Live fire training included classroom work and a series of smaller burns, such as dumpster fires and car fires, at the Bowen Training Center in Elizabethtown on Saturday, March 12.  Practical exercises continued in Glendale Sunday, March 13, where students confronted a series of burns in an abandoned house.

Farm Rescue & ATV Rescue

Farm Rescue Training presented various scenarios in which victims - portrayed by mannequins in some instances and by people in others - required rescue from entrapments and care for life-threatening injuries after disastrous encounters with farm equipment.  The ATV Rescue class also created realistic settings in which students had to follow through with rescue efforts.  Farm Rescue and ATV Rescue scenarios are often based on events that have actually taken place in Kentucky in recent years.

Firefighter Survival & Rescue

The Denver Drill was part of a two-day, sixteen-hour class called Firefighter Survival & Rescue that was conducted at Dixie Fire School the weekend of March 11, 2005. 

The scenario has a firefighter down in a closet-sized space below a window.  This victim is wearing full turnout gear, and his head is positioned against the wall below the window.  Two firefighters must enter the area to rescue the victim.  Firefighter One checks for solid flooring from outside the window with a Halligan tool.  Discarding the tool outside, the firefighter moves through the window head first and crawls over the victim to the victim’s feet.  Firefighter One then turns to face the victim, takes hold of the victim’s SCBA shoulder straps, and pulls the victim up into a seated position.  Firefighter Two also enters the window head first and sits under the window with his back to the wall after adjusting his air tank to one side.  Firefighter Two bends his knees to create a ramp.  Firefighter One lifts the victim onto the knees of Firefighter Two, and then lifts the victim’s legs as Firefighter Two pushes upward so that rescuers outside the window can grasp the victim and assist in sliding him up and out on the ‘ramp’ of the Firefighter Two’s legs.  The catapult method differs slightly, in that the victim is passed through the window face-down, while Firefighter Two lies on his back with his feet on the victim’s chest and ‘walks’ the victim out the window to waiting rescuers.

The Denver Drill is based on the 1992 death of Engineer Mark Langvardt of the Denver Fire Department in Colorado.  While working a commercial structure fire, Langvardt reportedly became separated from his crew when a floor collapsed, trapping him in a small storage room on the second floor.  The room measured approximately six by eleven feet, but cabinets and equipment along the walls reduced the room to an aisle only twenty-eight inches wide.  At the end of the aisle was an exterior window with a drop of 42 inches from sill to floor.  Firefighters entering through the window had to crawl over Langvardt, who lay face down with his head against the wall below the window.  There was only room for one rescuer to attempt lifting the victim to the windowsill and this, after multiple efforts, proved impossible.  Firefighters recovered Langvardt nearly an hour later after breaching a wall to remove him, but the rescue came too late to save Langvardt’s life.  The Denver Drill was designed in response to this tragedy and is taught in fire schools throughout the United States.

Another Survival & Rescue technique based on a real event is the Nance Drill, named for John Nance of the Columbus Fire Department in Ohio.  Nance was trapped in the basement of a commercial building after the floor collapsed under him.  He died despite rescue attempts, and new rescue techniques were designed to simulate recovering a firefighter who has fallen through the floor and must be rescued from above.

State Fire & Rescue Training instructors demonstrated this drill by lowering one rescuer down to the victim.  This rescuer assessed the victim and surroundings before calling for the four firefighters above to lower two ropes.  The rescuer prepared a bow-shaped knot called a handcuff hitch in each rope and slipped the "handcuffs", one set at a time, around the victim’s arms between the elbows and wrists.  Each rope was held by two of the firefighters who waited above.  When the ropes were tightened, the rescuer stepped back and called up to his companions.  “Lift!”  The firefighters pulled their victim up through the opening in the floor.

The Firefighter Incentive Program states that the Firefighter Survival & Rescue class is a requirement for all new firefighters, both paid and volunteer.  Participants earn sixteen hours in the category of Safety Training.