Are you being .......watched ?

Sadly we are  hearing reports of WYFRS employees being threatened with disciplinary proceedings for liking our Facebook page, which is available by clicking  HERE. apparently  exercising free will outside of working hours is potentially detrimental to your career!

People here at FCCL are too having issues with WYFRS management, where it seems hearsay is rife about the magical effects of  our website. Sorry we cant tell you more but we did drop  big hints here and here. 

We have always been aware that support for our facebook page and blog has been tremendous and that the number of likes and comments hasn't been commensurate with the traffic either site receives. 

BUT

FCCL are  very much aware that firefighters and non operational staffs jobs are much more important than people  liking the work we do. People have mortgages, financial commitment and family's to consider..........please do not put yourself at risk by liking our pages. We know we have firefighter Facebook friends who suddenly disappear and block us and believe me we do not  take offence. 

But its not just us who are conspiracy theorists. This Freedom of Information Request via the website Whatdotheyknow.com  is very interesting too. It is about WYFRS using surveillance to watch their staff.

Please provide me the amount of times in the years   the authority's employees have been placed under surveillance.    ( Surveillance meaning when the West Yorkshire Fire Authority has put an employee under observation by a procured third party.)

  2009=

    2010=

    2011=

     2012=

And the response was 

 2009 – 0

2010 – 1

2011 – 2

2012 – 1

We wonder if WYFRS has ever had a tracker placed on an employees car ? Or maybe  has all their station cats microchipped !   Perhaps we should FOI them and ask (nicely of course). 

6 minutes response time vital - why ?

We bang on about fires a  lot here at FCCL  and  don't mention rescues very often, the video below is about texting whilst  driving  but demonstrates clearly (and graphically! ) why response times for rescues are just as important as response times for fires. 

Because if you are trapped in a car and injured,  a increase in response time of a couple of minutes  from Fire and Rescue  can be the difference between 

LIFE  

& 

DEATH 

In emergency medicine, the golden hour (also known as golden time) refers to a time period lasting from a few minutes to several hours following traumatic injury being sustained by a casualty, during which there is the highest likelihood that prompt medical treatment will prevent death. It is well established that the patient's chances of survival are greatest if they receive care within a short period of time after a severe injury.

In cases of severe trauma, especially internal bleeding, surgical intervention is required. Complications such as shock may occur if the patient is not managed appropriately and expeditiously. 

It therefore becomes a priority to transport patients suffering from severe trauma as fast as possible to specialists, most often found at a hospital trauma center, for definitive treatment. Because some injuries can cause a trauma patient to deteriorate extremely rapidly, the lag time between injury and treatment should ideally be kept to a bare minimum; over time, this lag time has come to be specified as a now-standard time frame of no more than 60 minutes, after which time the survival rate for traumatic patients is alleged to fall off dramatically

South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue are currently consulting about response times in their  area 

----Just CLICK HERE 

to take you directly to the consultation questions.

More information about their Integrated Risk Management Plan can be found HERE

Hold The Front Page - And Squint !!!!

We had a bit of a discussion on twitter this morning  

The conversation went like this: 

@syfrthe consultation period doesnt end till June 27th, please put the consultation back to a prominentposition on your website
— FireCutsCostLives(@FireCCL) June 4, 2013

@syfrits half way down, prominent would be nice!
— FireCutsCostLives(@FireCCL) June 4, 2013

At  this point  we better explain that PROMINENT  means 

prom·i·nent

  [prom-uh-nuhnt]  Show IPA

adjective

1.

standing out so as to be seen easily; conspicuous; particularly noticeable: Her eyes are her mostprominent feature.

2.

standing out beyond the adjacent surface or line; projecting.

3.

leading, important, or well-known: a prominent citizen.

Anyway  - you  decide!

Prominent  or 

hidden halfway down in minuscule print!

Officers - 1 Firefighters - Nil

 

Righty before you read anymore - watch this video

Regardless of whatever South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue try to convince you about response times,  you have THREE MINUTES to evacuate your house if  you have a fire. 

 Fire and Rescue response times matter !

Scared................Concerned ............Frightened .................  GOOD         so you should be 

FIRE KILLS  - and you will never ever see a smoke alarm rescue somebody 

from a burning building. That is a fire fighters job, some would say a vocation. 

BUT 

the Karma Fairy has been waving her wand again and  as we start to blog about South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue the  news  is full of incidents  that have over the past few days stretched South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue to breaking point. 

On the 29th May  there was an explosion  in Dundas Road, Tinsley, Sheffield. 

At approximately 9am Agostinho Jesus went to leave his property when a huge explosion ripped through the house.  Mr Jesus describes the incident on the BBC website here and thought he was burning alive!  

Courtesy of the BBC

4 pumps and support vehicles  attended that incident, including those from the local station Darnell which has been earmarked for closure in this years rounds of cuts in provision

Retained staff had to be brought in to crew resilience pumps there as South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue were so stretched that day. 

The incident made the national news, it was on several times during the day. And if you had looked very closely at the screen you might have seen something  to shock you. ........

Even though the incident commenced at 9am and went on until 8pm in the evening - the fire fighters on duty remained the same.   The officers changed though,  i bet you cant guess when it was .............

 A)  Tea time  ?

  B) Lunchtime  ?  

Yes you guessed it -  the firefighters (the ones who do the dirty dangerous work) didn't get relieved at all, but the officers were, just in time for lunch.  

We bet the Chief Fire Officer was just relieved there 

wasn't another major incident that day !

BUT ONLY TWO DAYS LATER .......................

In the early hours of  June 1st  fire crews were called to Cow House Lane, Doncaster . The fire was in a yard used to store pallets. The alarm was raised at approx  1.30am . 

Now  I know I am not an expert - but having seen many bonfires that consist in the main of  (yes you guessed it) 

WOODEN PALLETS  

even I,  a rank amateur  would probably on balance 

if I had received a 999 call saying 

 would have hedged my bets and sent a couple of engines 

 ( just to be on the safe side )

BUT NO  - South Yorkshire  FRS in line with their "challenging policy" sent just the one engine on a recce !

Oh to be a fly on the wall when they rang back for assistance!

And although on the SYFRS site as a separate incident, we are assured that  the fire spread to a nearby industrial park. At the height of the incident over 70 firefighters were involved and engines had to be brought in from West Yorkshire. 

Courtesy of SYFRS 

And at 9am the same day   -  another large fire  this time in Sheffield attended by 5 pumps and 25 fire fighters at a rubber recycling plant in Monckton. 

Fires such as these can happen at anytime - as CFO Jamie Courtney said only last week, "we can reduce the chances of a fire with good fire prevention  BUT we cant reduce the severity once it takes place"  

Please oppose the cuts in provision in South Yorkshire.

If you wish to voice your opposition please use the link HERE to take you to the SYFRS website 

OR TO GO DIRECTLY TO THE  CONSULATION SITE  Just CLICK HERE 

South Yorkshire Consulation ..................

Good Morning South Yorkshire 

Ok so its a bit early for humour! 

The Fire Brigades Union represents Fire Fighters all over the country, the Union like fire has no boundaries. So when we heard of our neighbours in South Yorkshire we did the ONLY   thing  possible and have offered to put our little blog at  our South Yorks comrades disposal. Because like us here at Fire Cuts Cost Lives the FBU believe a solid coalition of fire professionals and community are the  way to save the fire service from these irresponsible cuts in provision.

We hope the FCCL effect of gentle banter combined with solid facts will  ensure that the citizens of South Yorkshire have the full facts in regard to the current consultation at their disposal. And as the fire and rescue service learnt to their cost in West Yorkshire in 2012 social media can have a massive effect on how the process of public consultation works.

So over  the coming few weeks we hope the FCCL effect will rub off on to the South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority and they will start to realise that the community do not back  the cuts in provision and response times that they propose.

Ask yourself a question  ,,,,to get the correct information about response times who would you trust to give an honest answer?

So 

lets start with the easy stuff,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, if you want to know more about how you can support you local firefighters get in touch with 

South Yorkshire Fire Brigades Union. 

Their  website is HERE  and their brigade organiser is Matt Winslow and  you can email him by clicking   HERE 

And if you wish to voice your opposition please use the link HERE to take you to the SYFRS website 

----Just CLICK HERE 

to take you directly to the consultation questions.

but REMEMBER ONE THING

It's YOUR LOCAL COUNCILLORS 

WHO WILL  MAKE THE DECISION TO CLOSE YOUR LOCAL STATIONS!!!!


TUESDAY at Doncaster Mansion House there will be  an opportunity to view the plans and have you say ---- details are available HERE  

Shocked or Sanguine ?

Well i think it is safe to say we here at FCCL float between both of these emotions most days in regard to fire and rescue...........some days if you didnt laugh you would cry.

Lets start with 

SHOCKED......

Although we haven't been able to glean any more details there was an incident in Beck Road , Harehills, Leeds. LS8 4EJ  in the early hours ( 03:30 ) of Saturday morning - a VERY HIGH RISK WARD. A male was rescued by the crews from Gipton and Moortown who turned out BUT he was pronounced dead at the scene. Again no mention of this on the public  WYFRS incident logs. 

Beck Road 

Beck Road is a perfect example of a very high risk area -dense housing including back to backs, high poverty and high ethnic population of whom english is a second language. WYFRS voted to move the local station further away from areas such as these! 

We have reported several deaths in the East Leeds Area since this blog started - in  fact not one but  THREE of the local East Leeds councilllors sit on the fire authority. 

Cllr Brian Selby  - - who last year didn't bat an eyelid when fire deaths rose in his ward by 18% 

Brian Selby  - Labour - Killingbeck and Seacroft. 

Cllr Arif Hussain  -  who in the two times we have visited the fire authority proceedings has not spoken at all. - we wonder how he is feeling about a fire death in his ward?  

Arif Hussain - Labour - Gipton and Harehills 

Cllr Ron Grahame  - who has now since 

a) promising to support the FBU in 2011 and then coming out with the phrase "Sorry Boys i have been whipped"   - for futher details please read this  

 b)  at the December 2013 IMRP vote didnt even bother to turn up! (too scared we reckon cos we have made his life quite miserable since 2011  as he was FCCLs local councillor! ) Ron since turning his back on his communities views and commonse has had two  deaths in the ward that we are aware of!!!  

Ron Grahame - Labour -  Burmantofts & Richmond Hill   

As all three have  had deaths in their wards in the last year we wonder if they are man enough to stand up and say  - i made an error of judgement - and get behind their communities and fight cuts in provision. 

Sadly we doubt it -  but it will be interesting to see what the Labour Party says in the 2014 local elections !!!

We do  of course offer our sincere condolences to 

the deceased mans family. And thanks to the crews at Gipton and Moortown, we know you did your very best. 

Anyway - lets get to SANGUINE .........

Monday was a bank holiday - one of those days you brave the sun, rain  or  hail to go to  worship at a D I Y centre.  And before you go,  you do without a shadow of a doubt use one of these 

A Tape Measure 

So if you are putting up shelves, buying a new washer or even a humblewashing up bowl you  know before you get the product home that it will FIT..... 

The Chief, Deputy Chief and 2 ACO's  cost the tax payers of West Yorkshire in excess of half a million pound a year in salaries alone, they have a drawer full of degrees between them (paid for by the taxpayers we suspect) and you would think when stumping up (OUR MONEY)  they would be able to use a tape measure to ensure the equipment they buy would be of the right size, after all  its what we pay them for. 

WYFRS have recently purchased a shiny new water ladder  which was to be based at Cleckheaton but was delivered to WYFRS Headquarters at Birkenshaw.  But when the new kit was taken to its new home it was discovered that the new ladder was 

Cleckheaton already has a dual level appliance bay as they once bought a piece of kit so big they had to dig a pit in the floor to allow it to fit! Talk about PLANNING  (not) 

We think Simon and Co should read this before making any other major or minor purchases and perhaps remember its the tax payers of West Yorkshire who pay for their errors. 

AND ITS THE PUBLIC WHO PAY WITH THEIR LIVES WHEN THE FIRE CUTS MEAN RESPONSE TIMES WILL INCREASE!


WHOOPS - we almost forgot..... WYFRS are particularly bad with tape measures. As you go into the main hall at Birkenshaw HQ to attend fire authority meetings you will see stuck to the outside of the building a rather large, ugly  and cumbersome lift shaft.  When that was installed  the doors didn't open correctly as they were not the right size for the hole - we swear you could not make it up. 

On Ilkley Moor B'aht Fire Engine

We here at FCCL promote Fridays as Fireplan Fridays   

BUT 

We think WYFRS could  do with reviewing their plans 

after an incident on Friday  24th May 2013.  

At 07:56 a 999 call was received by WYFRS reporting an incident at St Pauls Grove in Ilkley  -  a nice leafy suburb - LS29 8JJ  and VERY LOW RISK. 

Now you would have thought with a fire station  not a quarter of a mile away the response time would have been been pretty damn good  BUT Ilkley is a retained fire station  ( a station where staff are on call, ie the station is not full time crewed)  So whatever the incident on Ikleys station ground an additional 5 minutes has to be added to allow the retained fire fighters to down tools and get to the station. As by the RAC route planner the station to St Pauls Grove would only take ONE MINUTE driving normally. Even so a five and a half minute response time would have been good for any incident (even if  you local station is just around the corner).

UNFORTUNATELY 

on Friday there was insufficient retained crew available to send  the engine from Ilkley.  

So WYFRS control mobilised OTLEY and RAWDON

OTLEY is a retained station and was nearest at 6 miles away 

(15 minute ordinary drive) 

Rawdon is full time crewed BUT is 8.5 miles away. 

(24 minutes ordinary drive)

Then things took a turn for the worse - the house fire became a "persons reported" incident  - which means that the number of pumps attending immediately goes to 

THREE. 

This means Silsden another retained station were  called out 

Silsden is a retained station and 7.5 miles away. 

(17 minute ordinary drive) 

By the time OTLEY turned the corner to St Pauls Grove 

13 MINUTES AFTER THE INITIAL CALL 

HAD BEEN MADE......

The neighbours had rescued the  "person reported" via a ladder to the first floor window.  

SO THIS LEADS US TO SEVERAL QUESTIONS 

1. Is it acceptable to have a response time of 13 minutes - even in a Very Low Risk Area 

2. Are WYFRS content with response times so dire that members of the public are forced to rescue other members of the public out of sheer  desperation! 

3. Will at some point somebody DIE because of these delays in response times.  

A neighbour, the home owner or  a fire fighter ? 

Yes we are aware that WYFRS are recruiting for retained fire fighters in Ilkley - BUT it can take up to 2 YEARS to train a  recruit to become a "competent fire fighter"  

Also  we would  like to point out that if Haworth had become involved in the incident, and as their parish council  wishes  becomes a "volunteer" fire service, they would NOT have been allowed to enter the building as volunteers are not allowed to use breathing apparatus.

We have said since we started this blog in  September 2012 that we genuinely believe that Fire Cuts Will Cost Lives -sadly we think this incident should be recorded as a  

VERY NEAR MISS 

(some would say a complete balls up!)

But this serious incident didn't even make it to the public incident log of the WYFRS website !  

What a good job some people believe in openness and transparency in the fire service.