“Risk a lot to save a lot,” “Risk a little to save a little” and “Risk nothing to save nothing” are common mantras in the fire service. These sayings—which originally come from NFPA 1500—are OK in the sense of reminders, but they, like other similar phrases, can be difficult to apply at an incident scene.
Deputy Chief Mike Bryant said that when firefighters talk about risk, they think of people in harm’s way during his "A Firefighter’s Guide to Articulating Risk" session at Firehouse Expo 2017.
But the term risk has additional factors that may help the fire service better articulate its form of risk management.
The primary takeaway from Bryant’s presentation centered on the “equation of risk,” which has three variables: Threats/Hazards, Vulnerability and Consequence, expressed as: R = T x V x C. This approach may seem foreign to the fire service, so let’s consider how fire departments can use the three variables as a framework to articulate and justify actions working in hazardous environments.
- Threats/Hazards: These are hazards we talk about at a fire: flashover, smoke conditions, offensive position in a defensive fire, collapse potential, thermal burns, fire behavior, etc. In this process, we are constantly identifying hazards and putting controls in place to mitigate those hazards. Part of this variable includes a discussion of “tactical agility” in which you build in movement to navigate and avoid the hazards within your tactical application of advance, defend, reinforce, withdraw and delay.
- Vulnerability: Vulnerability represents the lack of controls/mitigations in place to defend from the threats or hazards that are present. Vulnerabilities only exist within your hazardous environment to the fact that no one has identified that hazards exist and no controls or mitigations have been established to reduce those vulnerabilities.
- Consequence: If you do not identify and establish controls to reduce vulnerability, then you will have consequence. Consequence is the name, the face, the family of the actual firefighter who we send into a burning building or other hazardous environment. Consequence is the most important element of our equation and is directly affected by the other variables.
By understanding the definition of “risk” through our equation, we are ultimately in a better position to articulate and justify our actions when questions arise. Lastly, this understanding can help ensure that, as the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation says, “Everyone Goes Home” and we survive another day in the life of a firefighter.
