Rural Water Movement Operations

BY BILL ADKINS

In the fire service, there is always more than one way to conduct an operation, even in rural water movement. Like many firefighters, training officers, and chiefs, I have insisted on my way of conducting rural water movement operations as the best way for whatever reason. But the more we progress in the fire service, the more things change. The structures get bigger, and the contents burn faster and hotter. So I collaborated with other firefighters, training officers, and chiefs to research these tactics and discover the statistics on hydrant pressures, water flow with or without hydrants, and property preservation using these tactics.

In asking why departments used different water movement strategies and tactics, many replied “We’ve always done it that way” or “It works for us.” But budget constraints made the most sense to me. In the rural areas, budgets are bare minimum; many departments can’t afford all the fancy tools, gadgets, and apparatus. I hope to bring department chiefs and training officers together to strategically plan within their budget and capabilities how they want to conduct water movement.