~Since the days of the cave men and possibly before, fire has been man's friend and he has put it to use, heating his home, cooking his food, making light to see with, to run our cars, trains, ships, airplanes and generate electricty. But fire is also our enemy when turned loose by our mistakes and carelessness. To learn why and how fires start and burn will help us prevent them.~

~Heat is transfered from one material to another in three ways: Conduction, Radiation, and Convection. I will relate to each one separately.~

~CONDUCTION is when heat is transfered by direct contact with a fuel such as a hot metal stove pipe in contact with a wall, clothes falling aginst a heater or more simple the handle of a pan on the stove getting hot from it's contents being cooked.~

~In the case of the hot stove pipe or clothes against the heater, their repeated contact with the source of heat will raise the combustible material to it's ignition temperaure and it will ignite into combustion.~

~CONVECTION is when heat is transfered by circulation most often as a gas or liquid, such as a hot air or hot water heat circulation to heat your home by means of a furnace or heater. This is the most common means of fire spread in buildings, the heated fire gases being lighter than air raise to the ceiling and travel from room to room, floor to floor, raising outher combustibles to their ignition temprature and they in turn ignite into separate fires. An example of this is: a fire starts in the livingroom downstairs, the heated gases (smoke) rise up the stairs and ignite the curtins and drapes which drop on the beds and floors and start fires in each room in the house.~

~RADIATION is when the heat is transfered by rays or waves of heat thru the air space between two objects, such as getting a sunburn when laying on the beach or heat radiated from a fireplace or stovepipe igniting the nearby wall as it reaches it's ignition temperature. Thus if the fire is great enought the radiation can cause a nearby building or even one accross the street to "explode" into flames without the flames from the original fire touching them.~

~I should also point out to you what IGNITION TEMPERATURE is: Every fuel, be it liquid, gas or solid has a point where it will ignite into flame and keep burning without a heat source, that minimum temperature is it's ignition temperature.~

~Early man discovered he could start a fire to keep himself warm and cook his food by rubbing two sticks of wood togather or hitting the right kinds of rocks togather, thus we had fire by accident, today we are having accidents and starting destructible fires that are taking our lives, homes and possessions. If we learn how and why fires start and burn we can prevent this loss,~

It can't happen to you? It can and it does, in my many years in the fire service, I have seen countless victims of what fire and carbon monoxide can do, and let me tell you it's not pretty, especially yound children huddled in the corner, hiding under the bed or in a closet, or worse laying peacefully in their beds. All because they did not have a smoke detector in the home or a good battery in it, have the bedroom door closed or have a firedrill plan.~

~Fatal fires usually occur when the family is asleep. While sleeping, people are less likely to notice the smells and sounds of fire. Bedrooms some distance away from the fire can become death traps in two minutes or less. A smoke detector in your home could give you that needed two minutes to save your families lives.~

~Do you still recall the Polio scare of the early fifties? The sight of crippled children so overwhelmed the American public that thousands dug into their pockets for money to support research and control programs to attack the monster. And because of this public attentention and active concern, Polio has been almost eradicated.~

~Now let me tell you something that may shock you. In the peak year of 1951, polio killed only one-third as many people as died in fires that year, And did you hear anything of an aroused puplic clamoring for someone to put out those fires. I didn't.~

~Fire burns, and maims, and kills, and costs. Fires take the lives of nearly 12,000 Americans each year. It injures 300,000 others, and destroys property worth more than $3 billion.~

~We live in the richest and most advanced country in the world. Yet we lead all the major industrialized nations in per capitia deaths and property loss from fire by far. Our deaths per million population rate is nearly three times that of second ranking Canada.~

~What's the reason for this miserable showing ? There are several-but most come under the catogory of ignorance or indifference. There is an old saying in the fire protection field, to the effect that fires have three causes: Men, Women and Children. It takes the careless or unwise action of a human being, in most cases, to start a destructive fire,~

~In their home envioronment, Americans live their daily lives amid flammable materials close to potential sources of ignition. Though Americans are aroused to issues of safty in consumer products, fire safty is not one of their prime concerns. Few private homes have fire extinguishers, much less smoke detectors. Homeowners do you know it is required by law that you furnish and up-keep smoke detectors in your rental houses?. And often when fire strikes, ignorance of what to do leads to panic behavior and aggravation of the hazards, rather than to successful escape. Look at your newspaper, it happens everyday, but it's always to someone elses family, not yours. BUT you could be next.~`

~In the next twenty minutes there will be approximately 100 destructive fires thruout the United States. These will cause roughly $1000,000 in property damage. A dozen persons will be injured, some of them crippled or disfigured for life. Within 44 minutes, on the average, another human being will be killed by fire.~

~The total annual bill including medical care, fire protection and insurance is closer to $11 billion.~

~The cost in pain and suffering is no less staggering. Fires favorite victims are the very young, the old and the poor. The death rate among children under five and persons over retirement age is more than twice that of the population as a whole.~

~About 40% of all indoor fires are caused by faulty heating, cooking and electrical equipment. Twenty-three percent are caused by careless smoking or by children playing with matches. Open flame and sparks account for another 9% and nearly an equal number are deliberately set.~

~Of the thousands who die annually in burning buildings, nine out of ten die at home. It may be a small child who tried to hide from fire in a closet or under a bed. It may be an adult who panicked and was later found a few feet from an obvious avenue of escape. It may be an entire family overcome in their sleep by smoke and toxic fumes.~

~It can really be summarised in two words: APATHY and IGNORANCE.~

~I heard the dispatch call of a car fire over the radio. I was out making Fire Prevention Inspections of commercial buildings and was near the location of the fire so I responded.~

~The fire truck and I arrived on the scene at the same time, the Wshington State Patrol was already there. The small convertible sports car was turned on it's top, a power transformer had been knocked off the power pole when the car hit the pole, it had landed on the bottom of the overturned car, broken open and it's hot oil spilled over the car and ignited, There could not be anybody alive in there.~

~The State Trooper came over to me and asked, "Will you have your men get a ladder and get the body down"?. "Down", I asked, "What body"? and he pointed up the powerpole. A young man was hanging up there.~

~The firefighters raised the ladder and went up and brought the body down after the Trooper took photo's. When his car hit the pole he was thrown out and impailed on the foot rung used by the linemen to climb the pole. He was deceased and had blood comming from his ears,nose and mouth.~

~The young man was only 24 years old, he was a hit and run suspect and had tried to out run the State Trooper. This was his last race.~

~The aid-call was for an attempted suicide, Jim and I responded in the aid-car, a police officer had also been dispatched. We all arrived at the same time and found the front door locked. The caller had said the lady inside had told her on the phone she was going to kill herself. The police officer kicked in the front door after no response to his knock and we went inside.~

~We called out and there was no response, she was not in the livingroom, the police officer went to check the kitchen and rear porch, Jim went to check the attached garage and I went to her bedroom. I called out," here in the bedroom". My God what a mess, it lookes like a slaughter house, there was wall to wall blood, where was it all comming from? The lady was laying in the bed covered by blankets, her eyes staring at the ceiling. I pulled back the covers to see where the blood was comming from, at the same time Jim bent over to feel for a paulse on her neck.~

~She lunged up at us, a large french butcher knife in her right hand, I have never heard such a scream come out of anyone, it was like a scene out of a horror movie. Jim and I grabbed her arms at the same time, but we could not hold her down or keep the knife from comming at us. The police officer came in and it took the three of us to get the knife away from her, she had to be handcuffed above her elbows as she had very deep cuts down both wrists.~

~An amblance was called by the officer while Jim and I tried to stop the bleeding. About this time the ladies husband arrived, he said his wife had called him at his apartment where he had been staying since his separation, she had said she was going to kill herself if he did not move back home. He said he had heard that many times befor when she was drinking and depressed and told her he was not comming back and to go ahead and do it. he changed his mind after he hang up the phone and drove over to see if he could reason with her and get her to seek medical help for her problems.~

~She was transported to a nearby hospital for emergency treatment of her cuts and then transfered to and committed for psyciatric care. She did live but came very close to death and taking Jim and I along with her.~

~The aid-call was for, "suicide-gunshot wound", John and I responded in the aid-car. The caller had said the man had called her and said he could not stand the pain of his headachs any longer and was going to shoot himself, she heard a loud explosion like noise and he would not answer her, she could not call out on her phone so she ran to a neighbors to call the fire department.(Today I wonder why she didn't call the police)~

~The man would not have anymore headaches because he had put a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger, his head was just about compleatly gone. This was a case fore the police and the coronor not us, we filled out our reports and waited for their arrival and drove back to the station very slowly, we were in no hurry to eat lunch.~

~You may have heard a story like this one several times but Harold and I seen it's results. The call for aid was, "burn victim", as we arrived in front of the old house in the aid-car we could see the windows were blown out, a crowd of onlookers were standing on the front lawn and in the doorway, someone said, "what caused the explosion?". We would soon find out.~

~The elderly man was laying against the far wall in the kitchen, an overturned wooden chair lay on the floor near the open oven in the gas kitchen range. There was a strong odor of natural gas thruout the house. Herold went over to aid the man while I went to locate the source of the gas odor.~

~The gas was turned on high on all of the stove burners and the oven. It was a very old stove and did not have a thermo cut out for the pilot light which was out. I had found the source of the gas, but what had been the sorce of ignition?~


~He said he had been very lonely since his wife's death and decided to end his life to be with her. He blew out the pilot light and turned on all the gas on the range and oven, placed a chair in front of the oven and his head inside the oven, it was taking so long to die so he decided to have a last cigarette.~

~It was his last cigarette, for he died several days later, had he not lit the cigarette he would still be sitting there waiting for death that would not come.~

~I had seen a lot of auto accidents and treated the injuries or covered the dead with blankets, but I had never seen one like this. It was a car-truck accident and the car was no match for the truck.~

~The semi-truck had stopped for the stoplight but the driver of the car must not seen it or anything else. He had driven right under the rear of the truck trailer and knocked the rear wheels from under the truck. The car now looked like it was a convertible. We could not get in to the driver or passengers it there were any, untill the truck trailer was raised and the car pulled out from beneath of it. It was bad enought waiting to see if the people in the car still needed aid, let alone to have to listen to the comments of the by-standers, "Why are you just standing there, why don't you people do something?" and, "Cool man, did you see the way that cat pushed that truck?"~

~After the car was pulled back, we could see that there was only one person in the car, or rather only part of one person. His head was gone and he would not require first aid. He was covered with a blanket and the State Patrol started moving the growing group of bystanders back. We looked and looked inside and outside the car for the head but it could not be found. The nearest thing to it was hair, bone and flesh scattered thruout the inside of the car. The man still had his seatbelt on but it couldn't help him. It was not known if the man was not looking for he had not slowed down before impact.~

~I was only a few blocks away from the address when the rescue call came in. I notified dispatch I was arriving on scene. Several children and an adult standing in the street crying and looking up a tree.~

~The 13 year old girl was about 60 feet up the madrona tree , was afraid to come down and in danger of falling and could not wait rescue. The adult was the girl's father, he said she had been chased up the tree by a group of boys to get away from them. She had been "frozen" up there for about 40 minutes while he tried to talk her down, she was crying and scared.~

~I could see that a ladder would not be able to reach the girl through the branches and the girl would soon fall so I decided to go up after her, dress uniform and all. Unbeknown to me a reporter and camraman from the Seattle Times Newspaper heard the call on their scanner and was below taking pictures for his story.~

~I climbed untill I reached her feet and told her I was going to help her down, "NO" she said, "I'm too scared". After several minutes I got her to agree to let me take her feet one at a time down the branches untill we were about half way down and she lost her nerve and scrambled back up the tree, well I was there so up I went again, in about 15 minutes I had her safely to the ground.~

~I was interviewed by the reporter and learned a lesson, don't ever say anything you don't want used in the news. I was quoted in the newspaper as follows: "I would not have taken the same risks for a cat. Cats come down when they get hungery. Have you ever seen the skeleton of a cat in a tree?" The news artical was captioned, "Fire Marshal Goes 60 Feet To Rescue".~

~The call was for "suicide, hanging", It wasn't long before we reached the house, but would we be on time? The front door was unlocked and we went in. The elderly man was found hanging from a rope attached to the roof rafters in the attached garage, a kitchen chair lay tipped over under his still twitching feet. I held the man by his legs while John cut the rope.~

~The mans hands were blue, his face was swollen, there was no heartbeat or breathing. John began closed chest heart message while I started him on the resuscitator with 100% oxygen, a police officer arrived and I asked him to call a ambulance.~

~The old man started breathing by himself and he had a slow but good heartbeat, he never did regain conciousness and was transported to the hospital where he lived, if you can call it that the rest of his days. He was in a coma from brain damage due to no oxygen to the brain we were told. Should we have tried to bring him back? Was he already past the point of no return and we had brought him back to this? The law requires we do everything possible.~

~We ask ourselves these same questions day after day, before, during and after each call.~

~Back befor chest compressions were part of CPR (a very long time ago) we used a resuscitator to force oxygen in and out of the lungs untill the victim was pronounced dead by the doctor on the scene or at the hospital. I can remember the first time I seen it applied.~

~We had several local doctors that would take turns responding to heart attact calls. This day the victim was 83 years old, she was not breathing and her heart was not beating. We used the resitator on her untill the doctor arrived a few minutes later. He did something we had not seen before and I don't think I would ever like to see or hear again (but I have).

~He pulled the lady from the bed to the floor, got on his knees, placed his hands on her chest and began pushing down over her heart area. I'll always remember the sounds that came from the womans chest, snap,crackle, pop as we watched her frail ribs and chest sink in. The woman was dead and the doctor said he had to try to bring her back if it was not too late. He said the lady was so old she had frail and brittle bones. Now everybody is learning CPR. It does save lives if you are there within the critical first 3-4 minutes.~

~A man or woman can only take so much and I was nearing that point, seeing all this death, pain and suffering day after day. WHY?, why does it have to happen, why? Is this all there is to life, death, pain and suffering? The old middle aged and the children. My God, why the little children?~

~The call, "two gunshot victims", Jim and I responded in the aid car, it was not to far away but would we be on time? It had been a family fight, the father shot the mother and also hit the 18 month old baby girl she was holding. He was gone when we arrived, the police were right behind us.~

~The young woman was sitting on a chair, the baby in her arms. Bloody foam was bubbling out of her breast. It was apparent the baby was dead, I had never seen such a pale bled out color. Jim ran to the kitchen to find some plastic wrap to get a seal over the sucking chest wound on the lady. I tried to take the baby from the mother but she would not let go of her. I told her I would help the baby as Jim held her and I pulled the baby from her arms.~

~The baby was wearing a red cotton nightgown and red diapers, red from all her blood. There was no breathing or paulse, I knew the baby was dead but I was going to save her. I began giving mouth to mouth resitation and closed chest heart massage, I could feel the blood squish through my fingers. I heard the woman tell Jim, "he only shot once". Once? they are both shot, I lifted the baby's nightgown and seen a small hole in the center of her chest, I turned her over and seen the large exit wound in her back, I put my hand in it to cover it. This was not happening I told myself, and continued CPR. I was going to bring her back!~

~Someone said,"you can't bring her back". but I would not listen, I WAS going to save her. Someone tried to take her away from me, but I would not let go or stop CPR. I rode to the hospital with her, still giving CPR they said. I had reached that point, I could take no more.........~

~Dedicated to all the Police Officers, Firefighters, EMTs, Paramedics,Emergency Flight Crews, Emergency Physicians, and Emergency Nurses who deal with the tragedies of life and death. The saddest of all, being those that involve children, and COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED.~ Author Unknown

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