Hollister
– The old convalescent hospital on Southside Road was bustling
with firefighters, fire engines and piles of equipment on Thursday
morning. The only thing missing was the fire.
Hollister – The old convalescent hospital on Southside Road was bustling with firefighters, fire engines and piles of equipment on Thursday morning. The only thing missing was the fire.
Members of the Monterey-San Benito County unit of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection spent the day running through search-and-rescue drills. The firefighters – 18 in all – strapped on full fire gear, blacked out their masks and started searching the building.
Capt. Jim Dellamonica said it’s been a year since the department was able to do search-and-rescue drills in an unfamiliar structure.
“It’s not every day we get a building like this,” he said. “This is a luxury.”
The Hazel Hawkins Convalescent Hospital closed its doors in 2003, but Dellamonica said that when he learned about it two weeks ago, he saw the building as a great opportunity to send firefighters crawling through an unfamiliar area.
Although county firefighters do practice runs on a regular basis, Dellamonica said most of those drills have to happen in the fire station. That’s not ideal, he said.
“Even if you black out their masks (to simulate an environment with thick smoke), they still know their way around the station,” Dellamonica said. “In a real fire, you’re in a foreign environment the instant you walk through the door.”
Things looked challenging for the firefighters on Thursday, as teams blindly crawled along the hospital’s walls. Dellamonica said that in a real fire, that’s how the firefighters would be searching for people, although Thursday’s exercises were focused on basic techniques like coordinating with your partner. That’s essential to a firefighter’s survival, Dellamonica said.
“If your partner books and leaves you in the center of a room, you’ve only got a 30 percent chance of making it out alive,” he said.
The key to these exercises, according to training chief Reno DiTullio Jr., is getting in and out while everyone still has air.
Dellamonica said that a normal oxygen tank can hold up to 45 minutes of air, but that can be used up in just 10 minutes by firefighters who are working hard and breathing deeply.
Even Thursday’s drills, Dellamonica said, are a far cry from a real fire.
That’s why Dellamonica had hoped the department would be allowed to burn the hospital down. However, since San Benito County – which owns the building – is still figuring out what to do with the empty hospital, the fire department couldn’t destroy anything.
Dellamonica said he’s grateful for the county’s help, but he continues to keep an eye out for houses targeted for demolition. The fire department can put old furniture inside those homes and set them on fire, making for extremely realistic drills.
Dellamonica said anyone who wants the fire department to destroy their building can call him at 831-636-2080. However, he emphasized that the building has to be a viable training site.
Anthony Ha covers local government for the Free Lance. Reach him at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or [email protected].
