ARFF is an acronym for Aircraft Rescue Fire Fighting. I first got started in ARFF back when I join the US Air Force Fire Protection field a while back, and it was called CFR back then which was the acronym for Crash Fire Rescue. Guess many didn’t care for the term “crash” in a fire fighting title so it was changed to the current ARFF title. I’m age dating myself when I use the CFR reference because many just don’t use it anymore and ARFF is the accepted term/title now a days. Took me awhile to get use to that change but we all must adapt to change. Besides the actual fire ground on any emergency can always be in a changing state.
I notice in my TFPFP Blog profile page here and my Twitter home page bio I have “ARFF Fire Fighter” and thought it be a good idea to explain it some what to those who visit both sites that might not be familiar with the ARFF term. Seems to always happen though, I’m thinking about two other subjects to write about and it’s the third one, that surfaces that I write about.
Now everyone knows what a Fireman...oh wait…its Fire Fighter now. Ha ha ha! Well, I’m still part Old School and still use the title Fireman now & then even thought it is Fire Fighter now.
Everyone though pretty much knows what a fire fighter is and does. The fire fighting job is basically such that you “put the wet stuff on the red stuff.” Well a lot of times that’s easier said then done. The job of fire fighting has become a pretty complex job now a days and especially when you throw in the Haz-Mat aspect that can develop at and on any emergency response.
Aircraft Rescue Fire Fighting or ARFF is a type of fire fighting that is specialize for when an airplane or helicopter that departs and arrives at an airport or field which may have an emergency issue with it. There are two types of emergencies but are basically either a “Ground Emergency” or a “In-flight Emergency.”
The primary purpose and goal for any ARFF emergency is to save lives if possible. This is achieved by the ARFF fire fighter being trained to establish what is called a rescue path to the aircraft once on the ground if it’s in-flight, and prepared to battle large volumes of acrid smoke, rapid heat build up, fight fire, lots of fire depending on the amount of fuel is being carried on the aircraft, and perform rescue. The ARFF fire fighter receives training includes structural firefighting tactics, aircraft familiarization, confined-space training, aircraft rescue, vehicle familiarization and aircraft egress. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
As to what an actual aircraft CFR or ARFF incident may look like, here’s a YouTube footage of an actual ARFF related incident of the B-2 crash that happened on Feb 23, 2008 at Anderson AFB, Guam. You’ll see first a B-2 take off normally and then @ 1:45 into the video it will show a second B-2 taking off that will crash at about the 7000 ft mark of the runway:
Like any disaster, an aircraft accident may require actions that do not fall into a predictable pattern. When there is any doubt on a crash site or any fire ground for that fact the ARFF fire fighter takes the course of action based on one’s own experience, training, and judgment that will dictate an outcome in order to minimize the risk to victims and rescue personnel.
There is a long training process to become an ARFF fire fighter with a lot of class room instruction and actual hands on training through simulated fire training exercises/drills. The result of this train as is in any fire protection training is to prepare. In most cases the over all training conducted and done gives the confidence to the ARFF fire fighter of being able to perform under what ever circumstance may develop.
Here’s another YouTube called “ARFF Operations” that starts off showing some more actual real aircraft crashes that ARFF fire fighters had to respond to and battle. It gives a pretty good prospective of what an actual crash site can look like and develop into. The video then switches showing what I would call the as close to reality as one can get ARFF hands-on training that is done:
Hopefully this little glimpse of what ARFF is, gives a better outlook of what this part of the fire protection field is about. I have to say also, that those that do structral fire fighting, hazardous material responses, and emergency medical services, be they paid or volunteer, response and work equally as hard to perform on any emergency scene. Lots and lots of training as well as after incident review on how an emergency operation could have been done better. The only problem is, it’s never the same as the last one. So you can see now that it is a little more then just “putting the wet stuff on the red stuff.”
(The usual disclaimers: I am not a journalist; This is a blog that expresses an outlook and is not conclusive in any shape or manner.)
