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When I graduated high school back in 2009, I joined the local Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), and from there went on to be certified in wildland firefighting and as a first responder. That's about the extent of my emergency response training, but while I'm attending my university I've begun working heavily with CERT and the local fire department for a lot of events/emergency responses/exercises. By far the most exciting and enjoyable part of this (due to the lack of human suffering involved) has been our controlled burn exercises. Typically, I'll be put on traffic control duties, although I've occasionally been asked to run an exterior attack line to make sure things don't spread out of control. When I've remembered to, I'll pack my camera along with me to get pictures of the event. A lot of the time I'll either be stationed too far out to get decent pictures or simply forget to bring the camera, but I've been able to dig up some of the images to share today. If you've got any questions about the process, CERT, or anything else related, feel free to ask them. If you're part of a similar program somewhere else and have pictures, post 'em here so we can compare our fireboners and whatnot. Also if you're legitimately an arsonist please don't post pictures of your crimes, that isn't cool man. Making room for a new movie theater in Canby, Oregon, Summer 2009    Final picture I took, about 45 minutes after the one above:  Demolishing a home at the request of the owner in rural Polk County, Oregon, just outside the small city of Independence. Due to the size of this house, we used the interior as a training ground, setting a room ablaze and then knocking the flames back down while extracting "victims". The house was fully furnished with donated couches and such, making it a truly unique opportunity to do some advanced training.    This picture sort of captures what it was like to be close to the building. The sun was partially obscured by the smoke, and the atmosphere was extremely humid and warm. It was surreal to have this massive fire in front of you and about 100 feet behind you a row of about 20 people sitting in lawn chairs, drinking beers watching the house burn down (the fire gathered quite the audience).       It was horrifying to see how quickly the house went up. We used it for small burns for about three hours, but the building became unstable so we let it go without knocking the flames down. It went from a single-room fire to a total loss (wherein the roof collapsed entirely) in about 35 minutes.
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 22:27 |
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| # ? May 19, 2013 15:29 |
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How difficult is it to masturbate with all those people around?
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 22:47 |
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How do they make a controlled burn? Dose gasoline everywhere or is it more sophisticated?
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 22:49 |
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Doctor Factical posted:sitting in lawn chairs, drinking beers watching the house burn down (the fire gathered quite the audience).
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:05 |
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GreenCard78 posted:How do they make a controlled burn? Dose gasoline everywhere or is it more sophisticated? There was a really cool Science Friday(?) thing on NPR about a year back talking about the science of arson investigation, and how new evidence and new test simulation techniques are showing that a lot of stuff that old-timers said were indicative of accelerant fires aren't.
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:05 |
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stuxracer posted:How difficult is it to masturbate with all those people around? You'd be surprised at how easy it is. Usually for the controlled burns we'll use a device called a fusee (which is just a huge road flare) and ignite something in the room to give it more of a natural burn. Gasoline is sorta unpredictable in enclosed spaces so we try to avoid that. It's supposed to be controlled, and giving any more credit to the whole "fire is crazy as poo poo" area isn't really in our best interests. Off what Slo-Tek said, exactly correct. In fact, after we'd knock down the flames, we used a few of the rooms for the probational firefighters to go in and tell us how the fire started and where. Some of them were pretty close to the truth, but a lot of them were going off stuff they'd learned in their fire classes and it was just completely untrue. Fire is difficult to understand, like YouTube comments.
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:12 |
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The fumes that the melting siding gives off can't be good...
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:44 |
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, but it reflects poorly on the forums. 
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Why a burn instead of a standard demolition?
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| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:50 |
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Leninboarrir posted:Why a burn instead of a standard demolition? A burn gives fire fighters a chance to do real hands on training instead of just simulated flames with bits of colored cardboard or something. Also allows the collection of real data to help fire fighters determine the causes of future fires. DSauer fucked around with this message at Mar 22, 2013 around 23:57 |
| # ? Mar 22, 2013 23:55 |
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Doctor Factical posted:It was horrifying to see how quickly the house went up. We used it for small burns for about three hours, but the building became unstable so we let it go without knocking the flames down. It went from a single-room fire to a total loss (wherein the roof collapsed entirely) in about 35 minutes.  It's a good thing you guys got there first, that wasn't even close to being up to code anymore.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:02 |
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What is the procedure for finding these 'volunteer' homes to burn down? Do people who have lovely houses just call up the local fire department and say 'Hey you guys want to burn some poo poo down'? What kind of inspection do you guys do before you agree to burn it down? Seems like a pretty sweet deal for everyone considering it probably saves them a bunch of money on demolition.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:23 |
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Here's some old helmet cam footage of a training burn we did a long time ago in a galaxy back in the woods. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiMXaPwwY0U
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:25 |
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Captain Beans posted:What is the procedure for finding these 'volunteer' homes to burn down? Do people who have lovely houses just call up the local fire department and say 'Hey you guys want to burn some poo poo down'? What kind of inspection do you guys do before you agree to burn it down? I honestly don't know, I think they just called the district one day and started the process, but I imagine it's super in-depth. And yeah, the fumes/smoke from all the burning plastics and such were awful smelling and the black smoke could be seen for miles. We got more than a few people coming by to make sure everything was Kosher.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:26 |
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Three-Phase posted:The fumes that the melting siding gives off can't be good... Yeah vinyl siding gives off dangerous fumes when burned and also goes up like a torch around high heat. It's why in places like Australia with year around wildfire blazes, Hardie plank is used instead.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:35 |
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DSauer posted:A burn gives fire fighters a chance to do real hands on training instead of just simulated flames with bits of colored cardboard or something. Also allows the collection of real data to help fire fighters determine the causes of future fires.  that makes way too much sense.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 00:39 |
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Speaking of burning things down, do you think these guys are just a liiiiitle too close to the fire?
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:03 |
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Those shrubs on the right in the 3rd picture seem awfully close to the house. How do you ensure the fire doesn't spread to nearby flora?
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:06 |
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Burn motherfucker... burn
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:38 |
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We had our local volunteer fire department do a controlled burn of a house on some farmland my parents own last year. My mom took a ton of pictures, I'll try to remember to post some of them tomorrow. As far as preparation goes I know we had to get the house inspected for asbestos and have it removed. Some of the more potentially problematic materials may have mysteriously disappeared before the inspection  . I'm not sure if there was much else to it other than that, I'll ask my dad about it tomorrow though. Obviously they're not going to use a house that's on the verge of collapse or something though.Leninboarrir posted:Why a burn instead of a standard demolition? It's a lot cheaper/easier to burn a house down and bulldoze the remains into a hole/the basement and then cover it up than it is to tear it down and carry all the pieces off. You obviously can't do that in the middle of a town/city but in the country it's no problem. Also it gives your local fire department practice which is obviously a good thing.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:38 |
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BattleCake posted:Those shrubs on the right in the 3rd picture seem awfully close to the house. How do you ensure the fire doesn't spread to nearby flora? That's usually my job. We keep all the plants and such soaked but even so things can go up sometimes. Either we hit it with a smaller attack line (usually half-inch or so) or, in the case of Canby, we attack it with a brush fire unit. Canby's got an awesome brush truck that has nozzles all over the bottom of it in every direction, so you just sorta turn them on and drive through a burning field and it extinguishes everything. They've also got more money than they know what to do with, so yeah.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:43 |
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Captain Beans posted:What is the procedure for finding these 'volunteer' homes to burn down? Do people who have lovely houses just call up the local fire department and say 'Hey you guys want to burn some poo poo down'? What kind of inspection do you guys do before you agree to burn it down? My aunt had it done once, and as far as I know you just call up the proper people and say, "Hey come burn down my house." They do some checks to make sure you're the actual legal owner, and then set up a date.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 01:52 |
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Doctor Factical posted:Also if you're legitimately an arsonist please don't post pictures of your crimes, that isn't cool man. On the contrary, arsonists should be encouraged to post pictures of their crimes.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 03:19 |
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I enjoy setting poo poo on fire as well but for me it is more of a performing art. I also help build poo poo to set on fire for my regional burning man events.  We work very closely with the local fire department for all events, the fire marshal in Lakeland Fl. is a pretty awesome guy and they love coming out to see the show.  As I said before I also perform.  You can see the fire marshal directly behind me in this pic while monitoring a show.    I have a lot more pics if anyone is interested in seeing them.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 03:31 |
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Dude keep 'em coming.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 04:02 |
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On the subject of burnination (much better term than "burning something down"), has anybody here tried thermite? I got the components but I'm thinking of a binder agent but can't find any info. How do you keep your mix from being blown by the wind? I will also share my method that is almost failproof for lighting bonfires on windy areas (one of the reasons I'm testing thermite and would like to create some sort of fire paste). Burninating Wigwam or Teepee: You obviously need a pile of preferably dry wood but green wood can work if you have some dry wood to overcome the humidity content. Also a newspaper, with at least 20 pages. A machete or hatchet to shape rebellious wood. Form your burning tripod. Three sticks ending in Ys will form your tripod, green wood for your tripod will help the bonfire keep shape for longer. Place the rest of the wood cut close to the length of the tripod sticks and try to form a teepee. You will have gaps, thats what the newspaper is for. Use a sheet of newspaper to serve as the base for a smaller pile inside your teepee. Try not to make the gap from which you'll feed the fire too small, you may need to add wood. Use the rest of the newspaper to make the sides of the teepee as bereft of gaps as you can. Once you are sure that your teepee won't have a draft going through it, you may light the paper underneath the smaller pile. If the wind is very strong, you may need to put the feeding gap facing opposite from the wind. A gentle wind will feed your bonfire. edit: holy poo poo Throwdown, nice pictures! When did you discover fire breating? Did you ever attempt it as a kid? TerryLennox fucked around with this message at Mar 23, 2013 around 05:30 |
| # ? Mar 23, 2013 04:22 |
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Doctor Factical posted:Dude keep 'em coming. Okeedokee Another fire fart.       Made a dragon while fire breathing  Troupe practice, we were working on getting comfortable doing what we do while in close proximity of each other.    Here is some video of a ferris wheel we built and set on fire http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjHF8f7srsI Random performers at another event. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZNBWgsBuMs
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 04:27 |
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Leninboarrir posted:Why a burn instead of a standard demolition? Nobody is letting firefighters burn down their house for "learning" out of the goodness of their heart. You let firefighters burn down you house because you are a politician who used to be in the NBA, are filthy rich, and could use the tax deduction. Or at least that's what happens in my town.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 05:38 |
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rottenland posted:Nobody is letting firefighters burn down their house for "learning" out of the goodness of their heart. The Polk County guy did because he wanted to rebuild. So yeah basically what you said.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 07:13 |
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Throwdown posted:Another fire fart. Twisted fire farter.
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 07:42 |
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| # ? May 19, 2013 15:29 |
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Three-Phase posted:The fumes that the melting siding gives off can't be good... No... not at all, probably wouldn't be the best
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| # ? Mar 23, 2013 17:07 |
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