fireguy
To Winnesquam, You seem to have answered some of your own questions. Yes, proper staffing is one of the keys. Have you ever worked a fire wearing 60lbs. of gear, and air pack while you are soaked with sweat, and your gear is soaked with water? that 60lbs. is now more like a 100lbs. You don't last long before you are spent. That's where staffing comes in you need reserves to back up the initial attack line ASAP, not have to wait 10-15 min. for the next closest dept. to show up with possibly 1 working firefighter! The NFPA suggests engine staffing of minimally 4 ffs. Laconia, and possibly Gilford have that. As far as throwing $$ at the FD, you answered your own question, manpower and equipment. My attitude comes from people making comments either based on a 1/10th of a second photo of a fire ground, or comments on a subject that they know nothing about. The fire service is based on improvising, adapting, overcoming any situation. Now let me ask you a question. Do you or your neighbors provide clearly marked house #s, easy access to your properties, and easy access to the lake for an engine to draft? If not, then that is part of the problem. I'm sure your local chief would be more than happy to hear your concerns. Again, as I previously stated, to understand, you need to walk the walk. Dippaspan's idea could possibly work, but there is a lot of logistics that would go into that. You would need a pump that can produce 150 psi at minimum. Then firehose, nozzles, etc. There is something in hose called friction loss, which means the smaller the diameter hose, the more pressure is lost in the line. If you have 2,3,4 hundred feet of hose out, sometimes even going uphill, the volume, and pressure out of your nozzle will be minimal. The bottom line is there is no one clear cut solution to island, and lake front property fires. Ask your local dept. what can be done as an island community, or a land based lake front community to improve access and/or firefighting capability. Over and outK
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