Strategic Decision-Making For Commercial Fire Operations

Commercial fires will expose weak decision-making—fast.

In this episode, we break down why commercial fire operations demand a completely different mindset than house fires—and how the Blue Card strategic decision-making model keeps us out of trouble.

We focus on size-up, realistic life safety expectations and the command choices that keep us from doing the wrong thing harder.

In this episode:
• Size, height and occupancy as your first strategic drivers
• Why residential tactics fail in large commercial compartments
• Reading sprinkler performance and recognizing when something is off
• Slowing down your size-up to avoid dangerous assumptions
• Confirming evacuation vs chasing unlikely rescues
• Standing up divisions early for better supervision and safety
• CAN reports, face-to-face coordination and radio discipline
• Knowing when to change the IAP and move to Plan B
• Air management, maximum depth and the round-trip ticket mindset
• Understanding capability limits—and where building systems must do the work

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This episode was recorded on April 9, 2026.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:54

Welcome to the B Shifter Podcast. John Vance, Chris Stewart, and Josh Bloom here with you today. We're going to be talking about commercial fire operations, usually the strategic decision-making model. We'll get to that in a second, but first let's check in with the guys. How are you guys doing today, Josh?

SPEAKER_02 1:11

I'm good. Happy to be on here.

unknown 1:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:13

Getting uh we're getting ramped up for FDIC here in a couple weeks and getting some stuff set out for we got three classes coming up starting Monday. So got crews getting ready to roll out to do those three classes, and then we'll be leaving those classes and headed Indianapolis. We'll be in that Hoosier corridor hallway starting Wednesday morning through Saturday.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

Yeah, that'll be good. And big news out there, we'll have Fire Command 3 available for order. So you come by the booth. Nick Brunicini's going to be hanging out with us. You can talk to him, kind of get a little, you know, talk about what the book's all about. And probably the biggest news is we have a huge discount if you come by and get the code from us. So during FDIC, we're going to have a special on the book. FDIC time only. So you'll need the promo code in order to receive the uh the big discount. So we we invite you to come by. We'll be in the Hoosier Corridor booth 13011, uh, right around the corner from the big fire engineering booth. So you go to the right, and that's where we'll be set up. Looking forward to seeing people, and we also invite the conversation. So, you know, a lot of folks in our world right now engage in a lot of discussion on social media, especially about command issues. We we invite you to come by and ask the experts and let's have a face-to-face conversation. If there's something someone in your organization or yourself or your chief or whoever is confused about blue card and what it's all about, please come by and have that discussion with us. We'd much rather do that in person than fight with someone on Twitter, which we don't do anyway. Chris, how are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 2:56

I'm great, happy to be here. Looking forward to FDIC and Josh is right. I look at the calendar and we've got like literally, I think now through May, there's literally something going on or multiple things going on every week, which is really kind of cool.

SPEAKER_02 3:12

Yep. Yep, we're out about. John, I do just want to mention that for FDIC, there's no better way to get the information than than right from the horse's mouth in person. So Chris is going to be there. And so if you have any interest in the ARF program, he's a key part of that. So, you know, stop by what it's about, what it looks like, what it does for your organization, what it could do for your organization, as well as where the long-awaited eight functions of command for TRT that's been, you know, on the burner, off the burner, on the burner, off the burner, whatever. So we'll be rolling that out. Probably not before FDIC, but right in the near future. It's 90. We could turn it on today if we really wanted to, but we're not, it's not not quite satisfied with it. So we're uh a future.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

We're not done tinkering.

SPEAKER_02 4:02

Right. As Nick Brunicini would say, uh, finished is better than perfect. But yeah, we're we're still there's still things, right, that to get it, you know, wrapped up. And then like I said on our last podcast, Eric Phillips is gonna be there and we're gonna have we'll have a big screen set up again so that if you're interested in that after action reporting system, what it can do, what it's all about. We got permission from several organizations to to use some incidents that are actually have been inputted in in those organizations. Uh, everything from house fires with rescues to a Mayday event at a apartment building on fire to multiple big box fires, offensive to defensive, a big box fire at a at a chicken distribution plant that was approaching like a million square feet with an explosion that organized organized response from 20 some fire departments, I think, altogether, ended up there, but they ended up saving like 75% of the building. But they followed the process as far as using all the systems inside the building and talking to the responsible party and did not take residential tactics to a commercial building fire, which I mean we're gonna be we're gonna be talking about some of that today, but specifically for the after action reporting stuff, stop by. But anything and everything, Commander Blue Card, come by, talk to us, see us, get it right from get it right from the horse's mouth because we know how it goes in our industry. If you hear it from somebody else, you're probably not hearing the whole story, or you're hearing their you're hearing their twist on it. So well, we don't need to let facts get in the way of a good story, right? Yeah, that's never, yeah, that's that's no there's no excitement in that.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

Every train the trainer we do, particularly when we're on the road, I find, people are always amazed, like, oh, this isn't what I was told the system is. They they were told a whole different set of things by people who haven't even been educated in it. So I yeah, get get the facts and learn the facts, and then you'll be more educated on on making a decision on whether or not that this is a a system for your department or not.

SPEAKER_02 6:02

Yeah, let's talk about what's out there. It's fun to talk about, not us, but them. It's fun for them to talk about what's out there in the dark that you can't see that you're not familiar with, that you can just make up your own story that you don't know nothing about. They're scared of the dark, just like they're scared of a system that they don't know nothing about, which I get that. But if you instead of talking about it, why don't you just take a look at it and see what it really is instead of you know talking about it? But I think I agree with what Chris said. Don't let the facts get in the way of a of a good story thing, and that's that's a big deal because you have the story, it's it's story time at the bar, and it's like, eh, well, okay, whatever.

Why Commercial Fires Go Sideways

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Yeah. Time time to uh break out the testosterone. All right, today we're gonna talk about commercial fires. You know, this the we we've had a lot of examples in the last few weeks. There was one in Ohio where the the solar panels on top of a strip mall caught on fire and it got into the building. We had the Ontario, California fire that went to six alarms and it ended up being a defensive fire in a in a building with a sprinkler system, and and you know that that was unique. Uh so we we've got some other unique examples this week. So we thought we would break open this subject and talk about the strategic decision-making model and and really how it affects the operations on a commercial fire versus a residential fire, because these are incidents we go to less often. And as we always say, when we apply those residential tactics at commercial fires, that's when we get in trouble. So just to start off with, I guess, just a question to to get us talking here. The first arriving I see at a commercial fire, what's the one factor do you guys think that most influences your strategic decision when you pull up?

Why Residential Tactics Fail

SPEAKER_00 7:52

Uh I think the first thing you're going to evaluate is building size, height, and occupancy type, right? And not only is that the first thing we should be evaluating, that's going to be the first thing we communicate, right, when we give an initial radio report. So I think it makes sense to start there and to say if that's always an overwhelming one, no. But when we talk about commercial buildings and we talk about size and we talk about open spaces and really know and understand and expect the differences between residential compartments versus commercial compartments, it's hard to ignore because there's so many things, so many complicating things that that building size and the way it's put together and and and what they do inside is so challenging to us that we really need to start there. And and when we couple that with you know serious fire and smoke conditions, then our the way we go about dealing with that isn't the shouldn't be from a fire control standpoint, isn't the same way we go about dealing a residential fire. We don't have the same opportunity to can to use the compartment space to our advantage to to cool the environment, to manage that way. We're we're having to do things a little bit differently and a little bit more directly on the water on the fire, so to speak, or the fuel that's actually burning, because I can't do it in the same way. So starting with the building size and then quickly coupled with, all right, what are the actual conditions? What is going on here? What can I see from the outside? Maybe what can I see from the inside? And that's gonna drive really the risk management strategy and action plan that we're gonna we're gonna put in place. So it it definitely should start with there. But I want to go back to something you said about residential versus commercial tactics. We need to be pretty clear about defining that. What do we mean when we say residential tactics? Residential tactics define for or we define it really as we're showing up with a significant life safety or a high likelihood of a significant life safety problem, right? And that we have a we have an anticipation and an expectation that we're going to be dealing with victims. So, how do we coordinate locating and removing those victims with managing the problem, the fire control part of that? And oftentimes that fire control buys us the time to do the other things. Not always, but a vast majority of the time. And so we tend to engage in that in a in a in a manner that is we know we can be successful in the in the in the residential environment. Quick search, quick fire control, coordinated together, managing the ventilation portion of it. And that doesn't play out the same way in commercial environments. And again, we'll go back to the size and then the conditions that dictate that. Our ability to show up and initiate rapid primary searches in an effective, repeatable, manageable way is not present in these buildings. I don't, I don't care what anybody's teaching people about large area search. It is it is an unreasonable thing to expect that we are going to be able to do it with any level of efficiency. So we become more reliant on the best thing we can do for the life safety problem is control the fire, get water on the fire, assess whether there's it's sprinkler controlled or not. If it is, then support the system, figure out how you're going to get water in the fire. If it isn't, then you have a you have you've got an opportunity in the beginning, if the conditions allow you to try and control it from our more normal commercial operations with hand lines and those types of things. And but that is a very short window on the front end of these things because we've got to evaluate is this, is this working or isn't it? And and make decisions based on that. Because the longer we stay and the the longer we do the wrong thing harder, the more endangered it puts us because of the fire conditions, the building integrity, and all that. So this it's it's one of these things that where we want to give this simple answer on the front end of something, but it's so many things are connected together that we need to understand. So that we kind of have to talk about it in a holistic way, I think, to be you know reasonably successful with understanding what's going on here.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

So yeah, maybe, maybe an example of some of these incidents that have happened recently that we're familiar with when some of those factors pulling up would would change either your strategy or you know, exactly the way you were going to deploy lines or try to get water on the fire.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

Several recent incidents. Well, one yes, one just this week, the the incident here in Ohio with you know the fire started on the exterior of the building on the rooftop. And it's still a you know, a giant, I don't know, maybe approaching a million square feet-ish building, but significant amount of fire from the rooftop that made its way inside the building, you know, it requires us to like think about okay, the fire was there, but what's how does the building construction line up with where this fire is and what's inside the system and then the auxiliary systems that are inside. So if the fire's on the roof going from the inside or from the outside to the inside, you know, being above the sprinkler heads and so on. So it comes back to that, you know, thinking piece, right? There's like a 30,000-foot view where we can give people direction, but the critical factors is how we make decisions really to operate onto the fire ground, right? Like that we don't pull up again to Mrs. Smith having chest pains and shocker because oh, you're having chest pain, so you're getting shocked today. But too often in the fire service, we take that approach. We this is just what you do, and it's like, well, no, we get there and we evaluate what are the factors, and then we take action based off of that. So, you know, a fire that starts on the roof is much different than, for example, the fire that was in Ontario, California that appears, I don't know, a 12 or so intentionally set fires in a 1.2 or 1.3 million square foot building that is full of Class A combustible materials, appears to be wide open from one end to the other, does have a updated current sprinkler system, what everybody, you know, believes. But if you have fire set in multiple locations, that's a whole different set of factors, right? So those conditions, you know, lead us down a bit of a different path. And then our understanding of how sprinkler systems work is critical. It's not designed to have multiple fires in multiple places, it's designed for a set number of sprinkler heads and a geographic area to flow a certain GPMs, you know, altogether, whatever the system's designed for. So it all comes back to that the size up piece of how, like Chris said, really, size height occupancy. That's a that's a big deal because then we have to we have to know what we're operating in to be able to figure out what kind of action that we can even take about what about solving that actual problem. And you know, oftentimes in these commercial buildings, that that that's the piece that's like what's standing in the way of us solving this problem. So is the fire 50 feet inside the front door, or is it 200 feet inside the front door? Do we believe that there's one fire, or do we have information where there was multiple fires? Does it appear, based off of what we know from looking at thousands of fires in the past, does it appear the sprinkler system's controlling it, or is the sprinkler system it is not controlling it? And that's an obvious thing. Chris could talk a little bit about the Home Depot fire in California about yeah, it had a sprinkler system, but it wasn't doing anything. So there have you have to make decisions. And we're talking about commercial, we're kind of putting an umbrella of of of a bunch of different buildings under commercial, really, I think today of you know, strip mall, you know, the standalone maybe 20,000 square foot commercial building. And and we can touch on and talk a little bit about the whole big box thing, but all three of those are even much different because a fire, I feel totally different about a fire in a strip mall and how big the space is compared to a fire in a million square foot building that's wide open from one end to the other. There it it the building plays a factor in what our deployment is gonna look like and what our capabilities are in solving that problem. And John, just to go back to it, we we have to have a different mindset about the whole life safety piece. Like we're we're not saying we're disregarding it totally, but it's not realistic to think that the three of us are even gonna go to Walmart in five minutes and walk around in there and without cell phones find our even be able to find each other in five minutes in a hundred and thirty thousand square foot building, right? Let alone it's full of smoke and we're going to this place and we think that we're gonna, you know, find somebody that maybe was left in there, which I I laugh about it because I just seen some stuff this last week on people are gonna die in Walmart and Target and all this because they're they're videoing these fires, and it's like, well, that's been going on for 15 or 20 years, and even they're smart enough to realize it's time to go, right? And they and they get out of the building, which is why nobody has been rescued, pulled out, besides being asked, hey, it's time for you to go, or them realizing, let's go, we got to get out of here with the basket of stuff that we're gonna take with us because the focus is on the fire, not on uh stealing some stuff right now. But it all comes down to the decision-making piece, which just kind of link brings me to a a piece of I think that's why we're gonna deliver close to 20 probably critical thinking and decision-making classes this year, because it's a key factor. We we have to teach people to understand how to evaluate critical factors so that we can figure out how to deploy, not on a single piece of paper have 20 things that this is just what you do when you get to this building. And it's like every fire is a little bit different, whether you're talking about primary access, secondary access, building size, height, occupancy, fire location, uh what's burnt, you name it, right? It's it's all different.

SPEAKER_01 18:13

You said a couple of things that I'm just thinking through the eyes of a first arriving company officer. If you arrive at a building where the roof is on fire and you know it's a sprinkler-controlled building, but you also know there's solar panels on the building, something's gone terribly wrong. There's something wrong with that building system. The same thing with the Ontario fire. If you pull up to that and you've got heavy black smoke pushing out, and it's not the typical sprinkler-controlled conditions that we see, something has gone terribly wrong with that system. So you have to be suspicious. You know, we talk about standard condition, standard action, standard outcomes. Well, that's not standard uh for that kind of building if you've got a system in it. So you have to think, okay, what happened here? Is the system off? Are are there multiple set fires? Uh, you bring up, Josh, that the conveyor systems in some of these buildings, those two aren't made to have fire spread throughout the building. If there's a fire in a conveyor system, it's just going to get spread out all over. So, you know, what where do you guys see companies getting it wrong when they arrive initially and make and starting to make those decisions where they they get in trouble almost immediately from not recognizing that? Just before we jump to that, Chris.

Size-Up Errors And Evacuation Reality

SPEAKER_02 19:30

So the conveyor systems, if conveyor systems are installed properly, we shouldn't have that problem because they're supposed to have smoke tubes and detection systems in them to that if the if the system goes off, that the conveyor system shuts off. So uh, but we see that that's not the case oftentimes, that a fire gets starts however, you know, from oftentimes from you know cardboard box dust, honestly, on on bearings on a conveyor system. But the conveyor system was was installed without any detection device as far as like smoke tubes or any of that. And then that conveyor system runs for a little while, as we know, before the before the fire gets big enough that the sprinkler system goes off. So yeah, you could end up with fires in multiple places. But that that comes back to that pre-planning and really like building code and compliance component, which you know we don't get into, but we need to have an understanding of when we're pulling up on these buildings. What what does that look like? What does that mean? And what the what are these systems capable of?

SPEAKER_00 20:32

So the the areas in which I think we challenge ourselves or we hamper ourselves or we cause our our own some of our own problems early on in these incidents is lack of size up, lack of effective size up, and actually taking a the time to to to to truly evaluate them and then directly connected to that is making making decisions about what we're gonna do on assumptions. Because the last time I was here, this is what we did, right? And and that's not that may not be based in reality and what's actually happening there. So I'll use the the example that you know the the the fire from around Columbus there that they had with the the solar panels on the roof, right? You show up to a building that that was a tall building that was easy 25, 30 feet from the the pictures that I saw. When you show up on that as a first arriving company and you've got pretty serious black smoke issuing from the roof, there's the assumption immediately is oh, there's a fire in that building and it's and it's showing through the roof. It's either burned through or it's there's uh some type of ventilation opening that's allowing that smoke to escape. And so the fire is inside the building. And you may not, you may not know that until you actually look inside the building, until you do that exterior size up and you move to a position where you can better size up the interior of the building. And that's a a little bit of a oh shit when you you pull up on a building like that, smoke from the roof, you look inside and you're like, oh, I don't I've got very little smoke, or I don't have a fire, you know, any serious fire that I can actually see at this point. So now I need to rethink, oh, okay, this is on the roof. I've got to do some other things. I can't, I don't have a, if I'm on an engine company, I don't have a ladder that's tall enough for to do it so I can evaluate that roof or the conditions on the roof, right? So I need to get other people to start helping me and to come up with a plan of what we're gonna do and how we're gonna do it. So, you know, my personal example is well, one night in the middle of the night, I'm like the second or third due engine on a fire in a strip club. And the first new engine gets there and says, Yeah, we got we've got fire through the roof. Well, what it Turned and then they get to the inside and there's no condition, fire conditions on the inside. And well, somebody got pissed off and they threw a Maltov cocktail on the roof of this place, right? So it looked serious and legit when we showed up, but then it wasn't. So we had to totally change the plan. And it unfortunately became simpler at that point. But right. So taking time to evaluate, all right, I see what I have going on the outside. Do I have the opportunity to get a 360 here or don't I? If I if I can or I can sign somebody to get it for me, I want to do that early on. And then I want to take a look at the inside. I'm looking from my vantage point around the building and then from the inside. And then once I have that, then I can start to make some better decisions here about what are the standard uh actions that I want to take place on trying to get if I see an opportunity to get lines in the building and be able to get some water on this and try and try and fix it. I I want to be able to do that or make the decision, hey, this is too advanced, right? Well, we we can't do this. So I think it's that time and commitment thing is we're so again, the residential mindset is fast, fast, fast. People are gonna die if we don't put the fire out fast and we don't search fast. Uh I I totally agree with that. Well, when we show up on these commercial buildings, we have a different life safety profile, we have the different life safety potential, and we definitely have a different capacity and what we can actually execute safely and repeatedly and consistently, right? So now I need my tactics to match the conditions there at the building and engage in it correctly. And if it takes me 20 or 30 seconds longer to actually come up with a better plan because I have more information or I have the right information, then that that's likely going to be more efficient over the the lifetime of or the lifespan of this incident, so to speak. So I I think that's probably our biggest mistake that we make on the front end is we rush our size up and we connect it to assumptions based on something else. And we we we we put an ineffective plan in place that either just simply doesn't work or is dangerous and and then and then and then we we suffer the consequences.

SPEAKER_01 24:59

There's a huge difference too when we're ruling out life safety and and helping us on the risk management model get into the yellow between left-handed wall searches that you might do in a residence or an apartment building and confirming evacuation, right? I mean, confirming the and and there are ways to confirm evacuation, both with our senses and and talking to folks and you know, using technology and everything else. But I I think people get hung up with, you know, I'm gonna have to, you know, we hear it all the time. What if there's somebody else in there? But the numbers just aren't there. And usually we can easily confirm evacuation, right?

SPEAKER_02 25:39

Yeah, yeah. And don't get sucked into somebody who's not used to responding to emergency events, who it's their everyday job is doing whatever their everyday job is at one of these facilities, and they tell you we still haven't accounted for 50 people. It's like, well, let's let's like double triple check that. Let's not jump to let's not jump, let's not ignore it, but let's not jump to we get we we have to go in here and try to find 50 people because not saying it couldn't happen, you know, from from some kind of an explosion event, whatever, but anybody anybody who's up and mobile in these places, based a hundred percent off of facts and statistics, get out of the building. I mean, they're there you can count on one hand the number of people that don't get out, right? Like I mean, if if we go to if we go to even down to a strip mall of of the restaurant and the owner was sleeping in the office, even those people like realize if they realize there's a problem, they get they get out of the building. And you know, just recently uh at a strip mall, they found somebody sleeping in the office. The person didn't even know there was a problem there, but they were were also not in any there was no risk to them. But they found them because you can search in a strip mall, and they they had put water on the fire and they were searching all the rest of the space, and they opened this door, and it's like, well, the guy's like, Well, come almost like what are you doing here? And it's like your building was on fire, right? So but that's a big difference between that and I'm at a million square foot building and whoever the responsible person is on third shift of making sure that everybody is out here in the parking lot and is met up. Uh, we're missing 50 people. Well, no, the building's on fire, they don't want to be in there working anyway. And just like when they take a break, they all ran to their car to do whatever they do with their car when they're on break to get as far away from the building. They don't want to be inside the building, right? So it's like, unless there's some kind of a significant event from an explosion or something like that, people who are mobile are going to get up and get out of the building.

SPEAKER_00 27:53

So let's make the comparison, the residential commercial comparison, right? So you show up and you know some somebody is pointing to a window and that said, they're in there. I know they're in there. I they're in there. Okay, we have a better system and capacity to actually be able to deal with that. We're gonna make a decision. Are we going, are we going in through the front door to get to that space? Are we gonna are we gonna go through a window to get to that space? And when I get there, I know I'm gonna search a, at least in the beginning, a defined area. And depending on the conditions, right, then I have some other choices to make, right? And that has a lot to do with whether we're getting water on the fire or not. And so that's a very clear, simple, effective, reasonable thing to be considering at a residential fire. But if we show up to a 1.3 million square foot warehouse and the the the building or the the the site manager says, yeah, I got 50 people I haven't been able to account for that are working in the building. And in an oh, okay, where are they? Oh, well, they're all they their work, their work locations are all over the building. Well, I don't have the ability in the same way at that residential fire to be able to do targeted searches for those people if I have any serious conditions going on. It just that doesn't make sense. There's no there's no reasonableness to that. So, what the best thing I can do is if I have the opportunity, if it's a sprinkler control or a building that has a sprinkler system, support the system and then figure out how to finish off controlling that fire. If it's not, take our stuff in there to try and control the fire and make a decision whether I can or I can't do that. Those are the best things I can do in that moment. I can't do targeted searches and uh of a uh of a lows, right? I just I just simply cannot, right? Because the because of the openings, my ability to get in, where the could they be, and and the complicated nature of of a layout on the inside of the store. It's not gonna be reasonable. So that's where the fire control element it becomes the the oftentimes the most effective thing you can do for a potential life safety issue that you may have or you may believe you have in there. And then you sort it out afterwards exactly what happened at that incident that we're that we're talking about. There's five, there's 50 people, uh 50 people that I can't account for. Well, oh yeah, they were all sitting out on the curb and their phones were in their lockers and they couldn't communicate with anybody. So now we sorted it out afterwards. It wasn't an actual rescue situation. They were unaccounted for. So does a building manager, owner, business person, some kind of RP telling us, yeah, we've evacuated all the employees and everybody out and all the customers out of the building. Is that a guarantee? Hell no, it's not a guarantee. But it is operational information that we should actually consider and we should balance our the risk we're willing to take on trying to solve this problem with that information. And can we find people? Yeah, we have. They found that cat, you know, it stuck in his FedEx truck, you know, after the fire. That can happen, right? But that's the that's the the extreme minority of the potential there. And there's no way we were gonna go search that building and then search the the hundred or so FedEx trucks in that building. That's just not gonna happen as a search and rescue tactic before a fire attack or coordinated with a fire attack in a commercial building. It's not reasonable. So we need to engage and and and have a better clue and understanding of what actually is reasonable.

Building Divisions Before It Hurts

SPEAKER_01 31:54

But when it comes to you know, I see number two and the decisions that I see number two is making, what are some of the triggers for that IC to say, I'm no longer going to be the Lone Ranger incident commander on this and I'm gonna start building a structure out and and start putting divisions in? I mean, at what point do you say now it's time for that? Because I mean, is it something isn't working? Does the radio drive you there? What what indicators are there for divisions being stood up?

SPEAKER_02 32:24

Well, I I want to put out uh first that this whole span of control of five to seven or three to whatever, whatever somebody wants to throw out there is is a general thing, and it's really based on how many people can you have report to you or groups can you have report to you really in a controlled environment, not we're dealing with an incident that is rapidly moving and that and that there's life at risk, right? And the condition the conditions change, right? There's a lot of moving parts to it, and then everybody's got a different level of experience and capability, right? So when we look at training and experience, those two line up to like what could you really manage. But we can we can talk about standards, Chris can talk about this, but really when you when you get to three companies in a space, we should start thinking about we before that, we should start thinking about like how are we gonna you know divide this up and organize this event. But if I'm in a commercial building on fire and I I have two companies working in a company on deck and I'm gonna be here for a while, then I need to get a boss there because uh and at a big building like that, I'm likely gonna have another attack position also. So that that boots on the ground, you know, boss that that can put their be a little bit closer to it, feel it, taste it, touch it, kind of if you will, not literally, but like a little closer to it, puts us in a much better position to be to solve the problem and to engage with the crews for you know a list of purposes, all the reasons why we put a division boss forward. So not putting them there when you're sitting in that car, it's like you have you you don't have a great idea of what's going on. And we're all firemen. So when you send somebody to a geographic area at a commercial building fire and say you're on deck, well, in about five minutes, they're gonna find something to do if there's not somebody there, you know, organizing and managing, you know, that piece of it. So that that span of control thing, I I hear people all the time, well, when you get to five, that's when I would, that's when I would, you know, let it go. And it's like it's too late because if you got five, then you're probably gonna end up with more there also because of the amount of work likely that has to take place in that geographic area. And and you can organize and manage something until you can't, right? And I bring this up in classes all the time. There's some kind of a reason why if you look at NCAA basketball, well, there's five people on the court playing, and there's how many ever sitting on the bench, and there's that many again, coaches and assistant coaches sitting there, and that's for a reason, right? No different than any other sport. Major league baseball, it's a baseball game, and it's like, well, there's 12 coaches, like football games, even even more, uh 25 to 30 coaches and assistant coaches and assistant to the assistant for for for a football game, right? And it's like, well, no, we're dealing with a hazard that's evolving that the time starts when the fire started, right? Like we there is no time to try to figure it out, make it up. Hold on, we're gonna time out, we're gonna we're gonna reset and try to figure this out. We don't have there there's there's no time for that. Though we do that when we're changing strategies or we're gonna take a different action based off of how we're doing. But uh assigning a division should be a a normal thing that we do at incidents for the purpose of uh providing service and solving the problem at the incident in the best way that we possibly can do so.

SPEAKER_00 36:11

I I want to kind of I want to say it a little bit differently, but it means the same thing as Josh is saying, right? Is I want to do it proactively. I'm gonna assign divisions and I'm gonna anticipate signing divisions proactively, right? Because I want to be doing everything right before something goes wrong. Everything doing everything right before something goes wrong. I don't care if I have one or two companies in the building. If I have the ability to put a division boss there and I know that's where work's gonna happen, I'm putting them there. I'm not waiting to get those companies in that position, right? Because stupid things can happen. 54% of the Maydays happen uh for the first in company, right? So I want to have that layer in place from the get-go or as early as I possibly can. And so that they can manage the work. But if something stupid happens and I've got Mayday, I've got, you know, drastic condition changes, the building falling apart, any of that stuff, I've got, like Josh said, eyes closer to it that's gonna reinforce my decisions at the strategic level of now, we're making a change here, right? And so I want to get ahead of that. And to me, in a in a system, and I get it, I come from a big system, right? So I have the resources to be able to do that. So if you're in a big system, I want you to be proactive. And if you're in a big shared system like Josh is in Ohio, I want you to be proactive. And if you're not, I want you to figure out how you can be proactive, right? Because there are things that you need to do. And there's it may change your decision threshold of offensive, defensive, but I need to get somebody in there as early as I can because I want to be proactive about managing this incident in order to prevent something stupid from happening, or actually put this thing out, right? The one thing that tends to help us and prevent Maydays the most is putting the stinking fire out. And so uh let's focus on it.

Radio Discipline And CAN Reports

SPEAKER_01 38:09

When we set up uh multiple divisions, say we have three divisions, each one has five companies, it's 15 companies. How do how do we as the IC keep communications from falling apart and the radio just getting overwhelmed with radio traffic? Let's talk about some of the tools in the toolbox for that.

SPEAKER_02 38:26

Well, one thing is that within the system, once once companies are assigned by command, or in this case by a division boss, which could be, you know, maybe they were assigned by command to go work for the Charlie division, that fate that assignment's likely coming face to face. But once they're given their assignment, we should only really hear back from them. One, if we communicated to them before they made entry, hey, when you reach the seat of the fire, give me a can report, which is a realistic thing, maybe to commercial building. So yeah, we're 120 feet inside the building. We we have two lines on the fire, and we got a lot of overhaul we're gonna do. We're gonna need some additional companies to assist with overhaul. That that face-to-face piece. Command really doesn't need to know that. They just need to know that that person that's responsible for that geographic area is handling their mini incident action plan that aligns with the bigger incident plan incident action plan within the strategy that the IC has determined. And then every so often, that division boss may give a can report or information to the IC, or is the incident commander not that we want them on the radio all the time bothering divisions or companies about let me know what's going on, let me know what's going on, let me know what's going on. The incident commander can call somebody that's in a division and say, Can you just give me a CAN report? They just want to get caught up on exactly what's going on. But if you're operating within a system, unless you see a reason like fire conditions change or you know, too much time has gone by, or some kind of factor like that, you know, we put people there to do the work. And unless we hear something bad or see something bad, you know, really we should let those people work.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

If we don't have radio discipline at small incidents with an IC managing three or four companies, there's no way in the world we're gonna have radio discipline with two or three divisions in place, right? So the expectation and the standard has to be that that has to be trained to is radio discipline. We communicate when we need to, we know why we're gonna communicate, and we know when to shut up, right? That's really a big part of it. So in order to be effective with the communication with three, four, shoot, I've I've I've had as many as five divisions in place with, you know, with quite a few companies in each good portion at least of those divisions, right? In order to be able to do that effectively, there has to be discipline from the IC to the division bosses in that communication. What Josh is describing is I'm not gonna overbear them. And then the communication inside the division from the companies working out needs to be face to face when possible. And when you're in the hazard zone and you need to communicate a status change or priority traffic, we need to be very deliberate about it. And it can't be, I'm just gonna narrate the work I'm doing, it makes me feel good when I talk on the radio, you know, all these other reasons that cause us to do it. I feel insecure, so I'm gonna talk on the radio, right? And we we've got to, we we gotta train that out so that when things get more complicated with our incident organization, that the discipline is more effective. And the discipline that we should be having with the radio traffic between the division boss and the companies is where it should be. And it's again, if you don't practice it on the little ones, you won't practice, you won't execute it on the big ones. It's like managing Maydays. If you don't practice actually managing Maydays, when you actually have one, it's gonna suck. And so if we if if we don't practice communication and know when, why, and how, and execute it on the small ones, evaluate how we're actually doing, hold each other like accountable to doing that, then it is going to suck the big incidents and you're gonna go, oh, this division stuff doesn't work. Well, no, you're just not doing it effectively. You don't have clear expectations, you haven't trained to it, and you're doing a horrible job of monitoring the performance when we're out in the field actually doing it.

When Plan A Is Not Working

SPEAKER_01 42:31

We see things go wrong when there isn't a strong plan B or the IC isn't being flexible enough to change the IAP. So, what's your trigger that things aren't working and you need to change?

SPEAKER_00 42:44

I don't, I'm not gonna say that I have a specific trigger. What I'm gonna say is I'm gonna be proactive in the management and the assessment and the size up of that. The very first opportunity I have if I'm IC number two, is when I show up and when I initiate the command transfer. And so at that point, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna clarify accountability of who's where on the incident. And then I'm gonna get the conditions, actions, needs right then and there from IC number one. And I'm gonna balance what they said against what I see. And I'm gonna look at the time, how long have they been doing that? Are the conditions better now than when they showed up? And and if they're if they're not, then I that's there's trigger number one, right? And uh of a likely a series of triggers that I need to be paying attention to. And that that change in conditions and the amount of time, you know, was how far behind IC number one am I as IC number two? If I'm five or 10 minutes, hmm, and things haven't gotten better, who that's a big uh uh there's a good chance I'm making a change. If if it's not, or if I'm short distance and I see that they're making progress, then I the then then that decision is being satisfied a little bit. I'm gonna be able to support that a little bit longer than I would otherwise. So I think there's a few things coupled together that is this progressive, consistent, perpetual evaluation rather than when I show up and I see this, these are the decisions I'm gonna make. No, I'm gonna evaluate it in the moment. Like I'm not gonna have the same assumptions that I was being critical of of the first arriving, or I'm not gonna fall into the trap that I I was talking about with the first arriving officers as the second arriving incident commander. I'm gonna go through this very deliberately and very specifically and make decisions based on what has happened, what I'm seeing, and the information that's coming to me about it.

SPEAKER_01 44:40

Well, one last question that I have then. What I I I n probably know how Chris would answer and I'm kind of interested in in Josh first and go to Chris. But what's the hardest lesson you've seen us learn in the fire service about commercial fires?

SPEAKER_02 44:54

We keep doing the same thing over and over again and refuse to change. And it really lines up with we treat it like we treat commercial fires like house fires. But when you look out there, house fires is what we go to the most, house or residential apartment buildings, maybe. But I think I think 95% of the training, I think I'm safe saying, that you see out there focuses on residential tactics and task level work related to residential buildings. And there's all kinds of stuff out there about you know fire attack right now. And almost every single bit of it is residential buildings. All kinds of stuff out there about ventilation, all of it's most all of it's residential buildings. Just this week, the latest on search training, and it's all residential buildings. So, you know, I I don't know that we should be surprised when we continue to take residential tactics to commercial building fires and that we're not successful with it. And and we know that oftentimes when we take those tactics to these residential buildings, we we see that we're not successful, and it kind of goes back to what you guys were just talking about. When do you pull the plug? And we're not very good at that. We keep doing the wrong thing harder, and I that's a that's a Chris Stewart ism thing, right? Like, don't keep doing the wrong thing harder. It's not working. You're you're not making progress with this, which means we should be looking at plan B, right? Like so many places they have plan A. This is just what we do, but when it doesn't work or anything goes sideways with it, it oftentimes the answer is throw more people at it. And I've worked with plenty of organizations for in the last 15 or 16 years with Blue Card of well, that's why we send 60 people to this house on fire. And it's like, for what? Like it's a 1500 square foot house on fire, and well, we have to have enough people because we keep throwing people at it until we can solve the problem. And it's like, well, that's maybe you should take a different approach to how you're trying to solve the problem, then.

SPEAKER_00 47:13

I would say this is a triggering question, JV. So you uh I'm glad Josh talked first because I was able to control myself for calm myself down. What my biggest issue is is not what occurred at Southwest supermarket. That's not the biggest failure I've actually been around and seen and and have witnessed. My biggest, the biggest failure I'm seeing or have seen is that we're doing the same thing today that we did at Southwest supermarkets. That's the failure. That's the we didn't know what we didn't know then. Thank God we we we we figured it out. But now we're to the point where it's a, you know, that's 25 years ago. It's just a story at this point to the most of the firefighters and and chief officers and and and yeah, it didn't happen in my lifetime, so I really I'm not gonna pay much attention to it. And so we're repeating the same things now locally, like the place where that incident happened, it's occurring, and in in and around where that that incident happened, it's occurring. And it's also nationally, I very much know, but it but so the greatest failure is the repeating of our failures. That is absolutely it. And learning and acting surprised when things don't go well, who would have thought? And it's complete nonsense. And it's a lack of professionalism, it's a lack of paying attention, it's a lack of being serious about the job, and and it's a lack of we don't quite fully understand what it means to be an incident commander, and so we're really not gonna engage in how to be an incident commander and what the serious part of the work is. And oh hell, but let's train, let's keep let's keep training, pulling hose, but we're not definitely not going to train managing an incident and managing or preventing residential tactics in commercial buildings. So that's that's my greatest failure. And I'm feel proud I controlled myself as much as I did. Good job.

The 170-Foot Problem And Air

SPEAKER_02 49:17

Can we talk briefly about you all's perspective? We get this quite a bit. What if the fire is further than 170 feet from any entry point inside of a building? Like, what does that look like? How do we what do we do about that? And you know, I keep hearing people, we're the fire department, they called us to solve the problem, and that's what we have to do. And it's like, well, we're you hit on a little bit already, Chris, that we only have the capability that we have with the equipment, tools, knowledge that we that we have, right?

SPEAKER_01 49:47

And there's limitations to all of it, but well, it and I was around a fire department in the last couple of weeks that they they wanted to solve the problem with pulling a three-inch line with a reducer, and that would give them additional distance inside the building instead of what we say. And we always go back to air management, right? Like, how are you going to get back out of the building? And that's where the round trip ticket mentality comes in. And and I'm still not seeing the round trip ticket mentality instituted at some of these fire departments where we're also talking about maximum depth inside a building. Yeah, we can assign you there. How are we gonna get you back out? And how are we gonna manage your air to get back out? I was in the Pacific Northwest last month, and that there was a fire marshal there that came up with, well, I'll I'll help you guys out. We're gonna put bottles in the middle of this building. They actually have a cabinet with SCBA bottles so they can do dirty atmosphere bottle changes and stay inside the building. And it that doesn't work. Well, who trains on that? Like, I I I don't know. Like, I I I have not seen a department train on that. I've not seen that in curriculum. Maybe you guys know where where that works, or like I'm sure we're gonna see at FDIC in two weeks, some kind of air system that is attached to a hose line. So once we run out of air, we can just click in there and start breathing air. All of those problems are management problems that don't have to occur, but we're not looking at the why, those are what solutions. We always say the what solutions to why problems. That's a what solution to a why problem. Bottom line is we have to manage the air. And if we've got 45 minutes of air on our back, that means we have about 15 minutes or less of work to do, and we're gonna have to get them back out. So, whatever that depth is, you know, we we've come up with less than 200 feet or 175 feet, it's no more than 200 feet unless somebody's got superlungs or you've got the most fit fire company in in the United States, but that doesn't happen. So that's my take on it. I I I know any department that I've been associated with, we haven't had the capability to do it. And I always point out you know, these large studly fire departments that are well staffed, way better than any place I've ever worked. If they can't do it, we can't do it for for those variety of reasons. So you triggered me on that one, Josh. I'll I'll bounce it over to Chris.

SPEAKER_00 52:22

So I this is a this is a fascinating perspective that the fire service takes on with this. So, in what industry and what profession, like profession, I'm using that word very deliberately, do they change or drastically exacerbate the comp uh the complexity and the problems that we problems that we are charged with solving or we feel like we're charged with solving? And we're just gonna take it on utilizing the same exact solutions we've always used. So now we're gonna we're gonna uh I don't think Alan Brunicini ever went to a 1.2 million square foot building fire, right? I know the the the cooler manufacturer here fire that we had here a long, long time ago was pretty big, but it it wasn't that big. And so we've we take this idea of, oh no, we're gonna, it's our responsibility to solve everything. No matter, no matter how complex this building is, no matter how tall it is, no matter how wide it is, no how no matter how big the interior volume is, we have to be able to solve it with what we have on the fire truck right now. And that's that's kind of an insane position to actually take, quite honestly. So if we don't adjust how we're doing things inside these buildings and within the tactics, those the that has to be solved at the code level first, at and then the operational level second, right? The code level has to make it more operationally reasonable. Or we simply say, no, it's not reasonable, right? Like that there are times and places that it is not reasonable for me to put firefighters in there. I don't have the ability to manage their safety welfare and the ability to get them out if something stupid happens. I'm not putting them in there, right? And you guys, if you care about your building, you need to do it differently so that I can either do that or you don't need me to go do that, right? And so that's an interesting part of it. The 170 foot or 100, 200 feet, right? The people that don't believe in it or the people that ignore it are people that have never been around somebody that died because of it. That's simple math or simple, simple history, I guess maybe is a better way to say that, right? So they don't practice how much air and effort it takes to get lines into positions in the building. And even if that that 170 feet or 200 feet, that's like a straight shot into the building, gives you enough time and then to do any amount of work on the inside, and then to be able to leave, right? That that it is very simple to actually exercise that and demonstrate the need to be able to do that, but they don't see it, understand it, or believe it. And they're gonna employ these again residential tactics in a commercial building, and and then they're gonna act surprised when it gets them in trouble afterwards, right? So I yeah, I I I realize you you told me the stove's hot, but I how do I know until I touch it? And so that's a that's a very, very challenging issue that the fire service has that I don't see many other industries actually having. We are we we are unique with that, right? And and and uh we have this mindset, we have to be able to solve anything in an incredibly short period of time, and we're really not interested in doing anything better or doing anything different. And that's a recipe for disaster, in my opinion.

Capability Limits And Code Gaps

SPEAKER_02 55:58

Chris, what what do you so what would be your response or answer about I I would say most organizations, if if if the first engine pulled up and it's ethyl methyl ethyl bad stuff coming from a tanker, and they do not have capability of hazmat on that unit, they they're gonna get as far away from it as they can, right? And I I compare this, it's the same thing, right? That that smoke inside this build a big building, if it gets on you or in you, it's gonna kill you in a period of time. You know, no different than jumping in the in the river that's flooded and ripping without a life jacket or any equipment or you know, whatever, right? I think it's the exact same thing, except for it's fire, right? So it's like, oh no, we're the fire department, so we have to we have to do this because they called us and they call us to solve every problem. And it's like we we do not have the capability of solving, and we're really not set up for so many of these large commercial building fires and and it and or industrial setting fires. Or again, a big topic. I just saw this week, I think I sent it to you guys. The fire department arrives to a fire on a shipboard in this in Washington and and decides, oh no, we're we're the fire department, and this is what we're gonna do. Even though experts were like, don't do that, it you're it ain't gonna work. Just shut it up and let it burn itself out from the people who know. And you know, let's open the door and let's put it out because that's we have to take action. We're the fire department. We're we we they called us. We have to, they're counting on all eyes on us, and it's like we are not set up for that. And I I remember Chief Brunicini being one of them and a bunch of other chiefs that have been around a long time saying the American Fire Service was built really around residential and and and much smaller buildings on fire, not 1.2, 3, 4, 2 million square foot buildings. But I think the interesting thing is some of the code is they most all of those buildings do have a sprinkler system in them, right? Like that and they and they do that for a reason because they know that we're we don't have the capability to do something and solve that problem. Because the 1.2 or 3 or 4 or 2 million square foot building, the sprinkler system's in there to save the building. It's not in there for life safety, unlike the sprinkler system that's in a residential setting, is in there for just life safety to give people enough time to get out. And then the fire department can, you know, work to solve the problem. But I just think it's interesting how we the same kind of things, but we we take a different approach because it's on fire or or even was on fire. When the truth is, anybody who's been to a big box fire is like after about 10 minutes of that, yeah, this is I'm done with that.

SPEAKER_00 58:51

Yeah, there's a there's an interesting perspective like you you're pointing out is is we we we we have this inability to associate other hazards and threats that we are very clear and comfortable managing, but we're not gonna do it this time because we have to act. There's nobody else. Like I can't I can't call somebody else to come help this. So we have feel like we have to, even though no sane person outside of their industry would recommend us doing that action. And then, and it also demonstrates an interesting disconnect between the operational expectations and the the prevention code part of it, right? And the code guys think that they're doing things that are going to help the operations guides, and then the operations guys uh are wondering why the hell are the code guys and the prevention guys doing these things? It doesn't make any sense, and yet we don't get together to to kind of solve that and figure that out in in a lot of ways. And that's that's a huge problem, right? I I I yeah we we we dealt with that in in my career, certainly with a lot of things that they're trying to put in the city of Phoenix. And when we did have that conversation, we tended to improve. When their understanding and our understanding got better and we had more of a mutual perspective, we did actually make effective changes to what not only what we were going to do, but how the building was gonna support us, considering to be able to do that. And so fire departments need to kind of start to figure out fire chiefs and the and the and the leaderships of fire departments need to start figuring out is all right, what is our actual role at these buildings? I it's I uh if I remember right, I think in in, and it may not be there now, but way back when in the IFSTA book, a successful outcome at a building with a fire was the fire was confined to the building of origin. Right? We looked at that as a success. And so if they're gonna keep throwing up these challenges and and making it that much more difficult and dangerous for us to do the work, then we may end up taking that perspective. I'm gonna feel good if I keep it to this building, right? And we're regardless of what's going on. Yeah, last thing I want to say is the the the conversation here, and none of the three of us are saying that, well, things are just getting hard, so look good, we'll throw our dresses over our head and run away. No, that ain't that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about, all right, we need to solve things. It can't be solved necessarily at the operational level. I can't change gravity, physics, chemistry, and the uh and then human physiology because I showed up on this incident. I need to work on the things that can improve my ability to operate there before I get there so that when I show up, I have a better plan and that my my my capabilities better match the problem. And so we're not we're not afraid of what's going on. We need to just do it differently.

Two Lines Truth And Closing

SPEAKER_01 1:01:47

Well, you guys ready for a timeless tactical truth? Timeless tactical truth from Alan Brumissini. And the book is available at b shift.com for 10 bucks. In most offensive situations, if two hose lines don't put out the fire in that spot, 10 more probably won't either. Kind of goes to Chris's comment about just doing the same thing harder, right? Like that's that's so the the IAP sometimes, and the chief here is telling us you know, if if a couple hose lines aren't good enough, 10 hose lines aren't going to be good enough. I I I was up in Michigan with him once, and he said, we could push this building into Lake Michigan, and it probably wouldn't go out. So where where do we draw the line?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:42

It's part of size up and evaluation. And then that has to be you have to have some knowledge about capability and capacity and what's working and what isn't, right? So the the one the the the scenario that pops in my head when when we read that tactical truth is the the Home Depot fire in San Jose, right? And they're you know, the we've got helmet camp video from two of the the uh of the first three arriving companies inside that front door at Home Depot with the with the lumber section just going to town right in front of them. And they've got two two two and a halves and an inch and three quarter flowing in there, and there's the water's evaporating before it gets anywhere near the fire, and nothing is improving. They could have brought five more two and a half in there, and it was gonna look exactly the same way it was gonna result. And the the time it would have taken to do that, the building was already failing, it burns through the roof. So there's all these things happening simultaneously that it's not just getting more line water in there as the only problem, but it's not oftentimes a problem that's gonna a solution. So right before Bruno passed away, and I don't remember exactly who it was, they asked him to evaluate the report for the the fire that killed Scott Dean in San Antonio. And and so, you know, I'm reading through this, right? Just just a couple years ago, because we're going through his stuff. And one of the most important quotes that I pulled out of that report was is these fires, no matter how big or or or or competent the fire department is, these fires outperform us almost every single time. Our ability to go in and can convert deadly defensive conditions into survivable offensive conditions simply doesn't exist. We don't have the capability and power to actually do that, right? So we need to know and understand when we're presented with that and make our decisions based on that. And that quote was important enough that we we we the the committee agreed to put that quote in NFPA 1700 when we're talking about warehouses and and large space buildings, right? And so that was a that's a that's an important thing that I have going on in my head when you when you read that tactical truth.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:09

The only thing I got on it is that that a key part of that is in a geographic area, right? So it's far too often when people uh they hear what they want to hear. So I just want to clarify that no, if you got fire on three floors in six different apartments, then yeah, you might have seven or eight handlines in place, right? Because it's the geographic area part of that, right? So engine one and engine two got two two and a halves operating. When they call and say, hey, we're not making progress on this, and we need another hand line. That's that trigger of like like we're not making progress here. It's not engine one priority traffic. We got fire on the first floor extending to the second, and engine one and engine two already are on the first floor, and you need now you need a line to get to the second, right? That that's not what we're that's not what we were talking about here, right? It was you know, two hand lines in any one geographic area. And I think to clarify two hand lines based off of making decisions of yeah, I'm at I'm I'm at the Home Depot and we stretched two and a half because there was a big fire in a big building in a big open space, right? So yeah, choosing the appropriate hand line for that. Like I I mean I get it. If you pull the if you if you choose to pull the if you choose to pull the two red lines into that, well, we know what that looks like. Also, right? Like, yeah, that that that's same outcome.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:40

Well, gents, thanks for the uh Great conversation today. I appreciate it. And we want to thank everyone for listening to the B Shifter Podcast. Make sure to tell your friends share it and subscribe. And we'll talk to you next week on the B Shifter Podcast.