Faced with a rescue operation, the most important decision is whether to launch an offensive or a defensive operation. This report presents a quantified model as a guide for the Incident Commander to determine the most suitable fire-fighting tactics in advance for given conditions at specific objects.
The model presented proves that it is possible to introduce risk management procedures and fire safety engineering models into fire-fighting tactics. If the model and its different sub-models are improved and scientifically validated, fire brigades will gain a powerful tool for predicting their capacity.
The model consists of two parts. The first is the evaluation of the consequences of the fire, where the determination of the rate of heat release plays a central role, together with damage evaluation. The second is the determination of the extinction capacity of the fire brigade, or the rate of heat absorption. If the determined heat absorption is greater than the heat release, it is possible to launch an offensive operation. Otherwise, an offensive operation will fail to reach its aim, and a defensive approach is to be preferred, i.e. to direct all efforts into containing the fire within its boundaries. The concept is similar whether used before the fire, in a pre-planning situation, during the fire to analyse the situation, or after the fire for tactical evaluation.
This planning of intervention is part of the risk management process. During planning, some scenarios might show that an intervention is insufficient to reduce the consequences below the acceptance level. These cases should instead be managed by fire prevention measures.
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I hope you will find it useful. I´ll be back in a few days.
Regards
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