Firefighters can make faster progress in a highly smoke-filled tunnel thanks to the search stick than without it. It goes even faster as soon as they are sufficiently trained and familiar with the search stick. It is one of the many interesting findings of a study carried out by Karel Lambert of the Brussels Fire Service with the support of Ghent University. The tests also provided new insights into the air consumption of BA Teams, which we briefly present in this magazine article. The comprehensive research report published in the Fire Safety Journal can be downloaded free of charge until January 4, 2025.
What influences the performance of search and rescue teams?
The research focused on the question: «What factors influence the performance of firefighters with breathing apparatus during a search and rescue operation in a tunnel?» To this end, 35 firefighters from the Brussels Fire Service were sent into a 420 m-long tunnel in seven teams. They had three tasks:
- Proceed for about 400 meters until reaching a marker,
- there, find a person within a radius of approx. 10 meters and prepare them for rescue using a basket stretcher with wheels,
- walk back to the starting point with the 80 kg heavy rescue on the basket stretcher.
The firefighters were blindfolded. For the test, they used a standard single-bottle breathing apparatus.
Air consumption, speed and heart rate
The most important data collected in this study related to air consumption, walking speed in the tunnel to the «site» and back, and the participants' heart rate. A run was considered successful if all firefighters in a team arrived back at the starting point without using their breathing air reserve. 14 participants did not meet this criteria. In the following, we briefly present two essential results of this study.
The faster, the less total air consumption
Higher walking speeds mean more effort, which is why the air consumption rate (measured in l/min) increases. A higher total air consumption per test run was also expected. However, it turned out that air consumption decreased because the teams needed less time for the task at hand. Karel Lambert concludes from this that the penetration depth that can be achieved with a specific supply of breathing air is, therefore, decisively determined by the walking speed of the troops. Lambert is planning further trials in which firefighters must walk on ballast. He assumes they will then progress slower and consume more air overall.
Search stick training can speed up the search
On the way to the scene, the average speed of the firefighters was initially 0.39 m/s and increased over time. On the way back, they reached an average speed of 0.5 m/s. The study explained this by the fact that the firefighters first had to become familiar with the search stick. «If teams practised regularly with the search stick, the adaptation phase would probably be shorter,» they concluded. «It would make them faster and reduce overall air consumption.»
Study available for download
The comprehensive documentation of Karel Lambert's study, in which all test conditions and results are presented, can be downloaded free of charge from Elsevier until January 4, 2025, as an article in the Fire Safety Journal. After that, the research report must be purchased for a fee.
Further publications by Karel Lambert
Karel Lambert is a major at the Brussels Fire Service, where he is both head of training and responsible for one of the four companies. With his company, CFBT-BE, he and his team offer training courses in Belgium and abroad. Karel Lambert is also a guest professor at the University of Ghent and teaches fire safety engineers in the field of firefighting. Two of his main areas of research are ventilation and search & rescue. In 2018, he published a study on the use of positive-pressure fans to generate airflow in subway stations.
Further publications by Karel Lambert can be downloaded from the CFBT-BE website in several languages.
