In part two of this vertical ventilation series, Instructor Mo Hein of Lafayette Fire goes over proper PPE and hazard preventing safety rules when ventilating with a saw, at the 2026 Weld County Women’s Skills Day at Aims Community College in Windsor, CO.
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VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:
Really important, uh, structure glove, eye pro, ear protection, you know, our full gear. Obviously, if you’re going up on a fire, you’re gonna be wearing your pack, you’re gonna be on air. As far as chainsaw goes, first off, making sure the chain is on the correct direction. That can be a hazard to us, uh, when we go to cut, it might kick back on us.
The nice thing is is there is a safety brake here, so when you do that, it’s meant to, like, hit your hand and shut the chain, like, down. Making sure our chain is on, making sure it’s tight, meaning it’s not sagging, uh, ’cause that can also lead to kickback. Be careful of your dogs here. They’re very sharp.
These are more for digging into a tree, um, for balancing and, like, maneuvering. We don’t really use it on the roof, but they are there, so just be mindful of those. Uh, again, chain brake. Anytime you’re not running the saw that’s just sitting here on the ground, leave that chain brake on. To take it off to run the saw, you just pull it back towards you.
To turn it on, you just move your wrist forward. So if it’s just sitting here, chain brake is on. You’re always gonna start your saw down on the ground before you go up. Again, another good safety rule. One, making sure it’s running before we even get up there into the unsafe conditions, and then two, it’s easier to start it on the ground than trying to do it on the roof, right?
So full throttle. These chainsaws, they’re two stroke. The motor itself wants to run full throttle at all times or nothing. But also when we’re cutting, going back to kickback, if you’re not full throttle, you’re putting yourself at, in an unsafe situation again where it could kick back because it doesn’t have that RPM that it needs to cut smoothly.
Sharp chains. We want them sharp. They will cut smoother, safer. If you don’t have a sharp chain, again, you’re risking that kickback and unsafe conditions. Lastly, this is structure fire. We don’t wear chaps. People have this misunderstanding that just ’cause we’re wearing this gear we’re safe. Not at all. If you’ve seen how chaps work, they’re threaded with a bunch of threads inside them, and when this saw goes through the chap, it grabs all that thread and binds it up so the saw stops.
We don’t have that built into our structure gear. You cut your leg, you’re cutting through your gear. So be very careful, you know, very mindful. Where is the tip of my saw? Where am I moving the saw? Especially those around you, right?