In part 3 of the fire truck tower ladder training video series, “Training To Perform Under Pressure” instructor, Steve Ripley, A.K.A. “Rip”, instructs firefighters how to navigate hazards when on the fireground.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:

 Let’s talk about the tower. Alright. It’s a beast of a truck. Aluminum ladder. Big bucket. Nice working area. Alright, so we’ll work off this today.

So we talk about that, look at that big Volkswagen on the front. How is that gonna be? Snake through trees and things. We are not gonna snake that one through very well.

Right. So you gotta understand what you’re willing to give up. So if we are going through there and we’re trying to get through the trees and stuff to get over to a house, things like that, can we push through limbs?

Yeah, we can push through limbs. How big are you willing to give up? For me, usually somewhere about an inch limb.

I’ll kind of slide through there. Okay. We also, I can bring up a, uh, small chainsaw. We have a vent saw, and then usually I have a, uh, chainsaw. That we can bring up with us. If I need to cut through, I will cut trees down if we have to. Doesn’t matter to me. I didn’t plant ’em. We had a, uh, nursing home fire.

Well, the first due truck we get there, they said, we can’t set because of these trees. They had a tree there about this big around. We can take care of that. That’s why they gave us saws. Okay, lay it down. Now we’ve got a whole run of the Charlie side. Okay. We were actually able to get up there, set our um, platform right out to the, uh, Charlie side windows for there, and we were able to, um, actually hand him the second line in through the window.

So, overcome what your obstacles are. Can we move things? Can we move cars? If somebody’s out there, ask them. If that’s your, if that’s your obstacle, knowing your outriggers. Okay. If we look here, they have an outrigger here, and where’s their other ones? They go straight down. So both these are easy. I have an H style jack, so both of my outriggers come out on my straight stick.

Okay. I can fit a small car in between there. Okay. So understanding your rigs. I try to keep my bucket as inside of as clean as we can. I want as few tools as it that I can necessarily have up there. ’cause I want a working space for us to work in.