139

Has anyone asked for and received an opinion from FAA clarifying:

1. Firefighter Qualifications. Are FF1 and FF2 REQUIREMENTS or niceties for ARFF? It can be interpreted either way.

2. Hot Fueling- Is there a requirement for standbys? We do them for medevac but not Con Air:confused: :confused: :confused[B]


I removed the EMT part, our cert says that it can be done.

Well, both good questions.. The FAA has no requirements for any professional qualifications for ARFF. Part 139 only requires "Proficient" Fire Fighters. On the other hand, if you follow NFPA, NFPA 1003 Pro Qualifications For Airport Fire Fighter, requires fire fighter #1 and #2, plus a host of other requirements to be 1003 Certified. It still is up to the Authority having jurisdiction to make that decision to follow NFPA or not. You have to ask your self the question, are we "Proficient"?? What is proficient? That alone is a tough one to answer. Confused any more?

On the issue of hot-refueling. NFPA 407 does not really cover the particulars with regards to having a standby vehicle. I know the USAF does this especially with Med-Evac aircraft. This would be a good question for anyone else to tackle.. God I like a challenge!

Bob

I put a call into the FAA this morning and left a message asking for clarification. The hot fueling came up last week down in Salt Lake when we noticed that they were doing stand bys on Con Air. They thought that it was a FAA requirement. The FF training is because our Cpt/Chief interprets 139 to say that we only have to read the ISFTA book and go to ARFF basic. We don't respond to structure fires on the airport :rolleyes: :rolleyes: , yeah right

Remember.. FAA Rules and even NFPA codes are only The MINIMUM requirements. Nothing says you cannot go above and beyond. I am sure every Airport goes above and beyond the regulations or requirements. There is such a thing as responsibility to the end results of something that happens. As a Chief I ask myself the question, what if that was my family on that plane? How would I want the ARFF Department to respond to them in a time of need????

My Two Cents...

Being in the AirForce i have never seen a con air before, is there a regulation i can read up on about the con air stand by's. I guess im just racking my brain on how the actual stand by would go? it seems very interesting.

In regard to Hot Refueling operations:

Our FBO requests ARFF standby for all Hot Refueling operations. I’ll check if it’s the FBO's fueling guidelines or part of Phillips 66 requirements.

Hey Bob, I couldn't agree more that we all need to provide the best service that we can. In our case the airport (Boeing Field)belongs to the County Dept of Transportation. They contract with us, the Sheriff's Dept for Police/ARFF services. Our airport is Index A, staffed and equipped at B (because of the Police function) and servicing E aircraft daily.
We're experiencing HUGE budget cuts county-wide right now. Consequently our Cpt/Chief is addressing everything at the minimum required level and relying on MA with Boeing Fire. Our problem with this is the accompanying safety issues due to our minimum staffing and the fact that we want to provide the best service we possibly can. Since 139 seems to be so open to interpretation I guess we need to speak with Airport Ops and find out if they're willing to adopt NFPA codes and the accompanying training costs.

nyhockeyff, "ConAir" is BOP/US Marshal and/or Immigration aircraft. Usually C-9s but we also get 727s. They land and load 100+ prisoners/detainees and re-fuel while loading up. The stand-by would be pretty much the same as a Medevac where you roll out the truck and stand-by while they re-fuel the plane in case there's a fire. The thought is that the passengers are not capable of self-resuce in either case hence the ARFF stand-by. We have a patrol car stand-by with ConAir for ramp access reasons. Our car is not there to provide security for the plane as they have their own.

we do hot standbys on medical aircraft and on airlines that run ICAO standards we do alot of those they come in here just to refuel and go out. don't know if our fuel is cheaper here probably not. we get con air in here but they usually don't refuel here just drop off and upload and fly out. don't want to get to close to them anyway to many guns around. some commerical carriers ask for hot loads because the fuelers won't fuel unless a fire truck is there especially with pax on board.

bh

Just like ARFF26 I work at Boeing but on the other coast. We provide standby's at all fuelings and de-fuelings of the Chinooks. But it's part of our contract that we wrote saying we are there. It our way of keeping work secure.