This huge fire in the historic district of Mt. Airy, Maryland, seriously impacted the town's municipal water supply forcing the incident commander to resort to a tanker shuttle operation to help support the fire attack efforts.

The drill begins with Baden VFD Engine 836B (1250 gpm/750 gallon tank) arriving on the scene and deploying a 1-3/4-inch attack line and getting supply lines into position.

At the 5-minute mark, flow is started to the 1-3/4-inch attack line at 150 gpm.

While awaiting the arrival of tankers, Brandywine VFD Rescue Engine 840 (1,500 gpm/500 gallon tank) begins to set-up a dump site while also pumping off its tanker water to E836B.

Brandywine Engine 840 (1,500 gpm/500 gallon tank) arrives and supports the fire attack by also pumping to E836B.

PGFD Tanker 845 (3000 gallon/1000 gpm) is the first tanker to arrive and moves into position to pump E836B's supply line. Due to a communications issue, the tanker was delayed in its arrival and the water flow at the attack line was interrupted for about 2-minutes.

Forestville VFD Tanker 823 (2,500 gallon/1250 gpm) arrives very soon after Tanker 845 and begins to support the dump tank operation by off-loading its water into the dump tank.

Tanker 823 off-loads into the first dump tank.

Rescue Engine 840 continues to work and expand the initial dump site. Note that they have switched to a side suction (officer side) so that they can improve their pumping capacity.

Denton Engine 304 establishes a second dump-site using three dump tanks. Note the roof ladder used to help spread out the tanks so that two, large tankers can get into position at the same time.

Jet siphons are used to transfer water between dump tanks.

The flow is pushed to 500 gpm as more big tankers arrive to off-load water.

An aerial shot of the dump site operations clearly shows the demands placed on resources - especially people - in delivering a sustained water supply without the use of fire hydrants.

Winfield Tanker 14 (3,500 gallon/1500 gpm) gets filled at Fill Site #4 which is bring supported by Charles County Fireboat 8 and Pleasant Valley VFC Special Unit 6.

Two, LDH manifolds are used to supply the 5-inch hose for tanker fill lines. By using two manifolds, the 5-inch line can be drained much faster in between tanker fills.

Charles Fire Boat 8 (750 gpm) drafts just off shore and supplies a 4-inch line.

Two Clinton VFD pumpers and Solomons VFD's fire boat supply water for Fill Site #1. This pumper uses a dump tank to help support its tanker fill rate.

About 800 ft of 5-inch hose is used to supply the pumper at the dump tank.

This Clinton pumper is drafting from the river to support the fill site.

Solomon's Fire Boat 3 (750 gpm) pumps water using its bow monitor which is then relayed by the Clinton pumper to the fill point.

Fill Site #1 crews work to fill this tanker by using 5-inch hose in between torrential downpours of rain.

Fill Site #2 is operated by Charles County Engine 73 (1,500 gpm). They are drafting from a 6-inch dry fire hydrant using three, 10-ft sections of suction hose.

Marbury VFD E82 (2,000 gpm) operates at Fill Site #5 where they have to draft off of a bridge.

Laytonsville VFD Tanker 717 (3,500 gallon) gets filled at Fill Site #5.

Mark E. Davis
GBW Associates, LLC

On a wet and dreary day - April 20th to be exact - over 150 firefighters from six different Maryland counties got together in Baden, Maryland to hone their skills at moving water in the "non-hydranted" environment. The drill was actually the Spring drill of the Maryland State Fireman's Association's Rural Water Supply Committee and was hosted by the Baden VFD which is located in the southern part of Prince George's County.

So what does a rural water supply drill have to do with the Everyone Goes Home theme? Well, even in the year 2008, most of America still continues to fight fire the way that the pioneers did - with water. From a fire fighting perspective, a reliable and sustainable water supply is critical to success. Just ask any chief officer who has had to withdraw his or her troops from a fire fight because the water supply had been exhausted. Or ask those company officers who led their crews into dangerous situations knowing that they had limited water supply available - perhaps only enough to protect a quick primary search or help evacuate an occupied structure.

The bottom line is that the presence or absence of a reliable water supply affects emergency scene decision-making; it affects the safety of everyone involved in the fire attack operation.

In communities both large and small where fire hydrants are prevalent, water supply is often taken for granted. Just ask the folks at the District of Columbia Fire Department and the citizens that they protect about fire hydrants. Most people would not think that our Nation's capitol would have fire hydrants that would have trouble supporting a fire attack. Well, the 2007 Adams Mill fire proved just that. Extra alarms were needed and long lays of large diameter hose were needed to overcome the water supply problems encountered with the hydrant system.

Similarly, the people in the small town of Mt. Airy, Maryland, probably never thought about their town water supply becoming depleted during a fire event. The big fire that struck downtown Mt. Airy in September 2007 proved them wrong also. After a few hours of master stream operations - the town's water supply was not able to sustain the fire flow and water supply operations had to switch to a tanker shuttle in order to stop the fire from destroying the historic down town area.

When fire hydrants are absent in a community or response district then water must often be transported to the scene via fire department apparatus. Operations in these non-hydranted areas will generally require the use of tankers and specialized equipment dedicated to moving water from "Point A to Point B." This absence of fire hydrants places a strain on fire fighting resources because unlike connecting a hose line to a fire hydrant - sustaining a water supply using tankers is labor intensive and can often result in more people involved in the water supply process than actually squirting water on the fire. The goal in rural water supply operations is effectiveness through efficiency.

To be effective and efficient in rural water supply operations, a fire department must be equipped and well-trained. Like all other fire fighting skills, training is critical in the success or demise of a water supply operation and personnel at all ranks and levels of experience must understand the common goal of rural water supply delivery and must be practiced in all aspects of the delivery process.

This training and practice - like most training and practice - also affects the safety of the rural water supply operation. For example, tankers are involved in a large percentage of apparatus rollovers and firefighter injuries and deaths resulting from those rollovers. Rural water supply drills such as the one reported on in this article provide an excellent opportunity for tanker drivers to practice their driving skills under real-life conditions such as narrow roads, civilian traffic, and congested operating areas.

In addition to the driver training component of a rural water supply drill, these drills also provide real-life training for company-level and command-level officers alike. These officers get first-hand experience handling everything from radio communications to dump-site configuration to developing a traffic management plan. The experience gained by the participants in these water supply drills will hopefully lead to improved decision-making and command and control of the real events. And we all hope that improved decision-making will improve the safety of the operation.

The rural water supply drill held in Baden, Maryland, provided numerous learning opportunities for everyone involved in the event. The drill was organized to mimic the Insurance Services Organization (ISO) 2-hour water supply delivery test whereby a water supply operation must be established and sustained for 2-hours.

While fire service professionals sometimes debate the merits of the ISO Fire Suppression Rating Schedule, the 2-hour water supply delivery test seems to be a reasonable standard by which fire departments can compare their water supply delivery capabilities. More importantly, the test allows a fire department to develop a benchmark against which it can compare future test results or which it can use to develop performance goals for improving its own operations.

The Baden drill was the first of its kind in many years for the Maryland State Fireman's Association both in terms of participants and apparatus. Crews from Prince George's, Charles, St Mary's, Caroline, Carroll, and Montgomery Counties worked together to run a large, dump-site operation which was supported by five different fill-sites - two of which were supported by fire boats. The crews had to work through some torrential rain at times but in the end, the drill was a success in that the participants got to practice their craft and experience the difficulties of trying to support such a big operation.

In terms of the lessons learned, there were a few: first was communications. Although interoperability has certainly come a long way in the last ten years, there were some radio communication issues during the first half of the drill. Even though several companies used 800 mhz radio systems, they had difficulty communicating with each other. Eventually, a mobile communications post was able to sort out the problem and present a solution - however, initial operations were affected.

A second lesson learned was the importance of supporting the initial fire attack - and that may mean pumping water to the first engine before off-loading a tanker into a dump tank. At about 14-minutes into the drill, the water supply was lost and the fire flow to the attack line was interrupted. The flow at the time was 250 gpm and it had been sustained by two engines that arrived on scene after the attack engine. However, the first tankers were delayed in their arrival, thus the dump-site set-up was also delayed and the fire flow was interrupted.

Most rural water supply enthusiasts find that it is the transition to dump site operations from a "pumping the first supply line" operation that proves to be the most critical phase in the ISO water supply delivery drill. One of the most common problems that occur at this transition point is that the pumper cannot obtain a draft. That is why it is important to maintain a way to supply the attack lines with water until that draft pumper has obtained a prime and is ready to flow water. At this drill, even though the folks had water flowing again at the 15:10 minute mark, they would have failed the ISO test because of the loss of water.

Another lesson learned was that when considering using two, independent dump sites, it is better to concentrate on getting one "up and running first" before starting the second one. Ironically, the second dump site at the Baden drill was actually a bit more efficient in providing water to the attack engine - perhaps because it was not built under the stress of running out of water - as the first one was.

One other lesson that was reinforced is the limited capacity of drafting through a front intake on a mid-ship mounted centrifugal fire pump. Few - if any - front intakes on mid-ship pumps are rated for drafting full pump capacity. In fact, annual pump tests in Montgomery County, Maryland, proved just that fact - none of their pumpers could do any better than 60% of their rated capacity when drafting through the front intake.

At the Baden, the first pumper set-up to draft using their front intake and found that capacity became an issue. Fortunately, they were able to identify the problem and switched to a side suction intake - which solved the issue. It is important to remember that when a pumper is supplying jet siphons, those jet siphons consume pump capacity. Therefore, a second pumper or pumping unit should be considered to just run the jet siphons anytime a three-dump tank operation is set-up.

In closing, the Baden drill was well-attended and received. Crews worked very well together and equipment compatibility issues were few and far between. Attempts to collect flow rate data fell a bit short and therefore at the end of the drill, evaluators were unable to provide an accurate accounting of how much water was moved. However, it is most probable that a flow of at least 500 gpm was sustained for the majority of the operation. It is hoped that all participants will be able to apply what they saw and learned when they are faced with their next water supply operation and that what they learned will impact the safety of their operation.

Mark E. Davis is President of GBW Associates, LLC a privately-owned consulting group that specializes in the area of fire protection water supply design, assessment, and training. Mr. Davis has over 25 years of experience in both the career and volunteer fire services in Maryland and holds a Bachelor of Science Degree and a Masters of Public Administration Degree from the University of Maryland. He can be reached by email at TheBigCamel@GotBigWater.com. For more info on water supply training, system design, and apparatus, visit the Big Water Information section at www.GotBigWater.com.