Fire truck question

Daniel Moore

Daniel Moore

Joined
Jul 28, 2003
Messages
2,790
We got a good icing over two nights ago in the northeast and yesterday morning my friend couldn't get his car down his driveway. He has an Explorer with 4WD and cannot get up the driveway, which is fairly steep and has two distinct curves, nor can get down it safely. Even in the best of conditions you can see it's not too fire truck friendly because of its layout, but what would happen if there was a fire at his house and the driveway was under a half-inch of black ice like yesterday?

This got me wondering about emergency vehicle limitations. Are there any laws that go into designing a driveway to make sure it is reasonably accessible to police, fire, and medical vehicles?

Here's his house:

_benhouse.jpg
 
That type of law is usually a local housing code. I'm not sure about limits on driveways but I know there are limits on the architecture of buildings. A few years back I wanted to put an apartment in the third floor of my duplex and found out that I would have to put in a straight staircase rather than one of those curvy staircases in the back of the house. The intent of that code was to create unrestricted access for emergency personnel in case of fire or having to carry people down the stairs.

So I guess you could look in the local codes if you really want to find out.
 
mycroftt said:
That type of law is usually a local housing code. I'm not sure about limits on driveways but I know there are limits on the architecture of buildings. A few years back I wanted to put an apartment in the third floor of my duplex and found out that I would have to put in a straight staircase rather than one of those curvy staircases in the back of the house. The intent of that code was to create unrestricted access for emergency personnel in case of fire or having to carry people down the stairs.

So I guess you could look in the local codes if you really want to find out.
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I am to lazy to retype the same thing. The problem is most of you fire engines and tankers are 2wd and long wheelbase plus they are very heavy. My dept. has a few 6x6 and 4x4 vehicle just for getting to those hard to get places. I have seen all of them get stuck. 2 things that are extremely important, access and water supply. Without both you are screwed. If you have a hydrant that is 3' under snow it wont do any good till its dug out. Time is a defining factor on whether you save the structure or not. The longer it takes us to get there and get set up the more damage you sustain.
 
Not only a fire, but hat about EMS access in that situation? If it's anything life threatening, like and MI, then chances are the patient may not survive due to the fact that EMS can't get there fast enough to make a different. in a non-life threatening situation, there are a number of ways to bypass the driveway. Getting a techinical rescue team to set up a low-angle hauling/lowering setup can get a patient down to the ambo safely, but not necessarily quickly.

As for a structure fire, I'd say the answer in that situation would be to hump everything up the hill avoiding the dangerous driveway, and leave the engine on the road. And hope for plenty of mutual aid.

It isn't the fire department's responsibility to make sure someone's property can be readily accessed in an emergency. If fire/EMS can't get to you because you haven't cleared your driveway or laid down ice melt, then oh well.. In the case of a sudden storm, everyone is screwed regardless. But one should have a plan about getting things taken care of in a timely fashion after the event.

Just my $ .02.
 
hikeeba said:
Not only a fire, but hat about EMS access in that situation? If it's anything life threatening, like and MI, then chances are the patient may not survive due to the fact that EMS can't get there fast enough to make a different. in a non-life threatening situation, there are a number of ways to bypass the driveway. Getting a techinical rescue team to set up a low-angle hauling/lowering setup can get a patient down to the ambo safely, but not necessarily quickly.

As for a structure fire, I'd say the answer in that situation would be to hump everything up the hill avoiding the dangerous driveway, and leave the engine on the road. And hope for plenty of mutual aid.

It isn't the fire department's responsibility to make sure someone's property can be readily accessed in an emergency. If fire/EMS can't get to you because you haven't cleared your driveway or laid down ice melt, then oh well.. In the case of a sudden storm, everyone is screwed regardless. But one should have a plan about getting things taken care of in a timely fashion after the event.

Just my $ .02.
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ems will find a way unless you weigh 300lbs + then it will be a nightmare. As far as humping gear for a structure fire here is some things to think about. If it is very far away 1000' plus or a steep elevation increase then you are going to lose a lot of water pressure due to friction and gravity. This will also lessen our effectiveness. Just some things to ponder. Have a good escape plan and fire insurance.
 
It's been years ago but when I was in the midwest there was an ice storm and several emergency vehicles where trapped or stuck at the bottom of a hill, firetruck, ambulance, police cars due to the results of an ice storm. It couldn't be walked or crawled up either.

They called for a sander truck, which got there, but could not get up either side either. Finally the sand truck backed up the inclines spreading enough abrasive for the other vehicles to finally get out

I supposed they could have called a wrecker, parked at the top and anchored, then send someone down with the tow line. (wouldn't help in your situation)
 
In our town our fire chief has pressured (with the help of the insurance companies) to make sure we have hydrants in most/all new developments and prevented most developers from designing roads like this. The insurance companies go nuts when they see things like this. Telling the owner(s) that they will have to pay exorbanant rates or that they will not be insurable for a fire because the equipment cannot get there or in a timely manner is a sure way to not have problems like this.

Saying that, we have plenty of houses on back and unpaved roads and steep areas and lots of woods so we also have 4x4 vehicles we keep stocked with sand and plows to help remove snow and ice. We also have a brush truck which is a converted 5 ton Army truck that was donated and carries a 500 gallon bladder with a pump.

KR
 
I wouldn't be the least bit suprised if many agencies in the snow belt keep tire chains on hand for particularly bad storms... then again I wouldn't be suprised if they didn't.
 
Buck268 said:
I wouldn't be the least bit suprised if many agencies in the snow belt keep tire chains on hand for particularly bad storms... then again I wouldn't be suprised if they didn't.
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I should also mention that all the tankers and engine tanks have automatic chains. Never saw those before I was a member of the department. Pretty cool.

KR
 
yep, they're called on-spots. Next time you're behind an ambulance or fire truck you'll probably see them hanging down now that they've been mentioned.
 
some also have self sanders they look like extra exhaust pipes right in front and behind the rear wheels. standard issue in minnesota
 
That would be a good argument for a in-house sprinkler system. I have been on some house fires that the inaccesibility along with low hydrant pressure did not allow much to be saved.

We did alot of pre-planning on houses in our district and made the owners aware of obstacles that prevent us from getting to thier house. Judging from that picture that would be a bitch of a forward lay to do.:eek:
 
Needleremorse,

I guess it would depend on local. I used to work for the engineering department of a county government in the Colorado Rockies and we had driveway standards for maximum grade, minimum curve radius, surfacing and turnouts required over a certain length. The standards were driven by emergency access and written to suit the fire district's vehicles. They were written into the roadway specifications.
 
B Finnigan said:
That would be a good argument for a in-house sprinkler system. I have been on some house fires that the inaccesibility along with low hydrant pressure did not allow much to be saved.

Judging from that picture that would be a bitch of a forward lay to do.:eek:
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dont you know it.
 
I work for a city FD. We don't go on driveways. Out in the sticks like that photo well your screwed. If I were building new at that spot I would be fully sprinklerd .

If you could get a pumper up the driveway and only had a one or two roomer you can knock it down easy with the tank. Any more your going to need a water supply within 3 minutes or so of the first line going, which does not seem to likely.
 
How far is the house from the nearest station? On scene time counts for a lot in structure fires. If you're in a rural area with a volunteer dept that has response from pagers, you're house is probably going to burn. More or less the same with pros if they're responding from quite a distance away. Response time and the number of arriving companies is a huge factor much of the time. Placing a home hundreds (sometimes thousands) of feet off the main road just increases the odds of total loss. Our dept. doesn't typically go on private driveways, either. In bad storms, we've actually had plows clear the road for us. I worked the night of the 1998 ice storm that crippled much of Eastern Canada and the U.S. and we just crept along with on-spot chains engaged from one call to the next. Not much more you can do than that.
 
flipe8 is correct, response time is much more likely to burn that house to the ground than is the driveway, although the limited access won't make life easy for whoever responds.

In keeping with the gadget factor though, there are chain systems that can be an added option for fire apparatus. We never ordered them, so my only experience with the chains was when we had a demo truck that a dealer was letting us test. My buddy was driving, and he couldn't figure out what one unlabeled switch was for. Unable to restrain himself, he hit it, and we then hear an ungodly noise from under the truck as the chain system starts flailing the drive pavement.

Also of a gadgety nature is the fact that newer apparatus generally turn better than do older trucks of the same design due to better/different engineering. I worked on a city department, and we had some really tight areas, so looking at the picture and the scale from a hypothetical perspective I think that our engine companies could have made the turns, but our ladders couldn't have.
 
Don't have a fire if you can help it. Have a plan for the unlikely event that you have a fire.

Buy a fire extinguisher or two.
 
No answer about the fire trucks, but it reminds me of a few years back. We lived in a new house that was built at the beginning of an older road that was to be upgraded to a full two lane town road. There was to be about 18 new houses built on this road. There were already a few existing homeowners on this road.

The developer had major site work to do to bring this road up to grade and such, but he was dragging his feet big time. The whole road was torn up, and during the spring thaw ended up looking like a river bed, with huge boulders sticking out and and torrents of water flowing down it. It was so muddy you would get stuck without 4wd.

We finally went to the planning/zoning meetings and complained. They sent the FD down there, and the trucks couldn't get in properly. The town threatened to pull their bond and stop the project if they didn't expedite the site work. Within a month the road was completed and paved.

Also, because there is no town water down there, all the houses were required to have sprinklers, and they had to have a cistern on the road.

BTW, this was some ice storm. My driveway is pretty much flat, and I couldn't even drive my work truck on it without sliding sideways across the driveway. After 3 days, my power finally came back. Fun times...:rolleyes:

Glenn
 
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