CALLING A MAYDAY DEPENDS ON HOW YOU CARRY YOUR RADIO

Captain Raul A. Angulo

Ladder Co. 6, Seattle Fire Department E-mail: captbomberos33@comcast.net

The leather portable radio strap and holster made popular by fire departments like New York City and Boston has become a very popular accessory around the country.

The radio strap is excellent for: • EMS calls • Building inspections • Pre-incident planning • Any training that does not require firefighters to wear their full structural firefighting personal protective equipment

So how do you carry your portable radio? If you carry it like this – under your bunking coat – you could be limiting your chances to successfully call a Mayday. If this practice doesn’t raise a red flag for you, then you haven’t been trapped before, and more specifically, pinned down.

Pros

• Radio unit is protected under the bunking coat.

• Mic cord runs up underneath the coat and

exits out the collar or top fastener protecting it from entanglement or getting severed.

• The signal for transmitting and receiving radio messages is better when the radio is carried in this position. (I have not found this to be the case. )

• Radio is out of the way and does not interfere with other equipment or with wearing the SCBA.

Firefighters who carry the radios like this claim they have no problem accessing their: • Radio unit • Hand-held mic • Volume control knob, • Channel selector knob • Switching to simplex • Emergency button

In normal situations, that may be true. Even if you’re lost or disoriented in a room, you will be able to access all parts of your portable radio.

But not if you’re pinned down.

• The antenna sometimes loosens and needs to be screwed down snuggly.

• The volume and channel selector knobs are on top of the radio. • The toggle switch for B channels or simplex are also on top of the radio. • Additional channel selector buttons on the face of the radio • The Emergency Button

There are numerous features you may have to troubleshoot, operate, or adjust on the radio.

But you have to be able to reach them.

Many new hand-held microphone and speaker units have the emergency button, channel selector, and volume control knobs integrated into the unit. These are excellent features but many fire departments still use the standard hand mic/speaker that simply keys the radio to speak. Regardless of how many features are incorporated into the microphone, it is still connected to the radio by a single cord.

Wearing the cord over the shoulder and around the collar is another bad practice because it subjects the cord to thermal assault. No matter what features are on the hand mic, if the cord is severed or burned off from the radio unit, all those features become useless. Optimal operating temperatures for the Motorola mic cord should not exceed 140° F ( 60° C). A flashover is well above that and there are case studies where the mic cord has burned off from the radio unit of a firefighter.

A more frequent occurrence that disables the mic cord is damage to the connecting unit. This grooved plastic unit slides onto the radio and is held in place by a rocker clip and small set screw. An impact force to this connector can shear it off the radio. Once the electronic contacts are separated, the entire mic cord becomes useless. A firefighter may not even realize this has occurred to his radio. If this happens, the speaker would default back to the radio unit – if you can hear it. You could still key the radio with the side key button – if you can reach it.

Though the leather radio strap and the spring-loaded clips are beefy and well-made, the weakest link in the whole system are the mini D rings on the holster that support the entire weight of the radio.

You’re entrusting your entire lifeline and emergency communication system to these little pixies. How much resistance do you think these “weenie” D rings can withstand?

Emergency Button

You have to be able to activate your emergency button. It takes practice. It is hard enough to do when the radio is in the pocket and you can see it. It’s even harder if your radio is under your bunking coat.

Trick of the Trade

A flexible antenna makes activating your emergency button a lot easier. Practice this technique without gloves.

Now try it with gloves on. This is almost impossible to accomplish if your radio is under your bunking coat.

You have to have the ability to:

• Key the side button • Tighten a loose antenna • Raise or lower the volume • Change radio channels • Switch to a simplex B channel • Activate the Emergency Button

And you need to practice with gloves on. This is not easy!

It’s highly unlikely, if not impossible to accomplish these manipulative skills if you’re pinned under substantial weight and your radio is under your coat.

If for some reason you lose the ability to use your hand mic, you can call a Mayday by keying the portable radio with the side button. You don’t have to remove the radio from the pocket to accomplish this. Simply press the button right through the pocket.

Remember, worse case scenario, you’re going to fall through something, or something is going to fall on you.

This firefighter is demonstrating a self- arrest technique using a D-handle roof hook. He is using his hands and the pole to keep himself from falling into the attic space. IF he was wearing a radio under his coat, it would be subjected to the heat and flames of a fiery attic. The truckman would also be wearing his axe belt and scabbard in addition to the waist strap of the SCBA. If he lost the function of his hand mic, it is doubtful he would let go of one hand to reach down for his radio.

In this position, with the radio in his breast pocket, the firefighter has the ability to use every function and feature on it.

In the Captain Morgan case study, this is how he ended up after the fall. Initially the captain may have had the ability to utilize all the functions of his portable radio, which was carried in the left breast radio pocket of his bunking coat.

Courtesy of Deputy Chief Mike Bryant L.A. Co. F.D. (ret.)

His helmet and face piece were knocked off by the SCBA bottle. He quickly started suffering the effects of carbon monoxide and other smoke gases causing him to go in and out of consciousness. Perhaps all a firefighter can do when he is succumbing to effects of carbon monoxide is activate his emergency button. Manual dexterity decreases and trying to reach and manipulate a radio under the coat would be nearly impossible.

Courtesy of Deputy Chief Mike Bryant L.A. Co. F.D. (ret.)

Protecting The Box

Protecting the box is protecting the space around your upper torso area. You need room for your chest to expand so you can breathe. Your vital organs are the chest cavity and your head. This is also where you want your radio, your PASS device, your regulator, your flashlights, and your hands. With great effort, you may still be able to maneuver your hands around the chest area but it’s doubtful you will be able to reach anything below your waist.

5 Position for Protecting the Box

Hands and Knees Crawl Position

(The strongest position)

Locking the Elbows at 90 degrees

Semi-push up with knees on the ground

On your side

On your back Locking your arms

or elbows at 90 degrees (Military press position)

If you’re a training officer or a chief of a fire academy, are you teaching your new firefighters it’s better to keep their portable radios close to their hands or close to their butts?

And if you’re a firefighter who wears their radio under the coat, I guess you have to ask yourself what side of this wall do you want your portable radio on?

The End