By Chief Richard R. Anderson, C.F.P.S., L.C.S.

When I read Chief Rusty Thomas's resignation letter, I thought of how it must have felt for him to write it. I thought of the pain those left behind are still feeling. I thought of fires where I was the one in charge, those on the inside were my friends, and how sometimes we were really just lucky. While I see many shake their head in wonderment and mutter sharp critiques of the chief under their breath, I can't help but believe that what happened in Charleston can and will happen again. In fact it has happened before.

It occurred to me that on any given day, under similar circumstances in many fire departments, the same out-come is predictable. Chief Rusty loved his department and his job. He knew they were proud, they were good, and they were doing what they had been doing for many years because it worked. No one was surprised that the reports revealed they weren't doing what the national standards said they should have. Can you honestly say that your department does?

When the ultimate challenge of a building with an extremely high fuel load, and no engineering solutions to minimize the predictable rapid fire spread comes, what will be your outcome? Maybe what has worked for years won't work this time. After all the reviews and investigations are conducted, authorities will likely conclude that it was predictable and preventable. It seems that we are very good at looking back and identifying what we should have done, but we are not so good at looking ahead.

Once we lose a brother or a sister we form a committee, or commission a blue ribbon panel of experts, and we begin to scrutinize everything that occurred. We question everything in an effort to prevent what has happened from happening again. Imagine ... What if we did a pre-fatality analysis, instead of a post-mortem analysis? What if we applied the same scrutiny before something happened. Why don't we do this?

Rather than have me answer that question, ask it of yourself. Why don't you do this? I hope the answer is that you have. However, if you have read this far, then I suspect that deep down in your heart of hearts, you may have a suspicion that on any given day what happened in Charleston might happen in your department. As the TV commercial says "Life comes at you fast." There are a lot of things demanding your attention.

Everyday we have to prioritize what will get done and what stays on the pile. Conducting a pre-fatality analysis before someone dies may seem like a low priority. Why? Maybe we are in a state of denial. After the tragedy though, nothing else matters. It becomes the only thing. We must find out how this happened.

As my high school principal would say "A word to the wise is sufficient." Is it sufficient? Knowing and loving your firefighters and your job makes the loss of them even more of a challenge to overcome. My heart goes out to all involved, but I can't help but think that on any given day... there but for fortune go you or I.

Plan your pre-fatality analysis today. Put it on the calendar and get your people together. If you don't know where to start, talk to the experts on the blue ribbon panel or those who investigated the recent loss in Prince William. They had great recommendations on what should have been done. Look on the Everyone Goes Home® Website and contact your state advocate, or e-mail us and we will be happy to help.

A great planner once taught me "Begin with the end in mind." What better end than to eliminate preventable line of duty injuries and deaths... So Everyone Goes Home®.