Back on Tuesday we linked over to an article in FireRescue1 that was written by Mike McKenna who is chairman of the NFPA technical committee that writes the standards for gloves.  If you missed it, or passed over it at the time, I’d urge you to take a couple of minutes this morning to CLICK HERE and read his story.  It’s a good explanation of what facets of glove construction they have to consider as the committee is revising the standard.  It’s more complex than you realize.

Then there is an important follow-up link on that page where you can click over and fill out a brief survey that the committee is taking where you can express your own opinion, experiences and preferences.  This is your chance to have some direct input into the design process.  It’s the link titled Share Your View in the Gloves Survey.  So take advantage of this opportunity and participate.  Make sure that you read the article first, though.

One of committee’s dilemmas is the trade-off required between improved dexterity and better thermal protection.  If you improve one, then the other has to be correspondingly degraded.  I’m not going to fill out the survey for obvious reasons, but if I was, I’d express a preference on the side of better dexterity.  My reasoning says that the greatest portion of your time while gloved is used to perform manual tasks such as operating hand and power tools, twisting knobs (such as radio channels), picking up things, and so on.  As far as trying to max out your protection against thermal blasts, or inadvertantly grasping something extremely hot, the chances of that happening are very much lower.

Since everything that we do is based on taking a chance with potential injury, I choose to consider the odds of inviting a problem when making that sort of decision.  For me, it’s more of a practical choice rather than a theoretical choice.  What are your thoughts on this?

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I saw a story last week that I bookmarked because it was novel, but it was kind of brief and I never got around to posting it.  A Portland, Maine, tv station, WMTW ran a short item that I would sort under the There are days you shoulda’ stood in bed category:

A duck hunter on one of Portland’s offshore islands placed a call for help, claiming that he was suffering from hypothermia.  So the Portland FD sent out one of their rescue boats to check him out.  But the tide was low at the moment and the boat became grounded in the Casco Bay.

So the dispatchers sent another boat on the mission, and it became grounded, too.

The Coast Guard was called for next and they sent out their 25-ft. rescue boat.  You guessed it, they became grounded, too.

On try #4, the Coast Guard took into account the results of the previous attempts and dispatched their low-draft vessel that finally reached the distressed man.  They successfully got him ashore for treatment.  As far as all the other sailors and their crafts went, they had a rather boring day waiting about 10 hours for the tide to come back in and float their boats.  Do you think the firehouse ribbing has let up yet?

All kidding aside, we’d better get this equipment checked out now.  I’ve got to get some coffee started.  See you back in the day room later.