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Human Behavior

These are the first responder situational awareness and decision making issues and opportunities related to human behavior. 

Flawed Expectations of Personnel Can Impact Situational Awareness

You develop situational awareness by using your senses to capture information (Level 1 situational awareness). Those clues and cues are then processed into understanding (Level 2 situational awareness). Once you understand what is happening, you can then make predictions of future events (Level 3 situational awareness). This article focuses on the third level of situational […]

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Ignoring the Signs of Danger

A lesson on situational awareness: The tones drop for a reported residential fire. On the way to the call, dispatch reports multiple calls, confirming a working fire. On arrival the crew sees fire blowing out the B-C corner of the single story, detached residential dwelling. The resident is standing in the front yard. A quick

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Imagination Can Influence Situational Awareness

If I were to tell you that on an emergency scene it is possible for you to use X-Ray vision, you’d probably think I’ve been watching too many Superman movies. But it is possible for you to look right through a solid object on an emergency scene and see what’s beyond it. Seriously! Read on…

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Episode 205 | Frustration

This episode examines how frustration can impact your situational awareness.  Length: 27 minutes             click the YouTube icon to listen       __________________________________________________ If you are interested in taking your understanding of situational awareness and high-risk decision making to a higher level, check out the Situational Awareness Matters Online Academy.

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Firefighting: It’s a whole new ballgame

There is little doubt the economic recession of 2008-2009 had a significant impact on the nation’s fire service. Hardly a day went by where there wasn’t some news about an organization that downsized, rightsized or capsized. There are all kinds of explanations and terms being attached to what happened. One I heard at the time

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Episode 203 | Normalization of Deviance

When we are operating under conditions of stress and consequence, coupled with changing conditions and time compression, we can feel a sense of urgency and this can cause us to want to take a shortcut from safety best practices.  Length: 29 minutes       click the YouTube icon to listen       __________________________________________________

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Fifteen Situational Awareness Barriers

The mission of Situational Awareness Matters is to help you see the bad things coming… in time to change bad outcomes. SA is a complex neurological process and I go to painstaking efforts to ensure that what I teach here, on the podcast and in classrooms is “first responder friendly.” I don’t ever want a

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Episode 202 | Relationship Bias

The episode explores how relationship bias can impact situational awareness.  Length: 29 minutes click the YouTube icon to listen

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Explaining Resistance to Change

Imagine for a moment that you’re part of a 4-person first-due crew responding on to an apartment fire. On the way to the call the dispatcher announces over the radio that a caller is reporting the fire to be on the first floor of a three-story apartment building. Your company officer tells you that on

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Every EMS Call Starts with Scene Safety

“Scene Safe, BSI.” These words have been uttered by every first responder who has ever received medical training. In fact, any responder who has performed a practical exercise for certification knows the first two mandatory skills to be completed on the evaluation checklist are: (1) Ensure the scene is safe before entering; and (2) Don

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