incident command Archives - Page 9 of 26 - Situational Awareness Matters!™

Situational Awareness Thoughts and Observations About Covid-19 (Episode 313)

Leave a Comment / Accountability, Anger, Assumptions, Attitude, Biases, Bravado, Communications, Competency, Complacency, Confusion, Defiance, Denial, Distractions and Interruptions, Emotions, Expectations, Fatigue, Fear, Frustration, Human Behavior, Human Factors, Hyper Vigilance, Information overload, Invincible, Leadership, Mindfulness, Miscommunications, Mission, Multitasking, Over Confident, Overload, Overwhelm, Perception Of Reality, Personal Protective Equipment, Preoccupation, Pressure, Risk, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Shared Mental Models, Situational awareness, Situational Readiness, Standard Operating Procedures/Guidelines, Stress, Teamwork, Training, Under Confident, understaffing, Vigilance / Rich Gasaway

In this episode, I share situational awareness thoughts and observations about the COVID-19 Pandemic and address 25 situational awareness barriers that are causing me concern. Length: 65 minutes Click the YouTube icon to watch the full VIDEO __________________________________________________ All of our live event topics are now available, virtually. CLICK HERE for details, enrollment […]

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A line of duty death perspective – The Jeff Dickey Story (Episode 312)

Leave a Comment / Accountability, Assumptions, Building Construction, Communications, Culture, Decision Making, Disoriented, Distractions and Interruptions, Gut Feeling, Human Error, Human Factors, Line of Duty Death, Mayday, Mayday and RIT, Mental Models, Mission, Mission Myopia, Personal Protective Equipment, Personnel location, Radios, Risk, Risk Assessment, Safety, SAMatters Radio, Size Up, Staffing, Standard Operating Procedures/Guidelines, Stress, Teamwork / Rich Gasaway

Lieutenant Jeff Dickey has served the Washington, D.C. Fire Department for more than 30 years. Jeff was an acting officer during an incident where a DC firefighter was killed and Jeff was on the crew that recovered his body. Length: 59 minutes Click the YouTube icon to watch the full VIDEO

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The Communications Specialist Role in Forming Situational Awareness

Leave a Comment / Accountability, Article, Assumptions, Attention Management, Auditory exclusion, Confabulation, Distractions and Interruptions, Emotions, Risk Assessment, Size Up / Rich Gasaway

Some of the least appreciated members of the emergency response team are the communications specialists (in some venues, termed dispatchers). How do I know this? First, I served as a communications specialist (my job title was “dispatcher”) early in my career and I was routinely subjected to criticism and ridicule from responders because the information

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Commanders in Turnout Gear

18 Comments / Article, Decision Making, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Leadership, Safety, Situational awareness / Rich Gasaway

I recently read, with great interest, a very long thread on Facebook about whether or not an incident commander should wear turnout gear at a fire scene. As my focus and passion is improving first responder situational awareness, I would like to address this issue from that perspective. The feedback on Facebook was, as expected,

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Mission Myopia

Leave a Comment / Article, Attention Management, Bravado, Decision Making, Expectations, Mission Myopia, Safety, Size Up, Teamwork / Rich Gasaway

The tones drop for an apartment building fire. On the way, dispatch is advising multiple calls, confirming a working fire and the possibility of people trapped. The mind of the officer on the aerial platform is busy processing – thinking – anticipating – what will need to be done upon arrival? Of course, truck work

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Physical Condition Assessments Improve Situational Awareness

Leave a Comment / Accountability, Article, Checklists, Crew Resource Management, Decision Making, Fatigue, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Human Factors, PAR, Physical Fitness, Safety, Stress, Technology, Weather / Rich Gasaway

One of the primary purposes of a Personnel Accountability Report (PAR) is to ensure the incident commander and safety officer know where crews are and that all members are accounted for. In the event of a rapid change in conditions or an unforeseen turn of events, the PAR can be used to quickly account for

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Situational Awareness Lessons from a Line of Duty Death

Leave a Comment / Complacency, Crew Resource Management, Decision Making, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Line of Duty Death, Personnel location, Risk Assessment, Safety, Simulation, Situational awareness, Situational Readiness, Size Up, Task Saturation, Teamwork / Rich Gasaway

Watch this YouTube video detailing the circumstances of a firefighter line of duty death in which a firefighter from British Columbia was tragically killed when a shipping container exploded without warning. Oftentimes when a firefighter is killed in the line of duty the lessons are not shared. Credit to the department and the province for

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Time to Task Completion is Critical for Situational Awareness

3 Comments / Article, Decision Making, Firefighter Situational Awareness, Leadership, Safety, Workload Management / Rich Gasaway

Your highest level of situational awareness is formed when you are able to make accurate predictions about future events. In science, we call this projection and it simply means you are able to predict, or project, future events. This is accomplished through mental models you develop that are founded in your training and experience. But

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The Normalization of Deviance

8 Comments / Article, Assumptions, Competency, Complacency, Expectations, Experience, Human Behavior, Neuroscience, Safety, Situational awareness / Rich Gasaway

It’s an odd term – normalization of deviance. But the term and the premise behind the term provides a valuable explanation as to some of the behaviors we observe in the first responder world. Defining the term Normalization: To make normal; to make an established standard. Deviance: Departing from the norm; performing

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Three types of stress

1 Comment / Article, Decision Making, Human Behavior, Human Factors, Safety, Situational awareness / Rich Gasaway

In this article, we discuss three types of stress: Acute stress, episodic acute stress, and chronic stress. First responders can, and often do, experience all three. Stress can impact firefighter situational awareness and, equally concerning, stress can have devastating long-term impacts. As I was writing this article I recalled various times during my thirty years

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