Good afternoon everyone,
Background/Example
The few suggestions that I am making in this post will pertain to Special Operations on the fire side. Many departments resort to combining both their Technical Rescue (TRT) and Hazmat teams into one special operations team. Mostly due to the expensive costs of having two separate teams and the equipment associated with each team. Additionally, a majority of departments have multiple units that encompass a Hazmat or TRT team, not just one unit. With my department (Broward Sheriff Fire Rescue), we have two separate teams that incorporate multiple units. For the Hazmat team, we have an engine, quint, medic, hazmat (heavy rescue), decon trailer, and a special operations battalion chief. For our TRT team, it includes a truck, medic, heavy rescue, collapse trailer, and the same special operations battalion chief as the hazmat team.
Suggestions
With that being said, I was suggesting a few things:
- Special Operations Unit- Having a unit that can serve as a heavy rescue or hazmat on calls. As stated above, this is a common occurrence within the fire service.
- Fire Academy Classes- Creation of a Technical Rescue course at the fire academy. Needed for staffing the Heavy Rescue and being apart of a TRT/USAR team.
- Ability of having Engines, Ladders, etc. to affect a hazmat/TRT/USAR call- Having the ability for any unit to affect the time remaining more than a regular unit as long as the crew as the cert required for that particular call.
Conclusion
All in all, the goal of this suggestion is to help enhance realism along with giving players a new task of getting complete special operations team in service. You can put anyone through a hazmat course but their is currently no course for a Technical Rescue course. If you were able to put personnel through the hazmat and TRT course, they would be able to act as a special operations unit and function as both a hazmat and TRT/USAR (Heavy Rescue) team. I appreciate any feedback relating to the suggestion if it is not biased (meaning just because your area doesn't utilize it, doesn't mean other areas around the country don't). I added some examples through pictures below. Let me know what you think!
[Blocked Image: http://www.usfirepolice.net/fl_florida/fl_boca_raton_special_operation_6_(2).jpg][Blocked Image: http://aemstatic-ww1.azureedge.net/content/dam/fa/online-articles/2015/11/Photo-of-the-Day/FA111915-POD-SL.jpg]
[Blocked Image: https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7571/15708218203_11ecbb2c42_b.jpg]
Username: US_DMAT
Alliance: National Emergency Services
Role: Alliance Co-founder, Admin, Emergency Services Director