Rapid Ascent Team (RAT) Concept
Curtis S. D. Massey, president and CEO of Massey Enterprises, Inc., has assisted fire departments across the country by way of the Massey Disaster Plan, training and seminars, and personal appearances at emergency sites, as recounted in our Essays and Print section. In addition, he conceived of a concept called the Rapid Ascent Team (RAT), that has been beneficial in saving lives.
WBBM Newsradio 780
Fighting the 69 W. Washington St. fire
Steve Miller, November 25, 2003
Chicago – The man who designed the disaster plan for the Loop building where a fire killed six people says Chicago and other cities should consider a special team of firefighters for highrises.
They would be the fittest memebers of the fire department: the men and women who could get to the top of a highrise quickly — up the stairs with light equipment on — just to assess the scene.
This is the idea of Curtis Massey, the Virginia-based disaster planner who designed the disaster plan for the 69 West Washington building and for as many as five dozen other highrises in the Chicago area.
Curtis Massey is in Chicago for the first time since the County Administration Building fire. Massey praises the Chicago fire department.
But he says it may be time for Chicago and other cities to start thinking about equipping a group of fit firefighters with lightweight gear and airpacks — and powerful radios — for what he calls a “Rapid Ascent Team.”
“And their only objective is to get up to the top of the building as quickly as possible, assess the situation, report back to the command post, and direct as many people as they can out of harm’s way.”
WBBM Newsradio 780
Steve Miller, December 2004
Chicago – The firefighting expert who advised the Chicago Fire Department on ways to change its highrise fire attack plan says he is now hearing from other cities that are impressed with the Chicago has done.
Curtis Massey is the disaster plan expert who — for years — has been pushing what Chicago finally implemented: sending a specially designated Rapid Ascent Team to high-rise fires to sweep the stairwells from top to bottom — and keep doing it — to make sure everybody has made it out.
Since the LaSalle Bank Building fire a week ago and the success of the Rapid Ascent Teams — Massey has talked to fire fiefs in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Houston, and Philadelphia — All interested in possibly adopting Rapid Ascent Teams like Chicago’s.
“They were very much interested to hear what had happened because they had never heard of a city implementing that type of advance concept in highrise firefighting search and rescue procedures before.”
Massey says some of the chiefs in the other cities were concerned that dedicating a team to search and rescue would be a strain on manpower — because those search-and-rescue teams have to keep searching the stairwells throughout the fire.
Massey praised the Chicago Fire Department; had advised them free of charge last summer on ways to improve their performance at highrise fires.
Chicago Tribune
Firefighters say new procedures worked
Tribune staff reporters, December 7, 2004
Excerpted from online edition (see image at right):
A Monday night fire that damaged two floors of a Loop high-rise burned as long as it did because firefighters gave top priority to evacuating building occupants, officials said.
The fire burned for 5½ hours, damaging the 29th and 30th floors of the LaSalle National Bank Building, 135 S. LaSalle St., because “we wanted to make sure we could contain the fire until we were sure everyone was out of the building,” Fire Commissioner Cortez Trotter said.…
A Rapid Ascent Team of up to 75 firefighters immediately started floor-by-floor search-and-rescue operations while other personnel sought to contain the blaze, Trotter said.
Chicago Sun-Times
Fire Dept. makes sweeping changes in high-rise procedure
Fran Speilman, City Hall Reporter, September 21, 2004
The Chicago Fire Department will bolster its initial response to high-rise fires by 60 percent — and assign 10 of those firefighters exclusively to search and rescue — under sweeping changes unveiled Monday to prevent a repeat of the mistakes made at a deadly Loop high-rise fire.…
Ten of those people — on two of the four trucks — will be assigned to “rapid ascent teams” assigned exclusively to search and rescue.
Chicago Sun-Times
Firefighters took heat, saved lives
Fran Speilman, City Hall Reporter, December 8, 2004
Excerpted from online edition:
A five-alarm fire at the LaSalle Bank building raged for more than five hours in part because Chicago firefighters were “defending in place” — keeping the fire from spreading until they were certain employees had been safely evacuated, Fire Commissioner Cortez Trotter said Tuesday….
The Fire Department also assigned “50 to 75” firefighters — of the 450 uniformed personnel no the scene — to “rapid ascent teams” with exclusive responsibility for search and rescue. They were equipped with one-hour air bottles so they wouldn’t run out of oxygen.
USA Today
Chicago firefighters lauded for response to tower fire
Rick Hampson, December 6, 2004 (excerpt)
Photo by Candice Cusic, Chicago Tribune, via AP
Flames consumed the 29th floor of a Chicago office tower, and workers on floors above cowered under desks, leaned out of windows or called 911. Bystanders watched from the streets of the area known as the Loop, wondering if the city had learned from history or was about to repeat it.
When fire hit the 43-story building downtown that houses the LaSalle Bank’s corporate headquarters Monday night, the relevant reference point for Chicagoans was not the World Trade Center disaster but last year’s fire at the Cook County Administration Building that killed six people.
No one died Monday. And on Tuesday, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley praised the response that he said differed markedly from the one Oct. 17, 2003, at the 35-story building half a mile away.…
Paul Wertheimer of the National Fire Protection Association committee that deals with evacuations said the fire department established “rapid ascent teams” to find people and lead them to safety. [Fire Commissioner] Trotter said at least 50 to 75 firefighters did that Monday.