Reflections on AFM’s first Virtual Fire Training Symposium

by: Hank Clemmensen, Board Member AFM; Retired Fire Chief, Palatine Rural Fire Protection District, IL

What a year 2020 has been in the United States, from COVID-19 to the protests and riots to some of the worst Western wildfires and hurricanes in the golf shores.  At times, we forget that it hasn’t been any better in other parts of the world and some of those places are not as prepared to handle these types of disasters.  

This is one of driving forces behind what we do at the Africa Fire Mission, why since 2012 we have traveled halfway around the world to help support the fire service in Africa. I’ve been participating in team trips with AFM since 2015.  During the fall of 2019, I spent more than 5 weeks in Africa working with fire fighters in Zambia and Kenya, sharing leadership skills that I have learned in the United States during my career in the fire service.  As difficult as that was for 5 weeks being in different countries and away from family, I would almost prefer it then teaching virtually.  

Although Kenyans speak English, they prefer to speak Swahili with their own dialytic.  When teaching in person, you pick up quick on their expression when you say something that they don’t understand.  However, when doing a virtual class, not until you get their homework or quiz back that you realize they missed some of main points of the lecture.

It was not until late summer that the final decision was made that we would not be traveling, and we were going to do a virtual symposium for the firefighters in Kenya.  Now how do we this virtual online training with volunteer instructors, no budget for IT support, little or no experience with putting together a virtual training symposium, and about 4 months to put it all together.  Not to mention the 9-hour time difference and the limited internet access in Kenya.

My first thought was that if my grandkids can do remote learning at home, I should be able to handle one forty-hour class.  A big thanks to Nancy Moore and the hours she put into setting up Google Classroom for this virtual learning.  The first challenge was to learn all I could about Google Classroom, and then figure out how to record the training since it would not be practical to try to do this live with the time difference.  Then of course, editing of those videos we recorded, which was a real learning process.   Let us not forget we had to come up with the class content, quizzes, and homework.  Now I remember why I gave up on secondary education and went into the fire service.

The good news was that most of the instructors for the different classes worked in teams.  I was fortunate enough to have Chief Kevin Milan, with the South Metro Fire Rescue in Colorado and Rick Best from the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation working with me on the Leadership class.  We created are videos with Zoom, which allowed us to have guest speakers join in and with some of my new video editing skills, it looked like we did it all in one take.

Another big issue was Internet access for our students and having enough band width to play all the videos and being to download the Google Classroom documents.  It appeared that most of the students used their cell phones to access Google and complete their homework assignments/quizzes.  It was amazing to see how hard they worked to make sure that homework was completed and submitted.  Although we may have better Internet access in the US, the firefighters in Africa really have the drive to make the technology work for them.

Being the first virtual Fire Symposium in Africa by Africa Fire Mission with more than 600 students from around the world (more than 16 countries represented), 20 volunteer instructors, and in the middle of a Covid-19 pandemic, I believe it was a great success.  Firefighters in Africa have proven again that they are extremely motivated to continue their mission to learn and improve the fire service their countries.  Every year I make new friends and learn so much from our brothers and sisters in Africa which is why I look forward to returning to Africa in the Fall of 2021.

For more information about AFM’s Mission’s in 2021 check out: Join a Mission

COVID-19 Vaccine - information for individuals interested in traveling with AFM

Dear AFM Team Members and Partners:

As the COVID-19 Vaccine is becoming available to many of us, we have received a number inquiries from team members about that vaccine and AFM's position/policy on the vaccine.  I wanted to take this opportunity to share with you AFM's policy on vaccinations and the information that AFM is receiving from our partners around the world. 

AFM does not require or proscribe that team members receive certain or any vaccinations to be a part of a team traveling overseas.  We provide all team members with the CDC recommendations for vaccines for the area a team will be traveling and encourage each team member to consult with their personal doctors and make the decision they feel best suits them individually.  

The only time a vaccine is required to be a part of a team is when it is required as a condition of entry into a country our team will be working in.  For example: many countries do require proof yellow fever vaccine for entry.  In those cases, a team member would need to have the correct yellow fever vaccine to be a part of the team so that they could enter the country.

At this time, no country we are working in requires the COVID-19 Vaccine for entry, although almost all require a quarantine period upon arrival.  The feedback AFM is receiving from our partners in many of the countries we are working in is that in the near future, the COVID-19 Vaccine may well be required for entry into the country or to enter the country without having to first go through a quarantine period.

I wanted to share the information that we are receiving from our global partners with you so that you may consider this information as you make your decisions about taking the COVID-19 Vaccine when it becomes available to you.  

We are optimistic that we will be able to put a team or two on the ground in Africa in the autumn of 2021.  AFM is actively working with our partners to stay up to date on entry and other requirements for the countries we are serving in and we will pass that information on to potential team member so that they can make informed decisions. 

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to me.  We know that many questions do not have definitive answers yet but we will do our best to find answers to questions you may have.

 Thank you for all you're doing to support AFM and firefighters across the world.

Sincerely, Dave Moore, Executive Director

For additional information on the COVID-19 Vaccine and other travel related Health and vaccine questions we recommend visiting the Center for Disease Control, Traveler’s Health

Mission Critical: Recognizing our Volunteers

On October 10, 2020 Africa Fire Mission during our Annual Fundraiser, Africa Fire Mission was pleased to honor Amelia Smith and Jonathan Seastone.   (watch the 2020 Chama on Facebook >)

Africa Fire Mission thrives on volunteers.   Volunteers are really the heart of our organization.   We have dozens and dozens of volunteers. We have volunteers from all across the United States, Africa and Europe that help to make AFM run on a daily basis.   In 2019, Africa Fire Mission logged 8851 volunteer hours!   These men, women, firefighters, civilians and children are all a vital part of Africa Fire Mission being able to achieve its goals and objectives. 

Amelia Smith – Volunteer of the Year

Amelia is resourceful, relentless, takes on tasks with little direction, helps us to implement new projects that expand our mission.   Amelia traveled with LifeSpring Christian Church and Africa Fire Mission to Kenya several years ago and since then has been a dedicated volunteer along with her husband, Andy.  Thank you Amelia for all that you have done and all that you will do for Africa Fire Mission and those that we serve around the world.  Amelia says:  “It has been great to watch Africa Fire Mission grow and adapt through the years.  I’m grateful to be able to support AFM behind the scenes.”

When Africa Fire Mission travels with a team to provide training in Africa or other parts of the world, our team members volunteer their time, talents and treasures to provide world class training to our partners.  Our instructors, undergo training in advance of the trip to prepare of the mission and prepare the lessons that they will teach in our week long fire training events.   We have been fortunate to have many instructors return year after year and continue to build each year on the training that they have been providing as well as to build strong relationships with firefighers and our overseas partners. 

Jonathan Seastone, Trainer of the Year Denver Fire Department –

Jon has gone above and beyond the call of duty.  He has been on multiple missions and has recruited instructors for our work in Kenya, Zambia and Ukraine.   He has led new instructors to challenge themselves to teach the right material at the right level for the firefighters we serve.   Jon pushes and encourages the firefighters he teaches at our training events to push themselves beyond their limits, to be stronger than they think they are.   Jon is not afraid to hold Chief Fire Officers, in the countries where we serve, accountable for safe and advanced training for their firefighters so that their firefighters are able to serve their communities and to protect themselves from the dangers of fire. Jon and his wife Shandy, who serves as AFM’s volunteer Mission Teams Coordinator, have both helped to grow AFM’s programs in countless ways.   Jon says: “With every trip I’ve wanted to something bigger (with the training) and we are accomplishing that.   This award means alot.” 

Interested in volunteering with AFM in administrative roles or as one of our international instructors?

Collaborating During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Kevin Milan, Assistant Fire Chief, South Metro Fire Rescue Authority, Colorado, USA

The lessons learned as an Africa Fire Mission instructor are many. Arguably, I learned much more from the Kenyan fire chiefs attending leadership training in November of 2019 than they possibly could have learned from me. I also learned a great deal teaching alongside Chief Hank Clemmensen who essentially wrote the book on emergency service leadership. What I didn’t realize while immersed in the Kenyan experience was the lessons learned were preparing me to deal with the COVID-19 virus as a leader in my fire department. Establishing common goals, aligning vison, and increasing respect are lessons from a leadership ‘game’ in Kenya that applied directly to managing our pandemic response. 

Through a leadership exercise Hank lead, the Kenyan Fire Chiefs tried to Win All You Can. Small groups worked together to choose options and negotiate with other teams to maximize their returns. The short-term gains and losses in the first rounds showed the Chiefs they could anticipate, but not guarantee success by looking out for their own best interest. One simple change of heart or decision by an individual dramatically altered the ‘plan’ and often ended in disaster for several groups. The final round brought the realization that only through cooperation and collaboration can everyone benefit. An attitude of winning collectively paid far greater benefits than winning for your team. 

Fast forward 90 days from Kenya, and I attended the first planning meeting for my agency’s response to COVID in the United States. The Win All You Can game was replaying before my eyes. The attitude in the meeting was we had to win; win N-95 masks, gowns, personal protective equipment, even toilet paper. The group schemed ways to end run systems, triple order, and even considered paying 800% mark ups for hard to get resources. The short-term losses and disappointments showed us very quickly that winning as a department was not going to benefit the collective response to the pandemic.  

I was able to share the lessons I learned in Kenya in a non-threatening manner. I explained how the Kenyan Chiefs learned to work together for the common good. We even ran an abbreviated version of Win All You Can with our incident support team. This ultimately led us to looking across disciplines, industries, and borders to take care of all responders.  

We were able to share the supplies we had in excess and accept alternatives proven out in private industry. We shared our strategies with hospitals and came to a common understanding: We are all in this together. This collaborative attitude with goals, vision, and respect is a recipe for success. I am forever in debt to my Kenyan sisters and brothers for teaching me a lesson of a lifetime. Thank you, AFM, for all you do – you are making a difference every day.   

Improving Water Supply for the Fire Service in Africa

Edward Collet, Jackson Township Fire Department Firefighter/EMT, Ohio; Ohio Fire Chiefs Association Water Supply Technical Advisory Committee Co-Chair

I spent a week in November 2019 as part of the Africa Fire Mission’s training cadre teaching at the 2019 Kenya Fire and EMS Symposium.  Brian Burkhardt from Greenville, Indiana Fire Department and I taught water supply and pump operations.  Wow, what an experience!  It definitely made me appreciate all we have available to us both as firefighters and in everyday life.  Unfortunately, the fire service in Kenya does not have the level of respect and support from the community we enjoy.  People will throw rocks and cut lines when they feel the fire department takes too long to respond or runs out of water.  But the firefighters I met are not deterred by this.  Just like us, in the United States, the job is a calling to serve the community.   This was a driving force for the level of participation at the training symposium put on by Africa Fire Mission and its local partners.  There were over 300 participants for fire and EMS classes and roughly 30 in the pump operations and water supply class wanting to learn how to better service their communities.  It was an awesome week of training and learning for the students and the instructors. 

The Kenyan firefighters were eager to learn how water supply is managed in the US.   Few departments have hydrants and rely on wells and storage tanks for water.  They are very reluctant to use lakes and rivers as water sources to avoid contaminating the tanks on the fire apparatus.  Many students were drinking from the tanks, so this probably a reason they only want to use clean water.   Tanks on engines are normally 3000 liters, about 800 gallons, and tenders carry 11,000 liters, 2,900 gallons.  Pumping operations are done mainly from the tank, fortunately the tank to pump plumbing is roughly 4” which allows full pump capacity to be supplied form the tank.  When the engine’s tank runs dry, tenders fill the attack engine’s tank through one of two direct tank fills.  Unfortunately, engines have larger pumps than tenders meaning the tenders were the limitation in flow.  Due to this difference in pump capacity, I broke the cardinal rule of offloading one tender at a time during our high flow scenario.  To keep the engine’s tank level over a quarter full while flowing roughly 750-1000gpm we had to fill the engine’s tank with two tenders at once.  This is not a tactic normally used in the US, but it worked well to maintain a high flow with these apparatus.   This emphasized a key concept of the class, know your apparatus, how to optimize what it can do to minimize the impact of things it cannot.

Standpipe hydrant

Pump plumbing

Schematic

Tank Interior

Relay pumping was something new to most students.  None of the apparatus at the training had an adapter to go from the large threaded pump inlet to the quick release style 65mm (2 ½”) supply line.  The students said their departments did not have these adapters.  Most apparatus do not carry any adapters since both 65mm and 35mm hose use the same 65mm couplings.  I was fortunate to find the proper adapter in the airport training facility.  The students were intrigued by relay pumping as it demonstrated the additive potential of centrifugal pumps.  While it is not a tactic they will normally use, it was a good learning experience.  Several students even said they were going to get the adapter for their fire brigade in the future. 

 We had access to a self-supporting dump tank for drafting practice.  This was the first time many students drafted from an external source.  Self-supporting tanks are not something I normally work with so there was a bit of a learning curve for everyone.  It would definitely be difficult to fill with a rapid dump chute like US tenders have.  The tank had a connection for a fill line at the bottom.  We used this connection to fill the tank using the tender’s pump.  This limited the flow rate to that of tender’s pump.  This tactic will suffer from the same issue caused by the difference in tender and engine pump capacity seen when nurse the engine.  Equipment configuration definitely requires rethinking tactics we tend to take for granted. 

Engine

Hose Couplings

Low level strainer

Priming pumps

The closest thing to a low-level strainer available was a river strainer with a check valve.  These are made to hang vertically in a river or pond from a bridge.  Without a swivel it was difficult to keep the strainer upright.  Once it tipped over, it drew air if the water level was not over 12” high.  Without a means to support the suction hose it crushed down the side of the tank limiting the fill level. Priming the pumps was different from priming American style pumps.  These pumps have an automatic priming system using two diaphragm pumps connected to the fire pump.  The priming pumps engage when air entered the fire pump.  Since the operators had never drafted before, getting a prime was a learning experience for all.  Back filling the pump and suction hose from the tank, increasing RPMs, and feathering the tank to pump valve till the prime took ended up being the best method we found to get a prime.  

We integrated drafting, nursing, and relay pumping into one drill to allow students a better understanding of how all the elements of water supply fit together.  They learned a water supply evolution does not come together quickly.  But with teamwork they were able to put everything together very few issues.   

The students took a lot away from this class.  Many said they would use things they learned to improve the water supply for their fire brigade.  I am grateful for this opportunity to join Africa Fire Mission and to represent the Ohio Fire Chiefs Association Water Supply Technical Advisory Committee and pass knowledge of water supply to the firefighters of Kenya.  I learned and grew as a firefighter, instructor, and person from this experience.  It is hard to describe the impact of seeing students gravitate to a subject and start teaching others in the group.  The work AFM is doing in Kenya and other countries is having a positive impact on empowering firefighters to improve their ability to serve their communities. 

Drafting and relay evolution setup

Thinking of Joining a AFM mission trip? Here's what you can expect

Submitted by: Lukas Watcher, volunteer firefighter, Ettenkirch, Friedrichshafen, Germany

What was your experience like?

I joined  Africa Fire Mission at the end of October 2019 for a trip to Zambia and in hindsight I am happy to say that it was the expected opportunity to develop myself while I could to really meaningful work.  On the one hand there is a big lack of knowledge, good training and equipment which is sad to see but on the other hand there is a good thing, an important thing: There is motivation in the eyes of every Zambian firefighter we trained and there is a huge desire of improving in the fire service in Zambia. They need to be taught and most important they want to be taught – by us, by you! 

How did the trip impact you?

The trip had a huge impact on me because everyone of us believes to know about life in Africa and their needs, you can see that on TV whenever you want. But you don´t really KNOW when you haven´t been there. When I returned home I started to appreciate all these little things, like drinking water out of your water tap. I don´t want to say you need to go there to help, but you can support someone who does. I have been to different projects in Africa and I realized it is not done by donating money. You have to make sure that you know how the organization works. Africa Fire Mission is not just about supporting and raising funds which are afterwards wasted for non-sustainable goods. AFM is about training, empowering and encouraging. I am glad that I got the opportunity to experience how that works! 

What could others expect if they were to come on a AFM trip?

If you join an AFM trip you can expect a great time full of meaningful work, nice people and a new sight on fire service. You can improve while helping others to improve and you will be able to experience a very exemplary way of development aid. An AFM trip is a role model of encouraging, empowering, supporting and training and you will be hammered by the dedication and kindness of your team members – so was I! Somehow it is unique how people who are associated to the fire service work together – it is a big family and with AFM your on a family trip!   

Learn more about upcoming mission trips with AFM at: https://www.africafiremission.org/join-a-mission