Page 8 of Too Much Heat

“The ladders are a mess,” Pike added.

“Keep searching,” Romano encouraged. “There’s four.”

Off to the side, Lara caught sight of the cribbing. Wooden four-by-four pieces of lumber, they chocked up cars, structures and anything else that needed to be lifted. This bunch looked okay, but Lara toed a block over. She turned and yelled, “I found the last one. The cribbing.”

A big smile from Romano. It made her suck in a breath. “Good work, Swanson. What’s wrong with it?”

“The planks you put out are green and splintered on the underside.” Her voice came out husky from that damn grin.

“We used the cribbing last shift. None of that was true.”

“I know, Gage. I found the bad ones among the pile when I was preparing for this drill. For what it’s worth, I should have checked all the planks and thrown these out before we needed them. Who knows why?”

Pike said, “They could split apart when we’re sliding under a raised car or structure.”

“Yep.” The cap had taken out his phone and read from what he’d called up. “Here’s the official report from our manuals. Cribbing is the single-most overlooked adjunct that we carry onour trucks. Catastrophic cribbing failure is responsible for more than 100 fatalities each year. Greater than 99 percent of those failures involvedwoodcribbing.”

Trent whistled softly. “This exercise might have saved our lives.”

“Did it?” Gabe was an arguer. “Wouldn’t we notice this if we went into the pile at a call.”

“It’s too late to replace it then,” Lara blurted out. “Seconds count on a call.”

“How’d you know it was too late, Swanson?” Gabe’s tone was curious.

“It’s in thePrinciples of Firefighting. The training text at the academy.”

“What about the rest of you?” Romano asked.

“Understood,” from Trent and Deluca simultaneously.

“Pike?”

“Got it cap.”

Romano smiled. “Good job, everybody. We’ll get this stuff back in the rig then go inside and talk about all this.”

Hands full, they didn’t wait for her and jostled each other as they went ahead. Lara shouldn’t have spoken up, she thought as she picked up some cribbing. But she was sick of being ignored or criticized. Playing the doormat wouldn’t cut it at a firehouse.

* * *

The message crackled over the PA system. “Electrical Fire in Basement. Engine 1 and Truck 2 go into service.

The group bounded up from the dinner table and hurried to the bay. Once they’d donned their gear, they climbed into the rig.

Joe read from his iPad. “Two story residence. Owner reported that her first floor got hot and she hurried to the basement entrance by the back door because her husband was down there.When she opened it, she saw smoke and got scared. She yelled down and there was no answer. Then she had to get out.”

“Holy shit.” Gage shook his head. “The first floor could ignite at any time. And basement fires are dangerous.”

“Why, Lieutenant?” Deluca asked.

“It’s easy to lose your orientation. Electrical fires often produced a faint, white smoke, but the color varies depending on the component that's overheating.This smoke can also beblue, gray and often called magic smoke.”

“It stinks,” Gage said. “Like burning plastic.”

“Make sure,” Joe said in his sternest voice, “that you stay with your group. Pike, what do you do?”

“Stay with the group.”

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