The Chelsea Standard
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Firefighters practice high-altitude, high-risk rope rescue at Jiffy silos
By Edward Freundl, Staff Writer
PUBLISHED: October 9, 2008
hey might not be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, but Chelsea firefighters can now rescue you if you decide to try.
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During the past two weekends, about a dozen firefighters were trained in advanced "technical rescue" techniques in low-angle and high-angle rope rescues.
Chelsea Area Fire Authority Capt. Augie Syrovy coordinated the training sessions.
"This is different from the usual things we do," Syrovy said.
High-angle rope rescue "is its own specialty," Syrovy pointed out.
"It's one of four technical rescue disciplines; everything starts with ropes and builds on that," he said.
"This will tie into the confined space rescue class we'll have next spring."
The other technical rescue areas are low-angle rope, confined space, and trench rescue.
"This morning we went to the sledding hill at M-52 and Waterloo Road to practice low-angle rescue, like for sledding injuries or a when car goes off the road," Syrovy said Sunday.
"Once we take charge of a patient at the scene, we don't want to do anything that will injure them further," he added.
"We use a rope system to minimize that so if they do fall, they just go down to their knees — it's easier on the victims, and easier on our guys."
As it turns out, the 110-foot silos at Chelsea Milling is not only the ideal location for training, it's the only place where this kind of rescue has taken place locally in several years.
"The only high-angle rescue in Washtenaw County that I can remember was in 2001 or 2002, right here at the silos; a painting crew got stuck up there somehow," recalled CAFA Chief Jim Payeur, who was with the Pittsfield department at the time.
"Pittsfield and Ann Arbor sent their teams. They had a 105-foot aerial ladder parked next to the tracks, it was fully extended straight up and we still lacked a few feet."
The firefighters spent several days learning the ropes, so to speak, before putting their experience on the line.
"Last weekend we worked on all the knots and lowering systems, and today we put together everything we learned in the last two weekends," Payeur said Sunday.
The first task was to scale the 102 steps on a metal ladder straight up to the top of the silos to attach the anchoring systems.
That's why they call it a "high-angle rescue," Syrovy said.
"We'll simulate a roof-based rescue," Syrovy said.
"There are two types of technical rope rescue: ground-based, where all the equipment stays on the ground; and roof-based, where all the gear is on the roof. We're thankful that Jiffy is letting us do this."
Two instructors led the local firefighters through the classroom training and also took up positions on the silo to run through the scenario.
Chris Smith of the Southfield Fire Department and Joaquin Martinez of the Grand Rapids Fire Department taught the protocol of the Michigan Urban Search And Rescue (MUSAR) Task Force, and each works with fire departments about once a month on a variety of rescue simulations.
"By doing this they are meeting the standards for training, and this meets the 'operations' level," Smith said. "We believe in realistic training."
Martinez added: "This meets NFPA (National Fire Protection Association) standards.
"In every town, no matter how big or small, there's something like this where people could require a rescue — a silo, a tall building or a water tower.
"This is a good group of guys here - they are eager and willing to learn and very receptive, and that's important."
Firefighter Sam Norton was chosen to be the incident commander for the roof rescue, coordinating the distribution of personnel on the roof, on the silo and on the ground, and keeping track of all the activity.
"The rescuer will 'pick off' the dangling victim and they will be lowered to the catwalk, where they will determine the condition of both victims," Norton explained. "The one in worse condition will be removed first."
A crew from Huron Valley Ambulance was standing by just in case they were needed.
While the roof team was setting the gear in place, the "victims" were positioning themselves along another set of steps about 50 feet to the left.
It was 49 steps up to reach the catwalk, where the first "victim," Firefighter Jeff Grau, was to lie on his back feigning unconsciousness; and another 20 to a platform from which the second "victim," Firefighter Robert Stetzler, would lower himself on ropes between the platform and the catwalk and dangle from a harness.
"This is a very nice training site; I'm glad Jiffy is allowing us to do this," Martinez noted. "The access is impeded, and climbing the ladder with all the gear makes it even more of a challenge."
Setting the anchorage points proved to be more difficult than anticipated, and more than an hour elapsed before the first rescuer made his way over the edge of the roof and down to Stetzler.
"We used a ton of equipment up there," Payeur said. "We have to tie two or three anchors together so the weight is distributed on the main line, and you have to do that with the second or belaying line, too.
"It's a fail-safe system with two independent anchor points."
Norton said that the roof crew had trouble finding sufficient anchor points.
"They had to tie one off, then tie that off again and tie it off a third time," Norton said.
"We'll have to talk to the folks at Jiffy about that; they'll need to fix that in case we have another rescue, and we'll also want to continue our training here."
Once they got going, though, the rescue team wasted little time in bringing their objectives down to earth.
Once Stetzler was on the catwalk, rescuers determined that he could make it the rest of the way down the ropes on his own while they hooked the "unconscious" Grau into a harness.
"This was very exciting, I'd even say exhilarating almost," Stetzler said.
"It's good that we have the opportunity to do this, knowing how to respond to it, and how to have our people get to know the building.
"Once the class is done, we're going to come up with a system to keep our skills sharp."
Back on the ground, Grau admitted to a bout of acrophobia.
"This was pretty neat, for as much as I'm afraid of heights," he said. "While I was up there it seemed like it took forever for them to get to me."
Lt. Bill Warner of the Summit Township Fire Department outside Jackson was the only non-Chelsea firefighter involved in the training.
"I researched the class and I was interested in taking it; my department allowed me to come over here and I'm going to take what I learned back to my guys and relay the information," Warner said.
"It was a great class. I'm very appreciative that Chelsea let me come over here and do this.
"Chelsea's got a bunch of smart guys; they've got their stuff together and they are very well trained."
Syrovy said local fire departments aren't required to provide this level of rescue, but it's a local decision.
Three CAFA members currently serve on the countywide technical rescue team, Syrovy noted, and the recent training would give Chelsea added capabilities.
"The idea is we'd have the ability to do the setup and (the county team would) be able to pick up where we left off," he said.
"As a department it's going to strengthen us."
Despite a rope rescue at the silos being a rare occurrence, Payeur said that there are plenty of places in CAFA's service area where the skills can be useful, such as the Chelsea grain elevator, water towers and farm silos.
"We'll end up with 12 people certified in rope rescue operations; even Pittsfield's not going to have that many," Payeur said.
"I'm pretty confident that if something happened our guys would be pretty well prepared."
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