The last statistic I remember hearing is that 95 percent of our fires are handled with one line or less (you can use your imagination regarding the “or less”-handheld extinguisher, bucket of water, or whatever). Under those circumstances, tank water is probably sufficient. However, the other five percent of fires will require more than one line and, hence, more water.
Our policy is that “every engine shall ensure its own continuous water supply.” If the officer believes he can handle the fire on tank water, he need not lay in from a hydrant. If, after sizing up initial fire conditions, the engine officer believes the fire may require more than the tank, that engine must lay its own line or have another engine lay in. Inner-city engine officers, whose stations’ locations are based on the assumption of how far a horse could run, and which usually are a mile or so away from another station, can afford to have another engine lay in. Those newer stations located farther apart find themselves providing more water for their engines because of the distance from which other units are responding. Either way, to run out of water before they run out of fire is a very big error that could have very severe consequences. We pay them good money to make good decisions; almost 100 percent of the time, they make the right decision concerning their water supply.
-John “Skip” Coleman, deputy chief of fire prevention, Toledo (OH) Department of Fire and Rescue, is the author of Incident Management for the Street-Smart Fire Officer (Fire Engineering, 1997) and Managing Major Fires (Fire Engineering, 2000). He is an editorial advisory board member of Fire Engineering and a member of the FDIC Educational Advisory Board.
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