Have you ever watched a child who has just discovered his or her shadow? Once she realizes the shadow is hers, she marvels at how it moves, how it can change shape and how other objects have shadows too — and most are larger than her own.
An astute young child once told me that they were “walking in the shadows of giants.”
So it is with me as I reflect on the contributions of two leaders in the fire service who passed away in recent months. While they are not universally known, their contributions will have a lasting effect on progressive fire departments.
W. David Hilton was the former fire chief of Cobb County, Ga. I first met him while I was taking the executive analysis of community risk reduction course as part of the Executive Fire Officer Program at the National Fire Academy.
Chief Hilton was a guest lecturer who spoke on his attempt to get residential sprinklers approved as an option for new residential construction during the late 1980s. To say he was a pioneer for residential sprinkler systems is an understatement.
Chief Hilton worked his way through obstacles not only with contractors, but also with his own building and water departments before finding innovative ways to overcome their objections.
A better mouse trap
Building contractors complained about the cost. They believed that all fire sprinkler systems had to be constructed of black iron or copper pipes such as those used in a business or warehouse. Hilton introduced them to PVC pipe before it was popular in residential construction.
His building department initially wanted a costly backflow preventer system to avoid brackish water backing up into the domestic water supply. That backflow system would have added considerable cost to any residential fire sprinkler system.
Chief Hilton’s solution was to have them approve a system that was hooked to the same supply as the home’s toilets — whenever one flushed, fresh water flowed throughout the entire system including the sprinkler pipes.
The water department, wanted to impose a standby charge similar to what large sprinklered commercial buildings because a fire would place an unexpected demand on the water system.
Instead, Chief Hilton showed them how a new generation of sprinkler heads could function on far fewer gallons per minute than standard sprinkler heads. He showed how sprinklers could both turn on at given fire temperature and turn off when the fire was contained and the temperature dropped below the ignition temperature.
While this may sound easy today, remember Chief Hilton’s quest for residential sprinklers took place nearly 30 years ago. Chief Hilton not only made believers of those of us in the classroom, but many of his pioneering ideas have been adopted into the residential building codes of municipalities around the country that wanted to mandate residential fire sprinklers or offer them as an option.
Interesting enough, I also found several of Chief Hilton’s ideas incorporated into residential sprinklers used in Australia and New Zealand, especially in areas under extreme water-use restrictions.
Facing the nation
The second giant lost was former Oklahoma City Assistant Fire Chief Jon Hansen. He came to public view following the devastating domestic terrorism bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995.
To give some idea of the gravity of this attack, the source of the blast was approximately 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate mixed with nitro-methane racing and diesel fuels contained in a rental truck parked outside the canopy of the building. The blast caused the building’s exterior to pancake, while cratering the foundation.
The attack killed 168 men, women and children; it injured 680 more while causing numerous fires damaging 324 buildings and 86 cars in a 16-block radius of downtown Oklahoma City. Eventually, 11 USAR teams would be dispatched to handle the massive rescue and recovery efforts.
Within the Murrah Building itself, was a day care center and many of the victims were the pre-school children of workers employed by various federal agencies housed at that location. One of the most striking images that became synonymous with the bombing and rescues was the Pulitzer Prize photo of firefighter Chris Fields carrying a dying infant, Baylee Almon, from the wreckage.
In the early hours of the incident, the OCFD stood virtually alone as other local, state and federal response agencies were mobilizing. With all of this as a backdrop, Chief Hansen became the face and voice of those rescue efforts.
It was his job to brief the media and America as to what had taken place, how extensive was the task and what means were being used. He also had to convey that while the investigation fell to law enforcement, the primary task at hand of rescue and recovery, fell to the fire service.
A model command system
Chief Hansen provided regular televised media updates and became not only the spokesperson for the OCFD, but also for Oklahoma City. From his uniform and groomed appearance, stalwart demeanor, expertise and professionalism, the nation gathered insight into the fire service and how ODFD’s incident command system (the forerunner to today’s NIMS) would integrate seamlessly with those other responding resources into a unified command structure.
Chief Hansen became the model for fire chiefs to follow when discussing long-duration, mass-casualty incidents. His answers were clear, concise and factual, while avoiding speculation. As the days moved into weeks, he made several appearances on late-night newscasts and was always prepared early the next morning for the next cycle of briefings.
He emphasized the human element in his media briefs. He explained that the grueling tasks were being painstakingly done by firefighters — ordinary men and women with extraordinary skills, courage and determination.
After the completion of the rescues and recovery, he wrote a book entitled, “Oklahoma Rescue — the Heroic Untold Story.” True to form, in the appendix, Chief Hansen named every OCFD firefighter and every USAR team that responded to the bombing and the subsequent rescue and recovery operations.
On a personal note, when teaching incident command prior to 9/11, I regularly showed students how the OCFD’s incident command system had retained the rescue division including the subsequent USAR teams throughout that incident and how it fully integrated into the federal system being operated by the U.S. Forest Service.
From both of these giants, the fire service can continue to learn how to respond during adversity or crisis. But more importantly, it can learn how to command that response with dedication and professionalism.
Even now, these chiefs cast giant shadows for us to walk among.
