In my old company, crew tended to be together for a long time. I always thought it would be a great idea to send the entire crew to Firefighting classes but the Company always feel back on they can attend classes at their Unions.
My thought for sending the entire crew is they could work together on fighting REAL fires and learn teamwork. You can drill all you want but the tendency to zone out because of running the same type of drill all the time. Let’s face it you can have as many different scenarios but when it comes down to it they are all the same. Someone gets dressed out in gear and does the entry.
I’ve been though my fair share of emergencies and you never know how anyone will react until the real thing happens. I’ve seen guys that you thought would be great fold under the pressure. One time I had a CM stand there with the radio frozen in place.
There was one fire in our ER and I insisted on making the entry so I could make sure the power was off. In this case the fire had damaged the Emergency Stops, go figure as they had just been tested the week before. Looking back maybe it was not the best decision as if I got hurt what happens but at the time it was the best of not so best ideas.