those guys that are like I don't need to go, I don't need to learn the basics, right, as long as I can know how to set a gap, bro, I'm good, right? So I mean, that's kind of where we're going into. You know, obviously we have these tools at your disposal. Then I know you work on a heavy, so you have almost every tool out there, right? So what do you tell your backstep firemen, right, when it's when they're saying or see example, you had a job where you were, where you use those spreaders, and it was very successful. And then he starts telling all of his academy brothers, or all the guys he works with, bro, go 100 of the time, go with this, go with this, go with this. What do you say to that?

Speaker 1: 1:02:22

I, it's going to bite you in the butt. Okay, I mean, there's no other way to say it Like, if you say this is my tactic, 100% of the time you're going to fail. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. So just understand that. And when it comes to this, you've got to have the basics down. You got to be able to walk before you can run. And when it comes to teaching forceful entry currently I'm down with the recruits. So with the recruits, we very much focus it's two-man operations only. We're going to hammer this in, so you have those core basic stuff. When I teach with experienced guys and then, hey, we're going to work two-man, we're going to get this down and then we're gonna start working one man, then we're start adding other tools into this. We're gonna we're gonna increase our leverage, we're gonna increase our force, we're gonna increase our capabilities of now let's talk about using battery operated spreaders, let's talk about a rabbit tool, let's talk about any other thing that you can bring forward and tell me that you carry on your truck. So those are all all great things. I'm a hundred percent with you. We are not going back to the truck. I mean, obviously, life says you are, sometimes because you got a job that wasn't what you expected, right? But if we're smart, thinking about our tasks that we're just given, we should be building that plan the minute we get that task. And us as a crew, we're working together like cool. Hey, I'm grabbing this, you're grabbing this as we're leaving that truck. As a team, we're communicating like all right, we got everything, let's roll. So, rolling to that backside of the building, we're going to the seaside of the building and now it's time to start opening up doors. It's having that game plan of I'm a fan of. I don't care if you're going to open up more than one door and you have more than two people. You should have a minimum of two sets of irons, and I've had guys tell me Dave, we only carry one set of irons on the truck. Yeah, I'm like cool, the next closest truck you get to take theirs. They're not going to tell you no, because they're not using them, because it's on the truck still. So grab a second set because you may be able to split off and start working. Hey, one-man operations on doors, or two-man operations on doors, or split into two and two, whatever your makeup of your guys are and start getting efficient work done as much as you can, and with that we start going cool. Hey, we even brought our spreaders with us because we had that many hands today and we start going over there.

Speaker 1: 1:04:57

The spreaders may be great on that perfect scenario that you get in there. You got a good gap. This door is giving it to us. It's not an easy door to open. Get the spreaders pops. It may be great on that perfect scenario that you get in there. You got a good gap. This door. This door is giving it to us. It's a not an easy door to open. Get the spreaders pops, it open cool. Well, that next door you go into, we get that good gap. It may also still be faster just to finish driving our tool in there and putting the conventional forceful entry put force into that door. That may be faster than taking the tool out, trying to get the spreaders in there and less fatiguing on your guys where you're just hey, let's, let's get in there and get it done, let's get the.

Speaker 1: 1:05:32

If we got the basics done down, we can build on that if we never have the basics. So, going back to that guy, that he's first day ever opening a door and we decided we played with the spreaders and that door flew open. He's telling everybody it's like whoa, whoa, whoa. It worked great there, but that doesn't mean it's always going to work great. We got to have the basics, we got to be able to walk before we can run. We are running when we're using spreaders Like we are in that full sprint, we understand the full aspect of our job. We are in that full sprint, we understand the full aspect of our job and we're bringing an outside tool that's not designed for that job and using it into that job because we made it apply and it works. But if we don't have those basics down of, hey, I know my two-man operations, I know my commands and I know my objectives and I can work through plan A through Z on that then we can't even get to that other tool or other additional stuff in there. When you got the basics, you can roll off of that. Now we can jump into one-man operations. We can do a lot of other things with that.

Speaker 1: 1:06:36

But I don't know if you've ever sat through Aaron Fields. I obviously am not taking credit for this and I can't tell Aaron Fields a story, one as good as him. But he goes into. If you've ever taken his class, one of the greatest classes in the fire service uh, the nozzle forward class. But he gets into talking about a wrestling competition he had. He pretty much talks about going against the guy. And the guy straight told him hey, these are the three moves I'm going to do on you, and you stop those, you're going to beat me. And so, aaron, this is his life. So he tells it very well, I'm not even gonna attempt it, but basically he gets worked by this guy who is the, the top dog, and only doing three moves. Three moves, okay, but at the end what he learned was if you have those basics down, so good you can stop move a. But that guy's so good at those three moves that he can transition off of one because you defended that, and get into two. And if you defend two he gets into three. If you defend three he can get back into one.

Speaker 1: 1:07:34

So, being good at the basics and hammering that down to the point that you are a master of your craft at that, you can do everything off of that, because having just that good knowledge base of, hey, I'm coming off the truck and I'm going through that door. I'm going to get my size up. I know my tools. I know how to work my tools. My partner if I'm going to man, him and I, we speak the same language. We are looking at the same things. He knows when to chime in and he knows when to just be that support team member and listen and do the actions going in there.

Speaker 1: 1:08:11

We're doing all this and if we have all that down now, we can navigate off that. If the world gives us something different and we weren't ready for it, we're ready for it because we weren't worried about the basics the basics. We're nailing it because we weren't worried about the basics the basics. We're nailing because we train on them so hard, we know them so good. We're not thinking about them. We're thinking about what's on the other side of the door.

Speaker 1: 1:08:33

How many people are in this? Should I go left? Should I go right? Is it a commercial building? And do we have squatters hanging out inside? All those other things? What's the smoke doing? What's the fire load doing Like, oh, look at that velocity of smoke, this thing's going to, this thing's going to go soon, like all of those things should. Those are the things we should be paying attention to, because we are professional firefighters. We need to have full picture of it. We want to be we all want to be a master of our craft. Have a full picture of it. We want to be, we all want to be a master of our craft. So we got to put the work in. We got to and it all starts ground up. You can't, can't start at the top of the ladder. You got to start at the base.

Speaker 2: 1:09:11

Yeah, no, absolutely, and I mean it's. I mean I can't. I can't agree with you any more than everything you already said, but you're, you're absolutely correct. So if you got the basics, everything else is easy. And when you're really good at the basics, the complicated things aren't that complicated anymore.

Speaker 2: 1:09:31

But, like you said, it's, it's and we we know this terminology a lot, dave, because you and I have taught classes together and it's one of those things where it's like the it's, it's trying to get those blinders off Right and it's. Uh, we always refer to blinders off right and it's. We always refer to blinders for new guys, which of course they all have it, but we always forget to say that, hey, when that freaking senior fireman that was really good at everything promotes the engineer, the blinders go back on because all of a sudden he's now at a job that he's not a hundred percent comfortable with anymore. He's no longer the master of that craft, right, and then we get promoted to a suppression officer same deal, or whatever.

Speaker 2: 1:10:02

But man, what is your opinion? What's the best way for an up-and-coming guy to make sure that he takes those blinders off? I have a general idea, but I'm just curious on what you think would be the best advice to that guy that's like hey, man, I want to get the basics down to everything. What's a secret pill? What's a secret potion? What's a secret potion?

Speaker 1: 1:10:25

Well, there isn't one. It's the secret, but the willingness just to listen and be humble, I feel like man, having all the humility and being humble, it's going to go a long way in this. And when I say that, when it's trying to take those blinders off and gain that experience, and when I say that when it's trying to take those blinders off and gain that experience, it's a matter of willing to ask. Guys, you come into the station and you get that smell like, ooh, they had a good night? Yeah, yeah, they got a job. Yeah, oh yeah, we all know it. Okay, sit down and ask questions. Yeah, see what kind of information you can get. You can learn even if you weren't there. Drive you can learn even if you weren't there. Drive over to that location, get that information. Just pick people's brains apart. And also, which is hard in the fire service, because we're all on that type A mentality when we do something, don't be afraid to ask for feedback. And when you get the feedback, people aren't telling you that feedback to be mean. They're telling you because they saw something that can make you better and advance your abilities and advance your knowledge. And I promise you they're just trying to help you. So be open-minded, listen to them, take the information and then when you got a time, hey, let's, let's regurgitate that information and think about what they're, what they were seeing and what I was doing, and try and learn from that and get better. And and I say that guys will listen to this and be like that's, that's not. It's not the Dave I've seen. Well, I've been doing this 21 years. I got, I got hired at 21. I was an idiot and I got humbled very quick in life and I get humbled every day and I'm no different than everybody else. There's things I'm passionate and I'm driving and I want to keep going and doing a good job, and sometimes you need to be able to sit back and take that information.

Speaker 1: 1:12:22

Sometimes we all don't take it well, sometimes we take it great and I feel like over the years, I've gotten so much better of like cool man, what do you think? How do we do? A lot of times, especially being in the front right seat, I ask guys all the time after like, hey, cool, tell me what you guys were thinking, what were good things that went on, what are things we could have done better? And a lot of times they're like oh, I don't want to tell you the mistakes we made. Well, I can tell you one thing is we weren't 100% perfect every single call, because I've run all those calls and we make mistakes every time. Most of the time we just laugh about it because we have a great job and it's fun to laugh about the stupid stuff we do, absolutely. I mean, I've, from the simplest thing to obstrate, falling out of the truck Cause I've caught my toe. Yeah, you know, have one of my, one of my best friends, literally step over me staring at me Like what do you? What is wrong with you?

Speaker 2: 1:13:15

Yeah, lying on the ground, yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:13:32

We're good at laughing and then we check to make sure you're okay. Yeah, 100, yeah. But but the simplest things, from getting out of the truck to okay, hey, now we just we just breached that door, cool, did it go good? Yeah, like, what were you guys seeing? Were there things that we could have changed, could made us faster, could have made us a little more efficient?

Speaker 1: 1:13:38

Um, any of that stuff like be have the humility, willing to ask people and actually embrace the feedback you get from them, because people aren't going at you to tell you just because you suck, if they're willing to actually step up in front and say, hey, steve, you did a great job on that, but did you ever think about this? Or did you see this? They're not questioning your ability. They're not questioning your knowledge of how awesome a firefighter you are. They may actually just be asking because they didn't understand what you were doing, because their mindset may not have the knowledge in that area. Or they saw something and they're like hey, man, you were doing this. I think if you would have done that, it might have changed it and it might work. Maybe you go back and play with that and try that. So, just having that humility and humbleness to get better.

Speaker 1: 1:14:34

That's how we grow. I mean we grow from the lessons we learn in life. I mean you read all the after action reports of fires we go on. You know all of that stuff. It has an area it's called lessons learned. They're on every incident we have from the reason yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:14:52

So we need to embrace that, like actually go in and be like, oh yeah, that is a, that is a good lesson. I probably shouldn't do that again. And we all do it, whether we think we do or not. We all have a Rolodex in our head. The more incidents we run, the more calls we run, the more fires we run. We're getting all that Rolodex rolling in the back of your head. So it's all experience and it's building that knowledge base and now it's putting it in place. So you're always critiquing yourself, whether you think it or not, and you're making those lessons learned, whether you think it or not. Now let's bring all the other people and let them give you some some knowledge as well, because their lessons could be your lessons. We can all move forward together.

Speaker 2: 1:15:39

So, dave, I love it. Well, we'll end on the forceful entry thing on thing on that right there. Learn from everyone else's lessons first before you repeat their mistakes.

Speaker 1: 1:15:49

I tried to break the bat across my knee. It didn't work the first time. Please learn from that. Get good with your tools and you're going to fly through that door, and if you're a baseball guy like me, you also got the baseball swing.

Speaker 2: 1:16:02

You guys do have it. As much as I make fun of the baseball players on the job or whatever, you guys are typically the best at the baseball swing, for obvious reasons.

Speaker 1: 1:16:10

I still, I'm still, you know, hitting three 33% on that thing Cause yeah, oh, a baseball, baseball numbers, that's excellent. Yeah, I mean, I'm still, I'm still playing in the pros a hundred percent.

Speaker 1: 1:16:20

Yeah, yeah, I mean I'm still, I'm still playing in the pros a hundred percent, if I can just make it, instead of always one for three on my success rates. And the big thing, when I I cause everybody sees the video and they're like, oh, that's awesome, I want to do that. And I always tell guys when they're like, hey, can we try this? I'm like here's the deal door, because you drive that thing in the doors. You're either going to get it or you're not. And now you can't step back two steps and take another swing. That is unprofessional. But that advance to the door all in one motion, making that swing and flying through that door, that is skill correct. But when you fail, now it's hey, conventional force boundary, let's get into it and let's do it the way that we know we'll win Perfect.

Speaker 2: 1:17:05

I love it. All right, is there anything else? I know you can talk forever, yeah, right, and I hope we covered the basics and really the anatomy of the tools and then what we're looking for.

Speaker 1: 1:17:18

Is there anything else that you want to add? On the forceful entry, before we get into the questions of the day, man, I feel like there's so much that we didn't even touch on, but it's a forceful entry. It is a hands-on deal. I actually thought I'd only talk for like 10 minutes. I didn't know what I'd talk about after that. Yeah, we're at an hour and 20 minutes. Oh, my wife's going to love that. Yeah, she is, yeah. But so when we talk about it, it's a hands-on skill.

Speaker 1: 1:17:41

You can't just watch a video. When we talk about it, it's a hands-on skill. You can't just watch a video. You can watch videos, you can get techniques, you can get tips, but you've got to get out there and do it. Ultimately, just find a door, find somebody that has a door, talk your agency into getting it and get out.

Speaker 1: 1:17:54

I don't care what tools you have. The tools that are in your hand are the best hand to use at that time. Whatever it is, get out there, use them, try them, play them, learn the skill, learn other skills that are going to associate with it and bring it all together, our goal being smart, educated, thinking firefighters. I don't want somebody that's just going to run through the wall because I said to run through the wall. I want him to run through the wall because he's thinking on the other side of that wall there's a person I'm going to go get out and I got a purpose to go through it, not just because that guy told me to go. Like, be smart, think, do your job and be a master of that craft.

Speaker 2: 1:18:31

There you go, be smart, do your job right. Again, we'll end it on this, because I love this. The tool in your hand right Is the best tool that you currently have, right, I love it. Right. So it doesn't matter, just be proficient with that tool and sets and reps right. Yep, that's all you need. Okay, all right. Well, again, thank you for coming out. We have a couple of questions, right. So same questions for the entire season. There's only four of them. Answer whatever first comes into your brain, all right. So question number one why. Everyone gets this question, especially when they're trying to get hired. But why did Dave Colson join the fire service?

Speaker 1: 1:19:09

I'm going to give you the same answer I've been giving people for, uh, before I got hired, all right, fear of having to get a real job. I'm a first generation firefighter. I, uh, I was lucky enough through my. I mean, I all I wanted to do was play baseball. I mean, I grew up playing baseball, hockey, football, I was playing any sport I could, um, but I also learned that's not actually going to be my career field, cause, unfortunately, that's not actually going to be my career field because unfortunately, yeah, I wasn't that good, wasn't that big. Like.

Speaker 1: 1:19:40

So at some point my dad sat me down, said, hey, it's probably, I'm gonna say, my junior in high school. He's like what do you really want to do with your life? Because this might not work out. Playing baseball, I'm like I don't know. And I was lucky enough to have some people in my life that were on the fire service and I just remember not that I had any interest in it at that time, I didn't realize it, but when I'd be sitting around talking to my friend's parents, I mean I was just captivated. I was always asking questions about like hey, what's it like? Tell me about your job, tell me about this. And then, after my dad said, hey, what's your like, tell me, tell me about your job, tell me about this. And then after my dad said, hey, what are you going to? What's your plan in life? Yeah, I was like what actually interests me? And I there's guys on the job who've told me it was either this or I'd probably be a mechanic, which is probably a fair answer. Um, and women.

Speaker 2: 1:20:41

So yeah, I love it. I agree A hundred percent. Perfect, All right. So in your in your professional fire service career, who's been the most influential person for you so far?

Speaker 1: 1:20:52

I got to give two. Okay, I got to give two. One one. Tim Wayne give two. Okay, I gotta give two. One one. Tim wayne he's deputy chief at uh goodyear fire department. He has been a a mentor of mine and a great friend of mine for years and early in my career he knew I was a dumb kid, okay, and he supported that, and when I say supported that, he would put me in positions to make me grow up Even even in stuff that I'm looking I'm like, why, why are you making me do this Like I don't belong? I shouldn't talk to the news for this or whatever, whatever it could be he's like, because you need to learn he wanted to make you uncomfortable.

Speaker 1: 1:21:35

Yes, yeah, he was very good at that To make you better. Yes, yeah, he was very good at that To make you better. Yes, but he is still a guy I call when I have questions. When I got four, four young kids, so I don't have a lot of free time in life, uh, but we still try and get together, grab a beer, talk, talk about life. Uh, he knows my family, he knows my kids, he's done dinner. He's just been always a great part of my fire service life and which became a great part of my life. The second person I'm going to talk about is Chris Slayer. Chris is a battalion chief for the Mesa Fire Department and he loved this.

Speaker 1: 1:22:13

The first time I told him a new I was a captain in the training cat training academy academy uh, as a company training captain, so teaching all our current firefighters. Uh, there was information of this class going on about hose management and so myself and my counterpart, we were like all right, let's, let's go check this out and it's a three-day class. Three-day class of pulling hose, flowing water and the actual words that I had driving in the car. I looked at my partner and I said, dan, I'm as open-minded as the next guy, but I feel like we're about to waste three days of our life. Wow, Okay, yeah, that was Pre-taking the, that was. Pre-taking the class, pre-taking the class. Yeah, I didn't know much about the class, I didn't know anything about him and I sat down in this class. In the first hour I was blown away because I feel like in that point in my career, everything I'd learned had been so focused internally of our department and our region. And that's what I say is we don't know what we don't know. I literally sat in that class. I had 13 years, 14 years on the job, somewhere in that range 13 years, 14 years on the job, somewhere in that range and I felt like I was the worst firefighter to ever come along because there was so much information I was getting thrown at me that I just never knew and it was awesome. I mean it was awesome. So went through the class, one of the best classes I've ever taken.

Speaker 1: 1:23:55

Well, I get out of the training academy, I go back to my truck Next year I've ever taken. Well, I get out of the training academy, I go back to my truck. Next year I bring my crew. I'm like, hey, this class is going to kick my butt, it's going to be hot, it's going to be wet, we're going to work and we're going to work and we're going to work, but we're going together. So we go. They remember me, the guys were awesome, the instructors were awesome, chris was awesome.

Speaker 1: 1:24:18

I bring my crew. He's like you're back. I said, yeah, these are my guys, I've got more to learn. Yeah, I've got more to learn. We've got to learn it together. Go on about it, do all those things. The following year hey, I've got some new guys on my crew, we're back. I walk in. He's. The following year hey, I got some new guys on my crew, we're back. And I walk in and he's like what are you doing, dave? Yeah, he's like you're back again. I'm like, yeah, I got new guys, we're going to keep going, we're going to keep learning.

Speaker 1: 1:24:47

And it's funny, because it was a relationship that him and I grew over time of just that passion.

Speaker 1: 1:24:59

I think he I wouldn't say I was very much passionate about my job prior to going to that class, but he just lit, he, he put a fan on that, on that fire, and he stoked that thing so much.

Speaker 1: 1:25:08

And, yeah, I mean, the cool thing is the amount of times I've been back to that class and he's opened up the doors to going to a Fields' class, brian Brush's class, all these other things that I didn't even know prior to meeting him. That was. Even I didn't get outside of this region because my organization we didn't really talk about that much at that point in my career, so it was just a lesson I learned. And then over that time, uh, chris and I became friends. I then the other side of it. Now I get to teach on the class, um, teach other classes with him. Him and I only live a couple of miles apart, so we get to spend a lot of I mean a lot of time talking shop, talking stuff, um. So he's just been a great influence into my fire service career, become a great friend of mine and just really helped me drive to truly the the in strictly in the fire service. I feel like those two people helped guide my path to where us sitting here talking about this today beautiful, all right, uh.

Speaker 2: 1:26:27

Third question so favorite fire department tradition oh, that's an easy one.

Speaker 1: 1:26:32

Okay, kitchen table all right, it's a popular one. So I say the kitchen table it's so. When I first started in the fire service, we didn't not everybody had cell phones. I mean, most people had cell phones, but it wasn't like it was. Now it's everybody's smartphones, Everybody's on their phones all the time.

Speaker 1: 1:26:52

That kitchen table is that is. I mean, that is Sacred, it is sacred ground right there and it needs to remain that. Doing dinners together, that tradition is so valuable. Making dinner, sitting down, cleaning up all that stuff, Sitting at a table, no phones, just talking with the boys about anything and everything that is our relief. That is how we learn, that is how we get to know each other's families, get to know each other and grow from that.

Speaker 1: 1:27:24

And I mean, if I'll say this is, I don't believe a cell phone should be at the table unless it has a direct point to the conversation that's going on. And my old station, I I got tired of it because I sat at dinner one day, watched everybody on phones and I got pissed. I'm like hey, starting the next shift, I said no more phones at the dinner table and I made a point. I'm like this is about family time, about us getting together and it was awesome. So my phone's sitting about four feet away from me. That station has a little elevated area. My phone goes off Not two minutes after I say this.

Speaker 2: 1:27:59

Nice, so you're the guy it's my wife calling. Oh, you can't answer.

Speaker 1: 1:28:03

And, babe, if you listen to this, I love you. Um, so she's calling and they are just waiting, yeah, watching. What are you going to do? Like, pick it up, come on on we. We heard you go on your rant about how important this is and, like I said, babe, I love you if you listen to this. I had to quiet it, silence it, you know, flip it over so you can't see. And we continued on and I feel dinner's got.

Speaker 1: 1:28:30

If you don't get a call, dinner you should be at that table for at least an hour at a minimum. And I know you've heard me say it when we have a younger guy there, they're motivated, they want to, they want to be the first one done, they want to start cleaning, they're, they're doing their job. And I'm very quick to tell them no, you sit down, because we're all, we're team players. When one person gets up and starts cleaning, we're all gonna get up. We all get up and it it ends it. It's never the same to go back, sit down. We just don't have that same dinner, feeling the dirty plates sitting in front of us, just talking shop, talking about whatever, talking about things that have nothing to do with what we do. But that's what that is, that's our sacred ground, that is where we learn, that is where we vent, that is where we, we, we bond and grow as that family. So that is my favorite tradition in the fire service and, god, I never want to see you leave.

Speaker 2: 1:29:17

I know it's. It's one of my favorites too, and I've I've said it and I'll say it for the rest of my career like I feel bad for crews that don't cook together, don't get together because they don't they really don't know what they're missing.

Speaker 1: 1:29:27

Yeah, you know, but all right.

Speaker 2: 1:29:29

So last question, um, my favorite question of the four for this season, right? So if you could snap your fingers and change one thing in the fire service, what would it be? But more importantly, why so I?

Speaker 1: 1:29:42

I gotta say the passion for training. Okay, uh, I I have one. I've also been very bluntly told. So you want to increase the?

Speaker 2: 1:29:50

I want to increase the passion gotcha. So if we were to snap your fingers and get rid, of rid of something, what would you get rid of? The complacency, the negative attitudes, negative attitudes, the mutts, the mutt, perfect talk to me yeah, so, so I, I'm gonna break down.

Speaker 1: 1:30:04

uh, I'm gonna break down this. When I say the fire, fire department, I believe we are all we can. We can implant me into any other organization. People be like, oh hey, that's that guy, that's this guy, like we're all the same, mean we all got our own independence but we all have that guy in our department and this guy and when we break down an organization I believe we have 30% of our organization is motivated. You can tell them to stop. You can tell them nobody cares of you spending the extra time going out in the bay and working on those skills by yourself. 30%. They're not going to stop, they're going to keep going. They are motivated, they are ready to go.

Speaker 1: 1:30:43

We got 30% on the opposite end of that spectrum. They are living in the recliner. They learned it in the academy and they are the best firefighter because they learned it in the academy. And they are going to try and tear you down to keep them at that same level. Whatever that may be, they're the naysayer, they're the mutts. They don't have that drive, they don't have that passion and a lot of times it might just need to get sparked, but in the middle of that. So we got 30% positive, 30% negative. In the middle is that 40%? Those are the ones, those are the important ones, because you're not going to change the 30% positive, they're going to keep going.

Speaker 1: 1:31:22

The 30% negative I can give them a. I can give them a thousand dollars a day raise and they wish it was 1500. Yep, so it is what it is. But the people in the middle, they're going to float back and forth. So now it's whatever. That attitude is in that firehouse, that culture in that firehouse lives and dies by them. So the downfall of the negative is they're loud. They are loud and they're not afraid to be loud. The positive, that 30% positive, we need to be just as loud. We got to be louder because we need to make sure that we understand it's okay to care, it's okay to want to be better. And those, that 40 of the middle, they're going to come right to you like, hey, what are you doing in the bay? That's kind of cool. What do you teach me that they're going to? They're going to float with whatever. Is the the going going right, that rate that day, the atmosphere of that day yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:32:20

Yeah, if they hang out in that negative atmosphere, they'll be like cool man, I don't care either, I'm going to sit on the recliner. But if we keep that positive attitude, in art, that positivity is louder than that negative. Now we now have 70% that are in that positive, which now, if we think of a big picture that negative 30% they're the outcast, they're the outlier that is sitting there by themselves on that island like, well man, I thought this job sucked. Why does everybody else love it? They're going to slowly turn. Yeah. So if we can take that middle 40%, we can now get to that bottom 30%. Because when nobody wants to listen to them complain, they might actually come out in the bay and be like hey, you guys all keep coming in and laughing and having fun. You're hot, you're tired, you're sweaty, but you look like you're loving it. What are you doing? Why don't you come out with us? Tell me more. Yeah, tell me.

Speaker 1: 1:33:17

And this is a thing I'm constantly learning of when you have the opposite end, we can't attack the negative. When you're the positive, you can't attack the negative, because whatever you say, if you go too far you might shut them out. They're never coming back. So it's got to be like hey, that door's always got to be open. Like hey, that door's always got to be open. Like hey, man, if you don't like it, that's cool, I'm going to go do this. If you want to come, come and hopefully they come.

Speaker 1: 1:33:42

Maybe one day May not be today, we don't know what other things are going on with them. But if we take that 30%, gain that middle 40%, we got 70% in there. Hopefully we can bring them along. And if they know that door's still open, hopefully they come through that door. And now we're just making that whole culture stronger, better motivated, having fun, and I mean we get the greatest job in the world. We get paid very well to go out, learn our craft, practice our craft and be ready when the bells go off. When the bells go off, it's time to get to work. In between that, we should be focused on making ourselves better some way, shape or form well, dave, that's it, brother.

Speaker 2: 1:34:23

well, like we sat down here, I love it. So this is, uh, season one, episode two. Right, and we all decided this was going to be a 30 to 35 minute at max, right, we're, we're at that, plus an hour, right? So, um, but it's good because it's all good information. We could sit down here for 24 hours and talk and nobody would want to ever listen to us, and that's okay. But so, with that said again, thank you, my brother, thank you so much for coming out spending your time talking. I know we barely brushed the surface, right. A little shameless plug here, you know. Just remember everything we're talking about right now. We talk about mastering the craft and being that positive role model, right?

Speaker 2: 1:35:02

This is Copper State Fools sponsors this podcast. That's what Copper State Fools is all about. So you can find us on Instagram and Facebook. Every Friday, we do training minutes. This podcast will be published biweekly off of Copper State Fools.

Speaker 2: 1:35:18

If you learn one thing, it's successful. If you ever want to come to a meeting, reach out to us via email or social media and we're happy to oblige. So it's all about if you're in the Valley, please seek us out, but if you're anywhere else in the country. I guarantee you have a Fools chapter somewhere close to you, so reach out to them. They're all good dudes and they're just about making being a fireman cool again and, more importantly, just mastering that craft and getting better and then teaching each other. So again, dave, thank you so much for coming out here. I appreciate you. Thanks for having me and yeah, you guys have a great night and we will catch you on the next episode. Have a good one. Thanks for joining us. Always remember the most important grab you'll make in your fire service career is saving a complacent firefighter from themselves. Catch you next episode.