THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, August 10, 1996 TAG: 9608100253
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JUNE ARNEY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: 174 lines
City firefighters routinely fudge training records to meet their department's two-hour-per-shift training requirement because of pressure to do building inspections and keep fire stations and equipment in order, current and former firefighters say.
The practice of documenting training that wasn't completed has been entrenched for years, according to two former firefighters and another half-dozen former and current firefighters who said they cannot be named for fear of jeopardizing their jobs.
Although some shifts are doing the department-mandated training, falsifying of records occurs on as many as nine of every 10 shifts in fire companies across the city, firefighters say. Each month firefighters typically work 10 shifts of 24 hours each.
At worst, firefighters say the failure to do routine training may compromise on-the-job performance. Others think there is little effect on performance.
The department's training and other procedures have come under scrutiny since the deaths of firefighters John Hudgins Jr. and Frank Young in a March fire at the Advance Auto Parts Store on Indian River Road.
Among the policies examined by critics are the department's training requirements and the so-called ``two-in, two-out rule'' that requires that two firefighters be outside to back up two others inside a burning building.
Richard L. Griggs Jr., who spent 21 years with the Chesapeake Fire Department and was released to worker's compensation in December 1995 after an injury, said he was concerned for many years that training was not taken seriously. He is currently appealing to get his disability retirement.
``It was taken lightly,'' Griggs said. ``The danger in not training is you wouldn't be as sharp when it came time to make instant decisions.''
The kind of training featured in those sessions should include such topics as search and rescue, use of ropes, practice on hoses, forcible entry into a building, ladder training and practice on self-contained breathing apparatus.
Griggs, 46, worked in every fire station in the city except new station No. 5 in Great Bridge. He said the only exception to a generally lackadaisical attitude toward training was when he worked under Lewis White, now a captain at Station No. 12.
Griggs, however, said he does not want to see Chesapeake singled out for neglecting routine training.
``Other departments probably fudge, too,'' he said. ``My feeling is that it's probably going on everywhere.''
In Chesapeake, training many times consisted of throwing a videotape in a VCR and trying to stay awake through it, Griggs said.
He gave the example of a safety talk on cold weather: `` `Remember to keep your hands warm.' That was it. It was just for everybody's information, in case someone asked.''
``The men would have appreciated quality training, but the attitude of the administration was we just had to stay busy with busy work all day to appease public scrutiny,'' he said. ``You had to always have those engines parade-ready. In Chesapeake, if you went around the block, you had to wash the wheel wells at minimum. So . . . if you could skate on something, you did.''
Griggs acknowledged that the firefighters were partly to blame for the failure to routinely train. He didn't always admit to his supervisors a weakness in training in a particular area out of fear of repercussions.
``I didn't articulate it because there seemed to be punitive actions taken,'' Griggs said. ``They might assign it to you to do a class on it.''
And not every Chesapeake engine company fudges training records, said Mark A. Simmons, president of the local firefighters union, and others.
``We're not fudging ours,'' said the veteran firefighter assigned to a ladder company at station No. 5. ``I've been there long enough that I train the rookies anyway. I'm not going to let someone get me hurt.''
Chesapeake Fire Chief Michael L. Bolac has said he has placed new emphasis on training during his 10-year tenure. But current and former firefighters tell a different story.
Bolac declined to be interviewed on the subject of training and has forbidden his staff to discuss the topic.
Curtis Massey, a Chesapeake firefighter from 1980 to 1991, said, ``The reason why we fudged on training was that we were overloaded on so many other things.''
Massey, who was fired from the department in 1990 and later won back his job as a ladder lieutenant, now runs Massey Enterprises Inc., a Norfolk-based company that maps fire prevention plans for high-rise buildings across the world.
``If you're out there all day doing business inspections, you can't get to train,'' he said. ``What are you going to do? You fudge the training records. operations?' We'd laugh. It was just a paper trail.''
Some Chesapeake engine companies do as many as 400 to 500 inspections a year, firefighters say.
Massey said he thinks hands-on training sessions like those done with a smoke-house - a concrete building that can be loaded with combustible materials to practice fighting fires - are more useful than shorter, station-house training sessions.
``If you're going to make a mistake, make it on the training ground,'' Massey said. ``Don't do it in a fire because then people are going to die. . . If you're not trained on a regular basis and don't keep your mind focused, you're going to make mistakes when the real thing comes along.''
Not all of his former co-workers were troubled by the lack of emphasis on training, he said.
``To the truly dedicated guys, there was a high level of concern that we weren't getting the training we should be getting,'' he said. ``To the people just there to get a paycheck, it didn't matter.''
Massey, who worked in eight different companies during his tenure with Chesapeake, said the practice of neglecting training was pervasive.
It probably is more dangerous in stations where firefighters are called to fires infrequently, he said.
``The time just was not allotted to get it done,'' Massey said. ``There was a higher degree of pressure to get inspections done than to do training.''
He said he did not feel bad about failing to complete the department mandated training. ``I had a high degree of confidence in my own abilities and knowledge,'' he said. ``I'd pull the guys aside during business inspections and show them different kinds of construction.''
Massey remembers a time when Chesapeake firefighters routinely drew scenarios on chalkboards and discussed how to handle them. Such training became less frequent under the current administration, he said.
``Other things came to be known to us as more important, like business inspections,'' he said. ``Once Bolac arrived, training seemed to be less of a focal point. I don't think training is anywhere near as emphasized in Chesapeake as it is in Virginia Beach and some of the other cities.''
Massey said firefighters in Chesapeake are as good as any in Virginia, but a lack of leadership and little emphasis on training in the department may compromise their effectiveness.
There are no state requirements for training per shift, officials say. The state does require that firefighters complete 135 hours of training to reach level one firefighter and re-certify after five years. Firefighter level two requires an additional 86 hours of training and must be re-certified after five years.
All firefighters must complete training on defensive driving, vehicle rescue, forcible entry, hazardous materials, rope rescue and other topics as part of their study.
A survey of Hampton Roads cities shows similar local training requirements. Portsmouth requires its firefighters to do 16 hours of training per month. Virginia Beach requires at least one hour per shift. Norfolk and Suffolk each require two hours per shift.
The Chesapeake standard is an average of two hours per on-duty shift.
Despite the minimum requirement, Norfolk firefighters do much more training per shift, according to Donald A. Haupt Jr., a spokesman for the Norfolk Fire Department.
``The more training you do, the more choreographed and standardized your operations become,'' Haupt said. ``There is a direct correlation between the amount and type of training you do and the number of injuries your own personnel can receive.''
Consistent training is essential to keep information fresh in the minds of firefighters, Haupt said.
``If you train day in and day out, you never get this cascade effect where one mistake leads to another mistake and then to a fatal mistake,'' he said.
Several Chesapeake firefighters say the problem is as much a lack of facilities and training materials as anything else. Without a training ground like many other cities have, Chesapeake firefighters must rely on what they can simulate on their own.
``What we don't get to do is to work on a fireground with the companies we respond with and get critical feedback on it,'' one firefighter said.
For years, the department had a one-man training bureau, firefighters said. There are now three people doing training. In contrast, Norfolk has nine, with another two temporarily assigned to that department. Virginia Beach has eight.
In Chesapeake, firefighters say, written reprimands fly quickly any time documentation on the two-hours-per-shift training is missing. When asked about training, one firefighter said: ``Do we have a training department? Only on paper''
Another firefighter said he left the Chesapeake department because he did not feel confident that the training he and his co-workers received was adequate.
``Training doesn't happen,'' said the former Chesapeake firefighter, who asked not to be named. ``It just gets written on paper. We get our state certification but everything else is faked . . . It's just insane that that's allowed . . . I think the guys I worked with are as good as any firefighters anywhere. But they're not trained.''
The former Chesapeake firefighter said he thought there was slightly more attention given to training since the fatal fire, but still not enough.
``Frank and Johnny died, and someone else is going to die,'' he said. ``I'd feel terrible if I didn't say anything.'' ILLUSTRATION: FIRE STAFFING AND TRAINING
The Virginian-Pilot
SOURCES: Local fire departments and city officials; research by June
Arney.
[For a copy of the chart, see microfilm for this date.]
KEYWORDS: CHESAPEAKE FIRE DEPARTMENT TRAINING by CNB