Decisive Fire Torrent
Velva Non
As the sun sank below the ridgeline, the real fun began. Illumination flares lit the night sky, revealing the battlefield. At the first sight of a target, machine gun fire rattled the air. Focused on the training, Soldiers communicated to the best of their ability and reacted seamlessly. As the last target fell, a long, arduous day of training finally came to an end.
And also, one little question on decisive strike; it says that every other attack before the start of my next turn is also doubled, yet the penalty only applies to the first roll. Does this mean that any other attack I get to make this round (by, let's say, Fire Riposte, or an AoO), also gets double damage without penalty?
In photography, Henri Cartier-Bresson used to speak of the decisive moment. The moment when all things come together within the frame of a viewfinder to make the perfect photo. That same moment, if not acted upon that passes and is gone. Afterwards, the geometry, the expressions, the light never come together in the same way again. The decisive moment refers to the single critical split second in which an event or experience culminates. The term also seems to define photography itself as a medium. It is the pause button to life around us. One frame equals one moment.
In the fire service, every fireman throughout their career will receive at least one chance to act--one chance to make a life changing difference in someone's life. The decisive moment will come and no one will be able to say when or where that moment will come. You can work the slowest truck and pray to be left alone, but over the course of twenty-five years rest assured the decisive moment will find you.
The second way you will remember the decisive moment is to feel fortunate that you were able to guess and choose the appropriate thing to do and luckily everything turned out alright. Perhaps you were fortunate to be with someone who knew how to act during that moment.
Finally, the way I hope none of you remember their 'decisive moment' is with shame and regret, pushing it to the farthest confines of your mind hoping to forget it because you had not done all you could to prepare for that day. You dreaded drill time. You hid from the busy houses and chose to bid the slowest trucks regardless of who the officer was.
In the end though, we can't always control the outcome and sometimes our best preparations and efforts go unrewarded and unnoticed. But when the decisive moment comes and your mind captures that one image that will live with you forever, what will you think when you look back on it?
Meanwhile, Lewistown families are anticipating evacuation notices in October, potentially leaving their homes and personal belongings behind. No one should have to live in constant fear of fire, which is why Montana must take the responsibility of fighting it into our own hands.
We can no longer wait on the federal government to be our first line of defense in fighting wildfires across our State. While the U.S. Forest Service and the Department of Interior are responsible for most of the wildland fire management in our state, these same agencies oversee fire management across the entire country.
When it comes to fighting fires, attacking them quickly is paramount to safeguarding lives, property and habitats. Unfortunately, federal bureaucratic processes delay expedient and efficient fire suppression. Status quo contract and dispatch protocols are so burdensome and complex that it can take hours or even several days for federally contracted aircraft to arrive, even if aircraft are available just miles from the fire.
It is time for the Montana Department of Natural Resources (MT DNRC) to establish an aggressive initial attack strategy. It is imperative that we put our state on a war footing during the incessant wildfire season, to rapidly deploy overwhelming airpower capable of quelling fires when they are small.
Response measures towards the Robertson Draw Fire, Haystack and the fire on Finley point mirror this dysfunction. In all of these instances, a plethora of aerial assets were nearby and readily available for immediate dispatch, however due to federal priorities elsewhere it took days to commit meaningful resources.
The Deep Creek Canyon incident was the most notable. It featured a MT DNRC helicopter tragically crashing, and as a result we nearly lost 5 firefighters. That fire was in the foothills near Canyon Ferry Lake and Super Scoopers were fueled and ready to launch out of Bozeman. Sadly, they were never called. If deployed, these Super Scoopers could have dropped 1 million gallons on that fire in the first 12 hours.
Fortunately, Montana has some of the biggest and most capable aerial firefighting fleets right here in our state, and we pilots would proudly put our lives on the line to safeguard fellow Montanans if called to serve.
It is time for the Montana Department of Natural Resources to establish an aggressive initial attack strategy. It is imperative that we put our state on a war footing during the incessant wildfire season, to rapidly deploy overwhelming airpower capable of quelling fires when they are small.\nRead More
I get reminded of Crisis Management and Turnaround Strategy in the Corporate field. We have seen such business situations and the manner in which effective MDs have converted business from the red to black with decisiveness and quick collaborative actions.
Being decisive during a crisis in not enough, rather being soundly decisive is a better characteristic. The people you surround yourself with to advise you and help guide your decisions are equally important. Especially in times of crisis, you should be surrounded by team members who have the expertise, confidence and drive to take the initiative in finding solutions. Inexperienced people who require a lot of direction or lack the expertise, should not be at the forefront of the decision-making. This does not mean that they should be completely excluded from giving input, but in times of urgency, you need to be surrounded with people who already have the skills and knowledge necessary to contribute to the plan. The composition of your team will have a big impact on the outcomes of how quickly and efficiently a crisis can be controlled. In addition, the dynamics of the team will enable you to be both a decisive and collaborative leader. You should be able to have clear and firm goals and your team should be able to freely collaborate to provide the outputs that will help achieve results. It is also true that in times of crisis, the most pressing need is to do whatever it takes to control the situation and limit the effects. Once it is all said and done, then it is time to look back, analyze, reflect and learn from the mistakes.
The fire district, which serves the towns of Woodside and Portola Valley, and the communities of Emerald Hills, Ladera, Los Trancos and Vista Verde, operates three fire stations, in Woodside, Portola Valley and Redwood City's Emerald Hills neighborhood.
A U.S. Army Paratrooper assigned to 2nd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, fires an M224 60mm mortar system during decisive action rotation 19-08.5 at Fort Polk, Louisiana, July 29, 2019. The brigade conducted training on Global Response Force-specific tasks, including deployment from an intermediate staging base, an airfield seizure, noncombatant evacuation operations, and live fire exercises. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Michelle U. Blesam)
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