Accountability, is it working?
By Lt. David Polikoff
Ok am I the only one that thinks the accountability system that most departments use (including mine) is inadequate? I am talking about the tag system. Sure it will tell the incident commander who is on the apparatus, but has there ever been a tag left on the apparatus accidentally from another shift or from a volunteer that has left the station? What if the evacuation tone sounds and you give a head check and you say you have 3 and the tags on the engine reads 4 now what do we do? Firefighters might be sent in on a search and rescue mission looking for no one! now how accurate is the accountability system? I feel that there has to be a better way for incident commanders to keep track of firefighters on the fireground. It can't stop there, more importantly incident commanders need to know where every firefighter inside the fire building is. It is the latter that makes most accountability system inadequate. I know what you are thinking "David all our firefighters are professionals and they all go where the policy dictates them to go" yeah and if you believe that your accountability system is not your only problem! Sometimes crews on the fireground end up in a different location then they were supposed to be. It happens whether it is by mistake, orders were not clear, or freelancing.
What is the solution? Is anybody working on a solution? When I asked the Chief my department I was told "well you are right we need to look into our accountability system, but right now we have other projects that needs our attention" I asked "what other projects"? I was told "well the 800mhz radio system, we also need to find another uniform vender because we fired our current one". Maybe I am the only one that feels firefighters come first! I feel that I and all other firefighters are more important than a uniform shirt or a radio!
I recently read an article in a fire magazine and one of the topics was the accountability system that your department currently uses. Several chiefs from all the over country were polled. Not one said that they would like to improve their system so they know where every firefighters location in the fire building is, at all times.
Lets think about the firefighters in the past that have died inside a structure. Could we have saved them if we knew their exact location? Could we have saved minuets looking for them? It is hard to say.
It is the 21st century the technology has to be out there. We as firefighters need to look into our resources, look outside the fire service maybe the private industries have the solutions we are looking for, or maybe they can help us find the solution. If the military can see every tank on the battle field from a computer screen miles away, then why can't we do the same for our firefighters.
This article is something for you to think about!