In this week’s True Grit Nugget, instructor Marc Jonez breaks down the importance of the secondary search, making sure every area is thoroughly checked, everything is accounted for, and nothing is missed. This training took place at the Colorado State Fire Fighters Association 2026 Fire College in Aurora, Colorado.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:

  Fair and honest. A burn building is not the same as a real house, as far as just junk everywhere. Yeah. So your primary, when there’s zero visibility or limited visibility, is what it is, right? So what we really care about more than anything is that secondary. I wanna have that gut feeling when I go through there, I’m like, “I searched everywhere, and I, I feel good.”

You’re gonna be more methodical with it. So especially things we’re gonna miss, like even that bunk bed. There’s a good chance people miss that bunk bed. The cheaper, aluminum ones, a lot of times you can just tip those like you’d tip a crib. Yeah. Remember when we do this, we’re, we’re not sifting through it.

We’re not patting, right? We’re gathering everything as we can, and then we’re sifting for weight. Because we’re gonna be deceived by padding. We can have some, a full-grown adult, a big boy in a bed, and just padding this, we can, we can lose that next area. So methodically, like you said, get up there, clear it.

When you can’t see, like, truly first primary, remember any time we come to a bed, especially when we know it’s a twin-sized bed, we’re gonna search out, gather in. And I’m searching up, right, to make sure I feel if it’s a bunk bed or not. And you should know by other key things in the room whether that’s a kid’s bed or not.

Do I assume a bunk bed if there’s a king-sized bed in there? Mm-mm. Probably not. If I see little kids’ toys in there, these are the little things that should start be firing off in your heads and start thinking about like, “Well, what is this room meant for, what’s it for?”

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