Weekly Scrap #264 - Steve Kaiser, Firefighting Down Under

Corley: Corley Moore coming at you. Wanted to talk very briefly before the scrap starts tonight. And if you know me, you know that I love the vigilantes. Um, I love the like-minded souls and I'm always looking for ways that we can have more interaction. One of the things that every vigilante says when they join is they're looking to connect with those like Minded souls. They're looking to connect with other vigilantes and people who feel the way they feel. And so I'm constantly looking for ways to make that happen. So far, I love Patreon. I love Patreon for bringing us together, but it hasn't created that the the ability to share information and things the way I want it But one thing we did discover was that Discord is integrated into Patreon. So we've been working for the last couple weeks to launch a Discord server where the vigilantes can get together and hang out. Now I'll be the first person to say I am not a tech guru. I'm much better at forcing doors and and hooking ceiling. I'm better at destroying stuff than I am at using technology. But that being said, Discord has so many options that look like they could be phenomenal for the vigilantes and for our growth and for the fellowship and the camaraderie that we want to share It's got chat rooms that you can post in separated by category where we can have great discussions. It's got voice channels you can jump in and have voice discussions with people at the drop of a hat without any without needing to start a zoom call or anything you just drop in and drop out you can share screens we have plans uh people have plans to share classes that they've built so they can get feedback before they go and teach those classes. I mean there's so much that could be used for this Discord server and we're just scratching the surface. So get in, come be a part of it, man. It looks to be an incredible platform And if you want to be a part of it, head over to patreon. com slash the vigilantes. Become a part, man. If you're not a vigilante, why not? Um, five bucks a month. You I it you can't even afford a fan fancy coffee nowadays for five bucks. So five bucks a month, you're you're a member of the like-minded souls.

Corley: So come be a part. Looking forward to seeing and talking to you in the Discord. Stay safe. Corley Moore, Firehouse Vigilance. It is weekly scrap number 264. My guest tonight is the man from the future, the wonder from down under, the one and only Steve Kaiser He began his fire service career in 2003 as a volunteer. In 2008, as a career firefighter. In 2020, the Fire Service of Australia underwent a massive reform Since that time, he has been actively involved in instructing at the academy while also maintaining his operational responsibilities. His focus when he teaches is on compartment fire behavior, structural firefighting tactics with a specialized emphasis On thermal imaging and rapid intervention teams. He makes his own way to FDIC for the last three years, and that is where I had the pleasure to meet him in person. In his own words, he is absolutely loving life and riding the backseat, practicing what he preaches at the Academy. Welcome my brother, Steve Kaiser, as the guest of weekly scrap number 264. Steve Kaiser: Wow. What a privilege. What a privilege to be here. Of all the great names you've had on this show for over the last four or five years, and now it's now it's my turn. I'm here. It's like this is surreal.

Corley: I love it, brother. I absolutely love it. Is there anything I missed in the intro? Anything I got wrong? Anything you want to correct? No, that's me. Steve Kaiser: That's me in a nutshell. That's my fire service career and uh and I'm only halfway. Corley: Awesome. I love it. Uh Audience, please get your questions primed and ready for Steve and myself. Kyle is in the YouTube chat. He is in the chat ready to grab your questions and throw them up here. So please, please, please throw your questions at me and Steve. Steve. Sam is also here. He is watching over, making sure things run smoothly. Now let's talk about the beautiful sponsors, the OG sponsor of the scrap, Keyhos. Check them out online at Keyhose. com and follow them on Facebook. Affordable drill towers on a mission to bring you cost-effective and versatile training props like the affordable bailout prop, which allows you to practice window bailouts, ladder bailouts, and ladder high point rescues. They also make the affordable standpipe prop, which you can roll into the classroom for standpipe theory and then roll it into the parking lot where you can can pump realistic flows and pressures. Of course their mainstay, their namesake, the affordable drill tower. It comes in several configurations and standard with a standpipe system. You can choose from one or two sets of stairs or integrate it into your existing Connect boxes for multi-story access or freestanding on a stair. Lab. All models are NFBA 1402 compliant and gain you ISO credit. The only thing you can't do on an affordable drill tower is live fire training. Call Steve at 844-55 Tower or drop an email to NF4 Info at affordable drilltower. com. Firestationfurniture. com provides a complete line of quality furniture for your firehouse. Firefighter owned and operated. They understand the strain that firefighters put on furniture and offer furniture that's built to last. Visit www. firestationfurniture. com for more information. And with all that being said, the sponsors are done and it's time to Get to scrapping. So let me just read a little bit of the YouTube. Get you fired up here, Steve. We've got them checking in because they check in a little early, especially the the The front row seat guys, they come early. And that's McGeean. Greg White said LFG Sam, let's go. Robbie Lyle said, ready to time travel to the future.

Corley: Let me scroll, scroll, scrolling, trying to scroll. Luke Stevenson said, good day from Sydney, Australia. Looking forward to seeing Ozzy Steve. Hope you can understand our accent. We'll see how that goes. We will see how it goes. And then there's a whole bunch of let's go. Here we go. Looking forward to it. Let's go. So there we go. There we go So excellent, excellent. Okay, there we go. I was checking to see if Rob is is sound okay. Sam's the sound okay Okay, just checking. All right, here we go, Steve. Let's talk about it. Right out the gate, I want to talk. You travel to FDIC for the last three years, I believe. And you pretty much do it on your own. You can correct me if I'm wrong. You pretty much pay to get here on your own. So the first thing I wanted to say before we even started talking was if you're out there and you're saying, man I'd like to go to outside training. I'd like to get to a conference, but I can't make it happen. My department won't help me or, you know, my chief, whatever. You're out of excuses because this man travels halfway around the globe So, all right, but seriously, talk to me uh about the differences as you see them, your perspective from America to Australia and the differences the just in general

Steve Kaiser: Yeah, it's it's real, it's like we're different, but we're the same wherever we go. Like I can speak to anyone in the States and we can sit down and have this conversation about firefighting. Um there's always these little differences. You get it between stations, between states, between countries, but uh you still have that same common vernacular with each other Like you can talk about firefighting and have a conversation where if somebody has no idea about firefighting, they'll be just looking at us going, these guys are speaking gibberish. What are they talking about? So it's it's fantastic being able to go to places like the States and and speak with everybody and and it blows my mind. You go to FDIC, one of the biggest conferences. in the world other than intershorts. And you speak with the people that I only dreamt about ever listening to, you know, big name hitters. And you're speaking to them just like you've been in a conversation for years. Corley: I love it. Absolutely love it. Anything surprised you uh at all? What was the biggest surprise for you? Or was there one Steve Kaiser: Just how how big the American fire service is in in comparison to us and how it's ordered. So we're a state-based fire service in most of the states in Australia. So we've got out six or seven states um but had their own fire services might have one or two fire services inside that state and that's it so probably you know 20 25 fire service all all up someone will correct me for sure But to have 20,000 departments in the United States, all of them mostly self-managed to some degree and of varying sizes. It was it just blew my mind to go to FDRC and see 30,000 people and it wasn't even the whole fire service there was amazing to see. It was just a big eye-opener. That's the biggest difference for me. And then the differences between everybody's policies, everybody's byground practices, and how you have to integrate a one brigade or department, sorry, coming from one area and another one come from another area and work together. It's not a very common practice here in Australia. We're pretty similar how we operate across

Corley: the board across the board and you think that's from the state down just being just all everybody's kind of under the same bureau yeah a lot of our information a lot of our history comes from Steve Kaiser: from from Britain, obviously, from the UK. We're still under the king's monarchy, which is awesome. But that also keeps everything fairly similar. We don't have huge practice differences. across the board, uh which is really good because if I was to go up to say Queensland in the north of the country I could probably slot straight in at my current rank and still be able to operate seamlessly next to him. Corley: Wow. No, no, no. That is a uniform that doesn't exist here without a doubt. We're still working on common vernacular in certain aspects and and and struggling to to make that happen. Uh yeah, I'm trying to read what everybody's saying. I love it, man. This man try uh heavily involved in training. I want to talk to you about your training methodology Steve Kaiser: Yeah. Yeah, I joined training about five years ago out of frustration a little bit. I was seeing a lot of new recruits coming to station and uh Just doing things we weren't quite doing operationally. There was that little bit of a disconnect. Um so I've always had that mindset, well, I can't argue against anything unless I go and see it. So I put my hand up, went to training, and wow, did that change my life? It made me realize two things. One was we were training firefighters in minimum skills, which is has its own problems and qualities. And I still needed to learn a lot more.

Corley: As the instructor Steve Kaiser: Yeah, as a as an instructor and as a firefighter, I both thought before I became an instructor that yeah, my shit didn't stink. Yeah I thought it was pretty good. And then what I found was, well, I had no idea how in-depth all our information comes from. So it was a huge turnaround for me, big eye opener, and love every minute of it now. Every minute of it. It is an opportunity to be in depth at every skill level because if you're gonna teach it you've got to be able to do it and if you can't do it you shouldn't be teaching it. Corley: Oh we like it I like it. Steve Kaiser: So with um the methodology, it's it's simple. It is really simple. It's that crawl, walk, run, you know, taking the student on a journey of understanding what they're about to do and how to do it. And most importantly, and I think everybody talks about this on the scrap, is why? Why do we do it that way? Especially with the newer generations. They want to know why. You can just tell them to do something and they'll turn around and say, well, why do I have to do that? Right. So we have to cater to everybody

Corley: Oh, I love it. Uh, you talked about your favorite things to teach, your favorite topics to teach. What's your favorite one to teach to new recruits specifically? Not may not not necessarily your favorite topic overall, but favorite one to teach to recruits Steve Kaiser: Hose management. Hose management. You see recruits come in and for the first maybe quarter of their journey in recruit courses. um the host management is is lackluster a little bit. They still don't know. They're still learning, yeah. Right. And then we get them at this really sweet spot where We break everything down, take them through this really simple approach, that craw, walk, run, or cognitive, associative, autonomous. And then after they've done the sessions with us on hose management and learning the system, they go back to their instructor card drive and wow, their instructors are like, why are they so much faster now? How are they moving through a building with ease? Whereas last week they were pulling the hose from the truck still. Now they've got a system of work. Nice. Corley: So is it that systematic implementation that really is is what uh makes the difference Yeah, people people need systems.

Steve Kaiser: Systems helps people understand and put things into order. And we work on the very basic principle of threes. We try and teach in three Okay. Keep everything simple in threes and you can break down the three even more. So for us with hose management, we start at first hose deployment. get the hose off the truck to the front door or wherever the entry point is. Sure. And if you don't do that well, it's gonna make everything else start to snowball. Yeah. You're gonna, it's gonna be hard. So we teach that very simplistically and we teach it with no stress. Just this is how we get the hose off. Right. There's a few variations. If there's an obstacle in front of you, this is how you now gotta move around the obstacle and we take through that journey step by step. Then we talk about okay now you're going to go from the front door or from the entry point to the fire. So whatever the structure is commercial, residential we talk about right what position are you in and what is your role so we have two positions primarily be your branch operator So branch firefighter. Sorry, nozzle, nozzle firefighter for the uh American listeners out there.

Corley: So we call a nozzle. Nozzle is branch Steve Kaiser: Yes, nozzle is a branch. Okay, okay. So our nozzle firefighter and our backup firefighter, which could be multiple backup firefighters. But our nozzle firefighter only has three responsibilities That's it. They've got to be able to cool the space ahead of them. Protect the path of egress. So if something goes wrong, we can get back out or we find a victim, we can get back out. And extinguish fire. It's super simple for them. And the guy behind them or the person behind them is going to be the backup firefighter. And they've got three responsibilities. They're going to manage the hose. They're gonna look for um passive uh they're looking for the go on mind blank They're looking for fire, heat sources, points of entry, everything with the thermal imaging camera primarily. Eyes if they can, torch, but then the thermal imaging camera And they're going to, so what's that? Management and oh they're gonna force entry as well. So they're gonna take the irons and make sure they can get through everything. I may have messed that up a little bit, but that's pretty much it. Yeah. So they're going to have three responsibilities, and the Firefox has three responsibilities Now it doesn't matter what rank that is or which person that it is, and if they swap halfway, those responsibilities are owned to that position And what does that do for an incident controller? Heaps. They know that that person has that job And they are going to have that responsibility the whole way through the firefight.

Corley: Just frees up bandwidth for the commander. Steve Kaiser: Absolutely. You call it incident control. Freeze up bandwidth for everybody. Incident control. Corley: Yeah, we call it incident control. No, no, I like it. Just pointing at him out pointing out the differences as I decipher. Yeah. I love it, brother. I absolutely love the threes, man. The rule of threes, the c uh I always miss them up though Aut autonomous the the the other thing. Yeah. I've got questions coming at you from the audience. Are you ready for those? Let's go. All right. So uh Kyle Romagus leading it off. So you got Mr. Smoothmore coming at you right out the gate. Steve, since coming to the states for training, what are some tactics that you have been able to implement back home, if there are any? Steve Kaiser: Oh look, there's heaps. Knowledge sharing between whether it's outside your department or outside your country is you've got to do it. You've got to do it. Whether you can physically go there or you've got to do it over social media or books. Books is a big part. You've just got to get out there and look at what everyone's doing. Even if you don't implement it, you've got to have an understanding of everything out there Because there's little bits you can take. The key one I just spoke about is um uh the FDI trips we got to meet up with Aaron Fields, uh myself and a couple of um really good colleagues. To am I frozen? Am I good? Did for a second, but you're back. I was waiting. Are you here? Uh so yeah, we got the meetup with Aaron Fields and we did the nozzle forward program And for us, we don't have uh a lot of smooth ball, large diameter hose tactics here. Um, to implement that would would require a lot of change. Sure, sure. But the tactics and techniques of moving hose, regardless of diameter, is amazing. So we reintroduced that to our brigade here. And that's now running in a program where we use it as hose deployment and hose management. And then we put on the end of that water application. So these are three three common things to go from the truck to the fire. Rapid intervention teams, which is is is new for our country. We don't do it as much or as well as uh other countries and uh the US being the main one Um so implementing and making doctrine and getting training for that is uh at the very beginning for us.

Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: And the same for a lot of states. And the other one is thermal imaging cameras. They've come a long way. Our understanding of thermal imaging cameras used to be how to turn it on, what it was made of, its limitations. etc but working with uh insight training who you had on last week um working with andy starns and and tim uh sorry thomas um Is it's just amazing. You just see a different way and it validates what we already thought we knew, but they do it in such a way that it's it's easy to understand and easy to uh implement. Corley: Oh yeah. Steve Kaiser: So we talk we talk about LiFire layout. We change the order a little bit the way we do it to make it more suitable to how we have our processes. So we talk about life layout fire and that's that difference in temperatures. So using the tick and understanding how that works. Instead of just going straight for the hot stuff and widing it out, we're using from cold to hot. But looking for those life, which is down low, the layout on the way through. And fire at the end, but it's hot up the top. I don't know if you noticed. I was I was holding the gangster group too. So if Andy Starnes gets to see this, he'll be pretty proud about that. That came straight from him So yeah, there's lots of things we implement. But then we go to the UK as well and and we look at what they do and we go, wow, yeah, maybe we can implement some of that stuff. Europe has this this one thing uh called the smoke curtain. I think that's going to be a game changer globally. The way that it protects the path of egress and escape routes in high-rise buildings is amazing. It's amazing. If you can Google it, Michael Reich, R-E-I-C-K. Man, this guy, that that invention that he's made, it's a game changer.

Corley: Love it. Love it. Love it. I'm gonna throw this one out of order at you. Uh it's coming from Rob Fisher. He said Aussie rule football or rugby Steve Kaiser: So I'm from Victoria. Victoria is down south. Victoria is pretty much the home of AFL, Australian Football League. So Aussie Rules Football Yeah. Rugby is more towards the s the northern states, New South Wales and Queensland. Um we do have a mix in between, but um yeah, look, I'm Australian will football all the way and for any Australian people listening you'll know I'm a Bulldog supporter. I've been a Bulldog supporter since I was a kid. You gotta love them. You gotta have your loyalty, I think, and that's Corley: I love it. I absolutely love it. Sticking with Rob Fisher, I like this question, so I want to hear your answer. Rob wants to know, Ozzy Steve, it seems like there is not much pride in brotherhood slash sisterhood. in the Australian Fire Department. Do you think this is a correct observation? And do you wish it was different? He is frozen. Okay. Steve Kaiser: I missed half of that. It chopped down on me. Corley: Um go again. Are you back with me? Mic check, mic check. My all right, I'm gonna wait. Yep. I'm here. Let's get spoke too soon. I will talk to the uh audience for a minute because I am interested in is now is the bulldog Luke Stevenson can answer me from the YouTube. He could tell me if he's talking about Bulldogs, is that if that's an AFL team Or if that's the UGA like someone said in the in the chat. You back, Steve. Maybe? Yes, yes. I'm here. I'm here. I'm here. Alright, we're trying. Hey, it's a scrap. Steve said it was a scrap. I can hear you. Can you hear us? Yes, good. All right. Yes, yes. Rob Fisher's question. Here it is. He says, Ozzy Steve, it seems like there is not much pride in brotherhood, sisterhood in the Australian Fire Department. Do you think this is a correct observation and do you wish it was different?

Steve Kaiser: It's a good question. I think there is a lot of pride in being a firefighter in Australia. Absolutely. Across the board. But we don't express it like the Americans do. And that's probably why it looks like we're not proud of it. I definitely know every firefighter is proud of being a firefighter. I have not met one person who doesn't want to be a firefighter or doesn't tell people that they're a firefighter But we are a little bit more humble and we're probably not a little bit, we're not outgoing in the way that we approach it. Which is us, that's our style, that's that's the Australian way. We're not uh very extroverted in the way that we present all our information, we're very reserved as a nation. So to say that we're not proud of being firefighters, I I wouldn't believe so. I think everyone's proud of being a firefighter Um, but we don't wear uniforms out in uh in the public. You very rarely see a firefighter wearing firefighting t-shirts out in the public Um it does happen, but uh for us usually we try and keep it on the down low. It's that bit of be bit of humility about it and being humble, I think, in our fire service. It doesn't mean that we're not professional because I mean because some of the most professional firefighters are going around. We love it. Um and we're very passionate about being um the best on the fire ground that we can be.

Corley: Right. Steve Kaiser: So yeah. Corley: No, it was tough. It was a great question from Rob. I love the question. I like the answer even more. Because culturally it's just kind of ingrained to be to to just kind of be reserved and humble about it Steve Kaiser: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And and it's the same with everything that we do. Um, like I think we always ask questions to uh strangers that we just meet, you know, what do you do? All that kind of stuff. And I and we never hide but we're firefighters. Sometimes we're a bit weary about saying it because then you'll spend the whole night talking about being a firefighter. Corley: Sure, sure. Steve Kaiser: But we're definitely proud of it. We're absolutely proud of it. Um and it is it's the same everywhere, all around the world. I don't think anyone I've ever met in any country says that they're not proud of being a firefighter It's one of those professions that everyone loves. We're always there to do a good job. And we're well respected. Wherever you go. Corley: Hold on, I got. I gotta write down the timestamp. Well loved. I gotta get a good name on it so I can remember later. I'm terrible about taking notes, so I have to Try it and be good. Uh no, I absolutely love that. And Rob did clarify. He said I he wasn't really talking about the individual because he understands that, but more about the profession and department pride. Like identity and stuff like that. Is that a is that a fair association? Yeah.

Steve Kaiser: Um yeah, I think there's there's small groups of small pockets who have huge pride in their stations. We we definitely talk ourselves up between stations. Uh so you know, for instance, one one station next to another station will say that we're better than them all the time. Corley: Yeah. Steve Kaiser: We always have that joke and that that jest with each other. other sure um and we definitely try and keep our trucks uh station everything looking clean looking tidy you know as the public expects of a taxpayer uh funds going to to good work, yeah. Sure. Um one thing I'd love to see in the fire service is maybe a bit more personal identity. Like uh maybe station station crests and things like that to show a bit more um ownership and pride of themselves. Uh I don't know if that's the right wording. Corley: I know what you mean. But identity almost. Just individualism or team. Steve Kaiser: Yeah, absolutely. Right. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't think we need it because We work well as teams. I can work with any I can go to any station and we're we function just the same as if I'm at my own station We work together. We work together very well and we mix in with the other services, so police and ambulance extremely well. Like there's just synergy there. Is it visible to the public? Not so much.

Corley: I love it. Uh Jason Haynes coming at you. Great question, Jason. He says, how do the studies that UL put on translate to your tactics and strategies with Excuse me, with your building construction and attack packages. Any differences or pretty similar to the U. S. Fire Service? Steve Kaiser: Yeah, there's there's differences, but then there's not. Um you know the construction for us, we've got a lot of mixed construction, a lot of lightweight construction. Yeah, remember our country is probably 200 years younger than your country. So we're still building and our high-rise environment is a lot of new building stock. You look at the skyline of Melbourne where I'm from in it in the last twenty, thirty years, it's doubled from what I remember as a kid. You know, so we've got a lot of really um passive fire safety systems inbuilt into our building buildings. So we don't have to deal with the big old legacy high-rise buildings like you would in the in the States. But the UL studies has been amazing. And I think everyone around the world is listening. To UL IFSI um sorry i fire you know which one I'm talking about.

Corley: Um yeah don't get me don't get me spouting FRSI Fire Research Safety Institute Yes. Yes, that's the one. Steve Kaiser: And um that's it. That's it. Um what I love is it actually helps us clarify a lot of stuff because they're Their data sets are data. It's not opinion-based. So when they do a study on transitional attack, for example We can then take that data and that terminology, compare it to our terminology and experience, because we don't have a lot of data. And then implement it. So for us down south, we've really looked at the IFSI transitional attack on the single story structures that they were doing and implemented that into our training. So we do look at it. We look everywhere though, not just the US, but definitely UL is a big source for us. Do we do everything from the URL? No. Because some of the tactics just don't work. So the for example the smooth ball flow and move. um tactics is doesn't suit us because we have combination nozzles. Sorry Kyle, combination is what's in Australia. But we've got to master the combination nozzle in a way that works for us in our built environment. And and we do. We we found some of the best tactics from the US. And the UK and made it into an Australian way of fighting fire.

Corley: No, I love it. I absolutely love it. Um and and that's the other thing about being like like top down, like everybody belongs to the same organization is that it's not like you can just go in and change your nozzles if you wanted to because it it would be almost a national movement to get it to happen, correct? Steve Kaiser: Yeah, yeah. Well uh or somewhat so the correct Oh look, it would take years to change for us. We're a big boat. My fire service is probably about almost tipping 4,000 uniform. So to train 4,000 uniform in a new tactical technique takes a long time, takes a very long time, and takes a lot of money. So not only just buying the equipment, the study for the equipment, but then implementing the equipment, training on the equipment, maintaining that equipment for a large service of my size, that's millions and millions of dollars. Yeah. Um and it takes a long time. So in a small service where you've got only maybe four or five stations and and Um you you can put in a change and have it done within a few months. It's fantastic. But for us, it takes a long time and you need a lot of buy-in. So to go from a combination nozzle to a smooth ball nozzle for us would be a massive culture change. And it would be the entirety.

Corley: It's not like one small area inside of it and then it can spread. It has to all be done at once. Steve Kaiser: Yeah, exactly. And and my state is about the same size as Utah. Yeah. Okay. That's a fire service that we have. So it's not just a local locality, it's the whole state, the size of Utah. And um to try and get something to work in the furthest corner of the state, as well as the CBD, they both have to be the same. Whatever I apply and do in the city has to work out at our smallest urban sprawls furthest from us in the state. So to get that training right is very difficult. Corley: Right. Nice, nice. Uh I love the question. I love the question on the UL and then uh yeah also on thank you for it Uh Rob Fisher says, since you brought up the smoke curtain, can you explain Australia's search process? I'm assuming trucks or whatever they are called down there are much different than they are here in the States. Steve Kaiser: Yes, yes. We're very we're still very British in the way that we approach firefighting. So we don't have um engine companies, truck companies. So we we call our frontline trucks, which we call or appliances. We call them appliances here. So all our apparatus or appliances. then have smaller names. So a pumper is the main appliance. So that will have usually four to five firefighters on that. And it will be capable of doing everything like a squad truck would do. I'm trying to teach talk US terminology here, yeah? So they will be in charge of fire attack search, they could even do small um road accident rescue, initiate hazmats, things like that. Yeah, so they're they're the all-rounder of the fire surface. They do everything like a squad team would. And then we have our specialist appliances like Rodex and Rescue Truck, yeah, or appliance. So they will be heavy rescue, that will be industrial rescue, rope access. and um heavy road accident rescue. So that'll be coming along as well. Then we have specialist trucks like ladder appliances So your ladder trucks are dedicated as search, where our ladder trucks are dedicated as access, basically, access and support and waterways.

Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: So a lot of those will be a straight stick, so they'll be uh um to access, you know, parapets and things like that in a in a straight formation. And then we also have articulated uh um trucks as well. I don't know if you can see. Whoop, wrong side. Something articulated like this. I even got props. How's that? Corley: Nice, nice. Steve Kaiser: So an articulated platform. Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: So we have uh a series of those as well, and that will help us with access to the roof spaces. Because we don't do a lot of roof operations like uh in the United States That's due to our construction and lightweight. If you get up on our roof, it's mostly terracotta type tiles. And once they're affected, they'd be by heat, they become brittle. So it's pretty dangerous for us to be up on the roof. More often than not, we'd fall through a roof with with all the gear got. So we have to change our tactics because of our construction. For search though, yeah, we don't have dedicated search teams. We're all rounders. So uh doctrine dictates what we do. If I know where my rescue is, so someone says, there's my rescue, um, you know, my my son is trapped in the first bedroom on the left I know where I'm going. Yeah, I'm going to go in there and I'm going to affect that rescue. If I can see them in the second story window, I know where they are. That's my priority. But if we don't know where the victims are, we've got to stop the problem. So we go straight to fire attack. And if we find a rescue on the way, absolutely, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna ignore the person. I'm gonna grab them, take them out But we've got to stop that problem. If we don't stop it, everything gets worse.

Corley: Nope. So if the known victim, known location, you're gonna go try and affect the rescue. In all likelihood, always always up to the commander on scene to make the call, probably, yes Steve Kaiser: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, if we if we know uh for without a doubt that we know where the victim is We're going for it. Yeah. Providing that uh that it's tenable. Yeah, if if we have full involvement and no survival spaces That's extreme, yeah? Uh and that unfortunate. But if we have survival spaces, uh we have the equipment and the means to make access and get to those spaces, we're gonna do it Corley: Interesting. No, very interesting. Steve Kaiser: That's what the public expects us to do. Corley: Uh Cody Brooks is he is revisiting an older um Topic here. He asked it a while back, but I'm just now getting to the question. Uh being at FDIC, and he you've kind of touched on this, but he's drilling down and says, what is the biggest difference between American and Australian What do you think the biggest difference is as you see it? Steve Kaiser: I think we're basically what we were just talking about, um the dedicated trucks and and engines and dedicated seating positions. Um I know that it's not always the same throughout the whole fire service in the US where you have um good staffing in the big departments And you have, you know, hopefully some type of staffing in the smaller stations out out in the um more rural areas. But I really like the fact that um you know going to a big station like say, let's go Chicago where where I got to have a look last year or this year. Yeah, they're dedicated positions. They sit there. One person knows that they're going to be doing search. One person knows that they're going to be getting the hose off. One person knows they're going to be sinking a hydrant or catching a hydrant. Yeah, I love that about um the larger departments in the US. um your dedicated role and that's what you're gonna do.

Corley: Right. Steve Kaiser: For us it differs though because um we may be one truck on scene for maybe ten or so minutes. maybe sometimes more out in the the regional areas. So that means between the four of you, you've got to operate all the functional roles on the fire ground Corley: No, yeah, more like our rural volunteer departments with showing up with no backup coming for quite some time and have to just deal with it and get it done. Steve Kaiser: Yeah, absolutely. So we have a few few um brigades or stations in areas where there's access to lots of um resource so you're gonna have lots of trucks standing up in a short period of time and you can dedicate crews to one task yeah right and that's that's ideal that is absolutely ideal But then we have areas where you don't have that. It's you know one person's gonna have three tasks. Right. Corley: Just cast that. Steve Kaiser: And that's what what has to happen. Gotcha. No way. Yeah, until relief turns up. Corley: Uh Kyle uh asks, can you And because one day, one day Steve Kaiser: No, go ahead. No, no, go, go, go. I didn't know. I was just gonna say one day I can be I One day I can be in the in the city, right, where I'm working to a task. And then the next day I can be stationed out in the regional area where I'm tasked with three or four things. So our jobs are dynamic in that sense.

Corley: Right. No, I yeah, absolutely. Um back to Kyle's qu the next question from Kyle, which is can you describe the and he puts it in quotation marks Australian way of fighting fire, specifically talking about nozzle work. Steve Kaiser: Yeah, I knew I knew that was coming. Okay. Um look, I We we talk about it very simply. A lot of our tactics come from compartment fire behavior training. But in the last decade, we have due to the fuels, due to the speed of fire behavior and the changing environment, whether it be the construction fuel makeup or our equipment and how much uh advance it's got over the years, including our PPE and and PBC. We now go to the idea of controlling the environment. So instead of where you have smooth bore surface cooling in volume, we try and use CFBT tactics. in s in residential structures primarily to control the environment. Corley: Repeat the the type of tactics? I didn't catch it. Steve Kaiser: Uh so compartment fire behavior training. So tactics. So CFBT. Yeah, yeah. So that so for most of your viewers that would be fog attack. Now I know that there's a there's a difference between what fog attack is and what people's perception of fog attack is. So do we fight fire with a fog nozzle on the whole time? No, because that will make a very untenable space. that creates too much steam. Yeah. So we need to use in a smoke environment where we don't want the smoke to light up around us. we try and slow that by inerting the gas by putting droplets up there. So we cool that space and keep it cool so we can then move underneath So that is under high pressure, low volume droplets to get the really small droplets to interact with that smoke and that gas. Which is very foreign. But that works. It absolutely works for us. We've been doing it for years and it works. We don't have any effect from it as long as you do it correctly like every technique. So once we're moving towards that room of origin, controlling, keeping everything cold around us and nothing hot behind us. Very similar to sm surface cooling concept. Bring the bring the cold with you.

Corley: This is my ignorance on it. Is the gas contraction Is it is it just is it is it close to the same as surface cooling or I'm asking out of ignorance, not from the small drug. Steve Kaiser: It is very similar. It's it's scientifically driven. Both of them are very scientifically driven. Right. If we put too much water into that gas space, you get um you get contraction, but if we're putting it in the wrong space, we get more steam because we're miss um applying it and we can have expansion and drop and mix up that environment. So there it is a sword, yeah, a very finite sword. You've got to play it right. Corley: Okay. So we talk about the right amount. Steve Kaiser: So our rule of three of water application is the right amount in the right format in the right location. And if you can hit all three of those You can control the environment. But you've got to have a good fire behavior understanding. And that's where our recruit courses and all our staff are constantly being trained in fire behavior. And if they have a really good understanding of fire behavior, that's great. It works. But they also understand what when it doesn't work, how to switch So we can go to surface cooling, but it's not going to be in smooth ball. It's just going to be a straight string. And that's the beautiful thing about our combination nozzles. is we can do finite gas cooling like in Europe, or we can go to now large volume water with low pressure and push water and surface cool. Just not with the same efficiency as a smooth ball. And man, I'd love to have smooth balls. But as I said earlier, to change a whole fire service from combination nozzles to smooth balls is Yeah, what do you do? Just stick with what you've got, because you know it still works. We haven't had any ill effect? Or do we change completely, which is going to cost millions of dollars, and probably get a few people upset?

Corley: Well, not only that, but it it's uh The efficiency is it worth the entire changeover for the amount of efficiency you're talking about on the one aspect and give up the other. So that you guys are used to in your co So yeah, it's a it's phenomenal uh discussion. Uh Rob wanted to know, Ozzy Steve, are you guys flowing over 500 LPM or less? Steve Kaiser: Cool. Now I got my sheet, so uh liters per minute I can speak about. Um So I can even talk in gallons, yeah. So about five hundred liters per minute is when we're flowing in smooth, straight stream Yeah. So we want to put water onto the fire, the object that's burning, or we want to cool that surface down rapidly so it takes it out of its steaming capacity. We want to put volume and yes, 500 liters per minute, which is 132 gallons. Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: Um, is what we're trying to achieve But when we're going to gas cooling, it has to be less to get the droplets, and that's 100 liters per minute or 26 gallons. Corley: Oh wow. So it is super effective. Steve Kaiser: That might scare a lot of people. No doubt. Yeah, yeah. And and you and Europe do it even less. They use less water. Um, and they do it very efficiently. Very high pressure, very low volume. But you can take it into context. If if I want, if I'm not trying to search or save somebody's life in a building, so it's just the fire I'm dealing with. I want to try and preserve their property. I don't want to destroy their house as much as possible, yeah But when it becomes a life problem, whether it's mine or the victim's problem, now all bets are off on the property. Priority is on the life. So I can apply more water. Because it's about trying to save that person, get the environment really cold, or trying to save my environment, get everything really cold. But when there's no life problem, no life risk, then I want to try and save someone's property because that's important to them. It could be commercial property that's that's gonna provide livelihood to you know, people's lives. You know, if if their business is out of order, then their employees don't have work, then they don't have money. So there's there's different levels that you've got to go with.

Steve Kaiser: And if we just destroy every business um with volumes of water, yeah, it it it stops the fire. Absolutely But we also gotta have that inherent responsibility to not destroy the property more than what it was when we got there. Sometimes we can't. Sometimes we can't Corley: No, no, no. And I and there is some there is some uh differences in just the culture or mindset in the in the American Fire Service versus the Australia when it comes to that. Uh because you've mentioned even survivables or you know survivable space and And that's a that's been a big uh argument, so to speak, back here in the States over the last few years of survivable versus searchable, you know, or uh yeah is it empty until we say it's empty those kind of those kind of things is what you're bringing up here and it's just I don't know where if those are arguments you guys have there or they have them in Europe. I don't know and that's my ignorance and that's why I like talking to you Steve Kaiser: Oh absolutely. It's global. Yeah, we have those discussions all the time. Yeah, we we go, well, is there a space where someone can survive in this building? And then some people turn up to a job where there's fire coming out of the whole front of the building and they say it's fully involved. But you go around the back It's not on fire. There's space there. So even our vernacular here is just like what's happening in the US, which is happening in the UK, and is probably happening in every other country where If if we choose the correct terminology and I say the front of the building is involved, to me, coming on scene as a second truck, I go, well, I want to get around the back of the building and search that space. But if somebody says on the radio, the house is fully involved, I am imagining, well, the house is gone.

Corley: Right, right. Steve Kaiser: Yeah, so even incident controllers can dictate our level of um mentality when approaching a fire scene by using the correct vernacular, the terminology. Corley: I love it. I'm learning new things. Incident controller. I like that. And then data. Data. Data. Data. Data. I gotta say daughter correctly. Um I have a son and a daughter. That's what but no, absolutely. Uh I have some fun questions here that I really want to know the answer to One of them was Michael Ramirez wanted to know what top three states would Ozzy Steve move to in the US and why. Wow. Wow. Steve Kaiser: Look, uh I love Melbourne, right? Australia, Melbourne down the very bottom. Melbourne for me is a really good pace It's orderly. The streets are in a grid fashion. I'd just I'd get lost if I can't find myself around and navigate around. And it's just got this this sophistication about it. Sorry, Sydney and Brisbane, but um it just seems to me to be a better place to live. So it has to be something similar. Now I haven't been to every state in the US. I did live in Colorado for four seasons in the snowfields. So um Denver's always, or Colorado's had it as a has a big place in my heart in that sense. New York was impressive. It's just huge. I think it would be too big for me. But I recently saw Chicago And Chicago just screamed Melbourne. It was just a really well laid out area. And and if I was gonna be a firefighter that you know they go to plenty of jobs in Chicago, especially down in the south. They're crazy down there Um and it's by a bay. You gotta have something near water. Yeah. Australia, everyone is near water. We all live within, I think it's like 90% or 80% of Australians live within 50 kilometers of of a beach. Oh wow. So you gotta be near water if you're Australian and living in the middle of the country. The only way I could do that is if I'm near a ski mountain

Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: Chicago. Let's go Chicago. I was really impressed. Final answer. There you go. Corley: There you go. Good answer. Uh Like it. I'm looking at questions here. I'm looking at questions here. I'm finding the final questions as we move towards the books and s and whatnot. Uh Derek H wants to know when it comes to water sources, do you have ample amount of hydrants or do you utilize drafting or I don't know if they're tankers, tenders, or Or uh what do you call them there? Steve Kaiser: Yeah, so our pumpers um are generally in urban built areas which have reticulated water source, so that's um ground mains. Uh which is great almost everywhere. Very rarely do we have problems finding mains. And if we do, it's just about putting more pumps in series to move that water along. um when we go out to regional areas uh and farmlands and things like that yeah absolutely we need tankers then so our tankers are our bulk water carriers And they'll be either drafting or ferrying water back and forth to the fire ground. Um generally we don't set up big drafting operations unless it's a long, prolonged job. Corley: Okay. Some sort of like wildfire deployment or something Okay.

Steve Kaiser: Uh yeah, Wi-Fi deployment. Um yeah. Corley: Coming at you from the Vigilante watch party that's happening over in Discord By the way. But uh from the Vigilante Watch Party, they said, Do y'all he's and there's a y'all in there. Y'all, do you all preach the firefighter rescue survey like it is here in the States for your Like has that had an effect on you? Because it's been a big uh impact here, the data coming from firefighter rescue survey here in the States Steve Kaiser: Yeah, uh no, we we don't have that here. I would love it to be here. Um it'd be a bit of a process to get that implemented here just due to um you know politically driven reasons, yeah. But the beautiful thing about the firefighter um rescue survey right on The beautiful thing about it is uh Americans and Australians, we're we're we're not dissimilar, yeah. We have houses, we live the same way. Our quality of life is very similar, similar. So our habits are the same. So looking at your data is being instrumental for us. to implement ways of doing search. So if when I teach search, it's not um I want you to go in and do a left-hand search and make your way around the whole building. It's now, I know at three o'clock in the morning we're going to put fire attack in a space to confine the fire and the first place we're going to search Is the bedrooms, because that's statistics. That's what's coming out of um the the the research, the data.

Corley: Beautiful Steve Kaiser: So we definit we definitely steal a lot of things from you guys. That is one thing that I love reading and looking at the data sets. And Project Mayday as well, fantastic resource of information. information regardless of where you live I think humans are humans are the same. Yeah. We all want to try and get out of a fire and we all have the same habits No, I love that. Corley: I love that answer. Uh Kyle is asking Steve, is there a system for tracking the number of civilian fatalities that occur in structure fires in Australia? Is there any data? Now I'm saying data without even the two. Steve Kaiser: Yes, there is. So we have fire reporting systems, so incident controllers. will go back to their stations and input all the data through so what we call fire incident report systems or FERS. And that information is collected and is presented in in more of a holistic view for the organization. So we still have to report back annually with annual reports to the government. uh and to um the public because it's all public documentation. Uh it shows the statistics of everything. Does it go into was uh the person 25 years old and saved in a in a bedroom generally not that in depth.

Corley: Right. Steve Kaiser: Um I wish it was. Corley: Right. No, no, absolutely. But you do have they they are collecting some data right now. It sounds like Like niffers with the American Fire Service before the firefighter rescue survey came along to start getting more data sets pulled into it. Uh Fireman 718 says, Have you ever done ride time in the US? If not, would you be interested? Steve Kaiser: Um yes, yes I have. Uh and I'll pause. So my experience uh overseas is obviously on my own back so I don't get um nothing's really sanctioned by my work um fantastic organization as it is uh being 4,000 people I'm still a small fish, yeah? Right. And just to send someone like myself over for several thousand dollars doesn't make sense. Um but the beautiful thing about going to the States is you guys are so hospitable. It's amazing. You go over there, you say, hey, I'm an Australian. And then it's almost like, oh, you've got to come to my house. You've got to you've got to go check out my fire trucks. So last year we or this year actually at FDIC um Chicago really took us on board. So the CFD Beautiful people, very hospitable. We got to hang out at a fire station up in the north um of Chicago, a station um No, I won't say names. I won't say names. Uh but legitimately we got to hang out with uh station uh squad five in the south of Chicago and and do some drills with them, which was fantastic, and go on on wildlongs and go check out their uh college, which was really good so um good good to see how other fire services are training when i was in new um with my friends uh we got to also go to the college there we got looked after actually um by Frank Leed um one of your alumni yep uh so he took us on a a huge tour of the facility and really gave us the the gold standard tour. Had a good steak sand uh steak lunch with him, uh tuna steak. And then And we said, well, we're gonna go down to rescue two um to check that out. And I hope I don't get him in trouble for this, but he gave us his driver to go down there And so instead of us catching taxis and stuff, we we got driven across even one of the battalion cars, I guess Um, so gold standard wherever we go, get to look at stations, couple of ride-alongs.

Steve Kaiser: Um, and yes, if I go back, I'll take up that offer. And uh, which I think I'm going back next year Um but the the cool thing was Frank Lee came to Australia last last year or this year. Corley: It was only January or February, I believe. Steve Kaiser: was yeah yeah yeah um so I got to repay him that favor I was his driver Joe for a day. Nice took him around took him around Melbourne we got a VIP entrance into everywhere we went. Went down to the beach, let them let uh let them have a swim in the ocean and got to show them all around the fire surface here. So uh as much as it goes out one way it comes back the other way and fantastic. Those bonds that you make just keep getting stronger and stronger. And that's one good thing. You've got to get out of your fire station. and and see everyone else and make those connections and network because otherwise, you know, stuff like this wouldn't happen. I I went to the States and got to meet you, Corey, and And then you said, Oh, you you're the Australian guy keeps logging in and listening to my scrap. And then we've just had this connection now. And and here we are. Yeah. And that happens so much. The connections are Invaluable, absolutely invaluable. And it's all around the world. I just had a conference here called AFAC. It's a small Australian conference Um and there's people from FDRC that come to that and you walk the showroom floor and they're like, hey, I remember you. And you have great conversations.

Corley: No, you just encapsulated what makes the American fire service uh the fire service I have to say I have to qualify what I say tonight and say what makes the fire service so great? I am biased in my love of the American Fire Service, don't get me wrong, but I'm broadening my horizons as we speak speak. So that you just encapsulated what makes the fire service so great. It's that it's that shared uh kinship camaraderie that just exists. So Yeah, absolutely. And Frank Leib's one of the best people on the planet. I'll go on record and say that He's an amazing person. Steve Kaiser: Absolute legend. Absolute legend. Corley: And his wife is such a lovely lady, too. Yeah, Lynn is awesome. So no without a doubt, man. Amazing. Amazing. Which takes me to one of my favorite questions I love to ask. I see a bookshelf behind you. And there's some books that I don't know if those are props, but uh book or books that you think firefighters should be reading. Steve Kaiser: All right, right, yeah. So I don't have them all here, but uh let's start with uh what I've got up here, yeah. I'm gonna go with some European stuff. Okay So I I really believe in uh you've got to learn all aspects of the fire service, whether you do it or not, yeah, um, to really understand it. And I find that There's a lot of pockets in the United States where fog attack is not well received because it's not well understood. So one person who is the best at um delivering information is this guy, Paul Grimwood. And this is just one of his books called Euro Firefighter. Good eye, Rob. Good eye. Paul Grimwood is just the smartest guy I've ever had the opportunity to read his books. with yeah I'd love to meet him he lives in the UK so it's a bit far from me but um wow what a guy so check out Paul Grimwood he's amazing um This guy, he's pretty cool.

Corley: That's a token. I think it I think it. Yeah. I love it. Yes. Check that box. All right. Steve Kaiser: I think I think everyone in America has read something from this guy or understands who he is, but I had to take the opportunity at FDIC to get a hardback version. Corley: Very nice. Steve Kaiser: So loving this book. I I struggle to read it because I read something and I go, wow, that's awesome. Oh, I need to go look at my documentation, see how we can implement that. Or how do we do that? Yeah, it's it's just a great book to read. Another one from the UK. About decision making on the fire ground. Now I got to meet this lady a few weeks ago, which was even more special, uh, because I love getting Signed autographs, obviously. Right. But um this book by Sabrina Cohn Hatton called The Heart of the Moment. Is a really good book by a lady who really encapsulates decision making. Now she's also a psychologist, I think. Dr. Dr. Sabrina Cohen Hatton Yeah, that's a book. Yeah, gotta look outside of uh if you want to look outside of your country, that's a good one.

Corley: Love it, love it, love it Cynic, one of my absolute favorites. Always. Steve Kaiser: Yes. Always. Love it. Always. Leaders in class is my favorite, but yeah, go ahead. Here's my last one, right? You've had him on the scrap, right? But I don't think anyone's ever said anything about his books being mentioned as one of the books, yeah? Corley: Okay. Oh brother, yeah, absolutely Steve Kaiser: These books are amazing. These books are amazing. He's got a whole series of them, and of course, got to be signed. Park Holmes, absolutely one of my favorite people. I'm not a huge reader of of of books, yeah. Uh I like reading um uh you know uh documents data things like that that's going to support me operationally but you have that on the on the fire table Yeah, on the firehouse table, we put that there and you can learn so much just from those pictures. Oh yeah. Yeah, it doesn't matter. Let's just open up to one picture. There's a topic right there. You can all start talking about that on the fire station. It is a conversation starter. Amazing book. Corley: Amazing book. Rob Fisher said Ozzie Steve is a truckey because he likes cartoons slash picture books. Ha ha. Oh yeah. Well it d does Paul Combs artwork translate well to the Australian Fire Service, obviously. I mean

Steve Kaiser: Look, the artwork is is American American driven, yeah? Sure, sure. But the topics is what I mean. The topics, absolutely. Yeah, some of the things um Absolutely relatable. Like decon, um leadership, sky's limit, rabbit intervention stuff, you know, Maydays, calling a Mayday and how important that is. Corley: Yeah. Steve Kaiser: And there's so much information in here. It's it's definitely relatable. Corley: And that is the first time he's been brought up. I uh you're right. I mean his drawings come up all the time, but his actual books, and so Amazing. Great call. Great call. Which takes us to my favorite part of every scrap. The five questions for firefighters. You've been well exposed to them, so I don't have to explain how it works. For the listeners who may not know, the five questions for firefighters, there is no right answer. It's only Only Steve's opinion. Uh, this is the firefighter version five questions for firefighters version 3. 2. Uh, your answers, no, it's just your opinion. The points are passed out by me with the help of the audience So Steve, are you ready for the five questions for firefighters? Yes. Let's go. I should have well it doesn't matter. I should have I I don't know if there's a if there's a uh equivalent monument to Mount Rushmore that exists in Australia that has like four statues or something. You know what I mean?

Steve Kaiser: Okay. Corley: That's okay. That has carried you through your fire service career? Steve Kaiser: This was the hardest one for me to think of. I'd struggle to think about myself in that fashion a lot. So this one was actually is my wife's answer. Um, she's seen my whole fire service career. Uh the good, the bad, the ugly, uh, and she says determination. Determination. She says a lot of the time when I'm told that something can't be done, I'll look at ways to make sure that we can try and get it done I I don't give up easily. And actually it I love the challenge. I love being challenged. I love being uncomfortable at the topics that don't get you know tackled. um and implementing stuff and seeing it through. So I'm very determined in that fact. And it and I think All those times when people tell you you can't do something because you're not at the high rank. Yeah, you can't make change. I call BS. I think if you are determined enough, you can manage people both up. at parity and below as long as you've got the facts the data and the drive behind you if you can do all that you can push forward Right. But it might not happen tomorrow. It might take you three or four years. So you gotta be realist. Definitely gotta be realist. Gotta have that determination. Gotta have the determination. Otherwise, you just give up. You just give up and that and there goes your good idea and it may never happen.

Corley: No, I love it. It's beautiful. And I love the fact, I mean, max points. Easy max points. points for determination and your explanation that goes along with it. But I love the fact that you've got the answer from your wife, because they know us, you know, sometimes they give us the insight, good or bad, you know, both ways, but they give us the insight we need to understand something about ourselves. So I love that. Steve Kaiser: Matt, I I'm so so blessed to have such a solid wife who understands me and my passions and and is accepting. Sometimes she pushes back a bit, but is accepting. Yeah. And and to have someone like that in your corner is is Corley: Froze up. Well, I'll talk to I'll talk to the audience and I'll talk to the podcast for a minute. Uh yeah, Josh Everett said amazing answer. Rob Lyle said Max points it's a great answer it was a great answer uh i did derek i did mention that ozzie ste was from the future it's one of the it was right at the beginning when i was doing the introduction i said the man from the the future. Uh I don't know if we've referenced it since then, but uh it was right out the gate. Uh and Rob Fisher referencing max points and max points on the you are back. You are back. I'll quit rambling. So you got max points. You got max points. Moving if you're there. I'm waiting. I'm waiting to see you move again and talk to me. We might have hit the limit of the We might have hit the limit on him making it to He's back. Wait, wait, he's trying. He's fighting through. Australia is fighting. Back again. Yep, you're back. Here we go. We're fighting. Number two. It's those pigeons going back and forth over the big pond. Number two, it's Job Town. It's time. That's good. You gotta pick your song in route to that work and structure fire. What song are you playing? I'm listening. Did I lose him? Mic check. You got me? I got you. I got you. You're moving. Talk to me. Hey have you got me? Yeah? Yeah, good good.

Steve Kaiser: I didn't hear the question, but I know what it is. Alright, number two. Uh song. Yes Songs, yeah. Okay. So I wanted to put something very Australian in. Um and then thinking back to all the podcasts. ACDC, a good Sydney band, has been well represented. So I'm pretty happy with that. Corley: Okay. Steve Kaiser: Then I thought about the song that we all want to say. And uh uh so this isn't my final song, but I think we all think about it, especially if we live in a built-up traffic area, ludicrous. Move. Get out the way. Get out the way. I think we've all had that in our head at some stage. Um but you know, I think the song that really gets me going and and probably gets me in that chill moment is a very old song, Lagrange by ZZ Top. Corley: Ooh. I like it. Steve Kaiser: Yeah. Just gets me in the right frame of mind. Corley: I love it, brother. I love it. Uh absolutely. That's the first easy top too. I'm I'm I w I wanna I again I've there been a lot of them, so I may be mistaken but in my terrible memory that's the first time Z Z Top has been put on there and it's a fantastic song to choose to go in route to a fire. So Max points on number two Number three, what is your favorite fire service tradition?

Steve Kaiser: It has to be graduation day. And the reason why is it's for the family. It is the one time the family really gets an insight into what their son, their husband, or their father is going through and about to go through for the rest of their career. career. They get to see all the the hype. Sometimes different places do demonstrations. So we do fire demonstrations. They get to see just the the ceremony. Uh and how much effort goes into it. You know, their partners or their family members have been gone for a couple of months, sometimes half a year, depending on where you train. And for them to come out the other end. From a civilian to a firefighter at the start of their career, that's a huge transition. That's probably the biggest transition for most humans to go from Not knowing anything about firefighting or very limited to now being able to go and set foot on the fire ground. And that is a moment that needs to be shared with the fire of it with their families Yeah, it's very important. Um, it's kind of like that crossover. So I I love the graduations and the pomp that goes behind it. Pomp being that British term. Sure. Yeah

Corley: Yeah, I love it. I love the answer. I love the answer, especially because it's not just the graduation, it's that the family gets exposed to all of that. Beautiful answer. You got on three for three on max points. Number four, this one's on the clock. You get one minute to answer And it's who are the four people that you would put on your Mount Rushmore of the fire service and go Steve Kaiser: I'm gonna put two to two to get in this, right? So my Australian version is um some really big names in Australia. So I've got Queensland, Shan Raphael. He's pretty much one of the grandfathers of CFBT and a good mentor of mine, whether he knows it or not. John McDonough in New South Wales Again, everything I know is probably come from him in a lot of sense. In Victoria, one of my good friends, good mentors, loving dearly, Jared Mann. um that guy's going places you'll get to see him at fdic so check him out jared man and one of the persons that i've just been uh met last year at fdyc from wa um is Uh Greg Henry. Wow. He's working on big box stuff, yeah. Um do I have time for an international one?

Corley: Yeah, I will since you are one of the Yes, absolutely. You can I will I will basically let Sam reset the clock if he's able to. Um real quick, I want to say Gerard Mann is planning uh we plan to have him on the scrap. He will be the second Australian to come Come on the scrap. So I'm looking forward to that also. But uh yeah, I want to hear the international version also. Um the this is the international exception to the one-minute rule. Go ahead. Steve Kaiser: Yeah. These are the four people that if you're gonna look outside the US, they're just exceptional, right? I've talked about Paul Grimwood in the UK. Um and and he's he's got about four books. Um John Chubb from Dublin Fire Service and his wealth of knowledge in tall and complex buildings. So if you're into high-rise firefighting, he's someone you need to tell Someone who's very controversial but fantastic to listen to on the YouTube is uh Lars Axelson Also known as the Swedish fire nerd. And the last one. Yeah, yeah. Wow. Man, you can listen to him whether you like him or love him or hate him. Um, the information is solid. Yeah. He he just explores the controversy amongst everything and it's great. Um and Michael Reich, who I I mentioned earlier about the smoke curtain, this guy understands uh smoke flow through high-rise buildings and how to overcome.