Congratulations to the Indianapolis Fire Dept. on the successful rescue of 2 children from a middle of the night house fire! The newspaper story states that the children's mother was woken up by the flames but was unable to get her children out of the house. IFD arrived and commenced an aggressive search and located both children. The children were found in a crib and under a bed. This story illustrates the importance of a rapid, systematic, thorough search. Here are some previous Brotherhood Instructors blogs about searching:
The "Searching Beds" blog is a fairly comprehensive guide to searching beds and bunk beds but we have yet to write about searching cribs. There are literally thousands of makes and models of cribs on the market. Hard and fast rules as to how to identify cribs are seldom useful so here are a few guidelines:
- Narrow vertical slatts that are close together
- High mattress
- Baby stuff: changing table, baby swing, toys
During our "Aggressive Search in Private Dwellings" lecture in Lockport, IL back in March the topic of bunk-cribs came up. Eddie Crombie from Hooks & Irons brought this up and it was the first time anyone else in the room had ever heard of such a thing. Just like bunk-beds, bunk-cribs stack one crib on top of another. It has been common practice to reach up after searching a bed to check for a bunk-bed and now the same must be done when searching cribs.
Again congratulations to FF Mike Hamilton and Capt Steve Sterrett for the successful rescue of these two little girls. Please pass these search blogs along to your fire service collegues and feel free to jump in with any questions, comments, or suggestions. As always, comments must be signed with your first and last name or department name in order to prevent unnecessary bashing and promote constructive discussion and learning.
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