Dust Off the Smooth Bore Baby!
By Lt. Polikoff
You can call me old fashion if you want ( I am really not that old!) but I still think that the smooth bore nozzle should be on the apparatus. I am not talking about in the compartment, but on an attack line ready to go to battle. I feel that the fog nozzle has been shoved in our face and down our throats for years. Now most people think you can't fight fire with a smooth bore nozzle. Well I am here to tell you otherwise. Years ago the nozzle of choice was the smooth bore nozzle. This nozzle fought many a fire (successfully I might add) then along came the fog and poof, the smooth bore that had done such a great job in the past was now put in the back of the compartment or on the shelf at the station. Think about the kind of fires we are now running, fires in energy efficient houses that have thick insulation and thermal pane windows that can have up to three layers of glass. Fires in these structures are hot. Lets not forget all the plastics and synthetic materials that burn hotter that ordinary combustibles. Do you want to go into a room the is very hot and open up a fog stream? I don't think so! If you are like most firefighters you use a straight stream with the fog! Well why not go with the smooth bore? Are you still using the combination attack The T, Z or O pattern? Lets go back to Firefighter I class where does heat go? UP where is the cooler air? DOWN so why would you disturb the hot thermal layer at the ceiling and bring it down on you? Our job is hard enough lets not make it harder! Think about this you arrive on the scene of a working house fire with heavy smoke showing from side 1. You pull the 200' 1 3/4 with the 7/8 inch tip that is going to give you 160GPM, you advance into the structure you are met with high heat and zero visibility. as you advance down the hall you feel it getting hotter you know you are getting closer to the fire. you see some rollover at the ceiling you open the nozzle and give 2 short bursts of water at the ceiling to control the rollover and to prevent a flashover. as you advance you see the glow of the fire you open the nozzle all the way and you attack the base of the fire at the fuel source. what happens? You achieve a quick knock down with very little steam and what's even better is that the hot thermal layer at the ceiling is not disturbed it slowly cools. "Why was there very little steam?" you ask. well because you used a smooth bore nozzle and it does not break the stream into smaller droplets of water. The smooth bore nozzle has a core of water that punches to the heart of the fire and cools the fuel rapidly if the stream does break apart the droplets are larger and do not vaporize as rapidly thus no large amounts of steam that can burn you. now you want to relieve some of the heat in the room open the nozzle and sweep it about 4 feet off the floor if you hit a window it will break. Now you want to vent with the nozzle open the nozzle 1/2 way and you will produce a wide V shaped stream aim it out an open window this will do the job. Where I work we have fog nozzles but they are all break away nozzles I carry a 7/8 inch tip in my coat pocket and this is what I have the nozzle man use to fight fire. If Large city departments still use the smooth bore and trust it why cant you?
If you want to learn more about smooth bore nozzles you can buy books and videos from Fire Engineering or you can send an E-mail to Capt. Joe Bruni His E-mail address is Uself@aol.com also read his article. Just go back to my home page and click New Ideas.