More and more cities are focusing on firefighter safety today than ever before. Injuries are devastating to firefighters and their families and are expensive for cities. For these reasons, cities are always looking for ways to improve safety for firefighters. One way is to install locking caps on fire department connections and standpipe hose connections. Since locking caps can only be removed by the fire department, they prevent vandalism and ensure that firefighters can make connections and readily provide a water supply to supplement fire sprinklers and supply the standpipes that are used for interior firefighting. Firefighter safety is the main reason that locking caps are endorsed by fire departments.

Water Supply for Buildings

Your city has an underground water piping system that supplies water for use in buildings. That water is not only for drinking but is also used for fire protection. The fire sprinkler system uses this water. Another use of the water is for standpipe systems, which firefighters rely on for interior firefighting.

Firefighters that arrive for a building fire will connect a hose from a fire hydrant to their pumper truck. Another hose is deployed and connects the pumper to the building. That hose ensures that adequate pressure and water-flow are available for the sprinkler system and other fire department operations that utilize the building standpipe system.

FDC and Standpipe Connections

At the heart of sprinkler system operation and standpipe system use is water supplied through the fire department connection (FDC). The FDC allows firefighters to connect hoses and supplement the water supply for sprinklers and interior firefighting operations.

In the case of standpipe systems, the water supply allows firefighters to use their hose lines on upper floors of a building. For a sprinkler system, the additional water from the FDC supplements the water needed to operate the sprinklers and allows firefighters to control and eventually extinguish a fire.

The success of these operations is dependent on successful connection to the FDC. Failure to supplement the water supply for sprinkler operation or supply water to standpipe systems could result in a delay or a failure to extinguish fires quickly and increases the possibility of firefighter injuries.

Hydrant Outlets

The starting point is a fire hydrant. Prior to connecting a hose between the hydrant and the pumper truck, a firefighter will flow-check the hydrant. This is done by opening the hydrant and flowing water. This enables the firefighter to ensure there is no debris in the hydrant. Once proper flow is achieved, the hydrant (valve) is closed. The hose is then connected between the hydrant and the pumper.

FDC Inlets

Next, another hose is connected to the pumper and the hose is run to the FDC on the side of the building. The FDC cap is removed, and the hose is connected. The main slowdown is where FDC caps are missing. Firefighters must often remove debris prior to making the connection. Even where caps are present, firefighters check for debris as conventional caps are not secure. That means that vandals can remove a cap, insert debris, and then replace an unsecure cap.

Unlike hydrants, which have outlets that can be flowchecked, a FDC is an inlet to the fire protection piping in the building. Since the FDC is an inlet (allows water to flow into the building), it cannot be flow-checked. Any debris that is not discovered has the potential to block or limit water flow into the building. This is very dangerous for firefighters that rely on adequate water pressure and flow to support their operations.

Standpipe Connection Outlets

Standpipe connections are typically in the stairwells of buildings at the landing of a floor. The purpose is to allow firefighters to use the piping rather than lay hose from the pumper to upper floors in a building. For example, only enough hose is needed from the standpipe connection to the location of the fire on that floor. A standpipe system eliminates the need to run hose all the way down flights of stairs to the pumper.

Standpipe connections also have caps. The caps protect the threads of the hose connection. If a cap is missing, threads can be damaged. Damaged threads mean a poor and leaky connection, cross-threading, or a worst-case scenario—a connection cannot be made at all.

Locking Caps are the Solution for Safety

Locking caps are available for FDCs (threaded and unthreaded Storz) and standpipe connections. Cap sizes and thread types are dependent on local conditions (check with the fire department). Locking caps prevent vandalism and keep debris out of the FDC. Also, their removal is prevented, other than by firefighters, thereby protecting threads from damage.

Approval for Locking Caps

The locking caps installed within each city must be keyed-alike. Although fire departments that allow locking caps have many FDC and standpipe key wrenches, each key tool works on every locking cap within the city. That is what is meant by “keyed-alike”. This also means that the fire department must approve the use of locking caps before they are installed. Fire Departments in Express Jurisdictions have approved the use of FDC Locking Caps. Click here for a list of Express Jurisdictions

The importance of making the connection to the FDC or standpipe is often overlooked until it is too late. Since it is only firefighters that make these connections, it is of the utmost importance that caps remain secure until the fire department arrives on the scene of a building fire. This can only be accomplished with locking caps.

For current Express Jurisdiction Cities, locking caps became a necessity for safety of firefighters. We can work together to expand the list of Express Jurisdiction Cities to include additional cities within your state, because we believe that locking caps are necessary for FDCs and standpipe connections, which improves safety for all firefighters that must use these connections. Learn More

Decision Making for Installation of FDC and Standpipe Locking Caps

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If you have attended one of my Emergency Lighting classes, either through Brooks or the FED Learning Center, you would have heard me say, “The thing I love about the emergency lighting industry is it is always in a state of transition or constantly evolving.”

In the 1960s, lead acid batteries had become the hallmark of batteries used in emergency lighting. Ironically, the first emergency lights had “wet” nickel cadmium batteries. The lead acid batteries became a better source for emergency lights as they were cheaper and had no “memory issues” like the nickel cadmium batteries.

In the early 1990s, the primary battery was a sealed, maintenance-free lead acid battery. Then, two important things happened that helped shape the emergency lighting Industry. The first was the advent of exit signs utilizing LEDs instead of lamps. The second was Congress passing the Energy Bill.

The Energy Bill, when passed, stated that exit signs could no longer be manufactured, requiring more than five lamp watts. So, the bar was set, and incandescent or fluorescent exit signs were out. Incandescent and fluorescent signs typically consume 20-40 lamp watts per sign. At that time, the earliest LED exit signs did just that. They used only 5 lamp watts.

As the years progressed, the LEDs in exit signs became brighter and more energy efficient. Exit signs today generally draw two lamp watts or less. Considering the millions of signs out there, a lot of energy is being saved.

Now that these signs consumed only two watts of energy, the industry realized that the lead acid batteries were no longer needed. A typical exit sign would have used two 6V 3.6 W lamps (B909 lamps) to provide illumination when the building’s electricity went out. Now, the LED board used to light the sign could be used for both the AC and DC operation of the exit sign. With the typical exit sign only using two or fewer watts, these signs were physically becoming smaller because they no longer needed a power pack on top of the exit sign to house the Lead Acid battery. The industry turned to nickel-cadmium, small double A-sized cells could easily fit into the new exit sign without blocking or interfering with the lighting of the word EXIT, and most importantly, they could eliminate the power pack. So, the signs became energy efficient and physically smaller. The ni-cad batteries also offered other benefits. They had a better and higher operating temperature range and had a long shelf life and service life.

That’s great for exit signs, but what about the emergency lights?

The emergency lights have only trended away from lead acid batteries in the past five years. The main reason was emergency lights, unlike exit signs, have much higher lamp-watt requirements that require larger batteries. Even though, for example, your smallest emergency light generally consumed 11 lamp watts (2- B939 lamps), which the PRB64 battery routinely covered. The lead acid battery was far more economical.

Recently, LED technology has exploded to unbelievable heights. Back in the ‘90s, none would have ever thought that traffic lights, high bay fixtures, car lamp heads, and even flashlights could be powered by LEDs. So, with the LED lamp heads reducing the number of lamp watts per sign (while dramatically increasing light output), lead acid batteries were again replaced by nickel cadmium batteries. In these examples, we saw lead being replaced by nicad. Now, because of the advancement in LED and battery technology, applications that use ni-cad batteries are being replaced by lithium iron phosphate batteries. And the evolution continues.

The most notable benefit of lithium iron phosphate batteries is holding their voltage constant during discharge. If a unit has a lead acid or a ni-cad battery, its voltage declines as it discharges (during a power outage). Thus, as the voltage of the battery declines, so does the wattage of your lamps. But, with lithium iron phosphate, the battery’s voltage remains the same (in most cases) either 3.6 VDC or 9.2 VDC for 90 minutes. The benefit of this is that the illumination level of the unit will also remain the same in minute 90 as in minute one of the discharge. So, in terms of life safety, providing continuous light levels for safe and efficient facility egress is a considerable benefit.

Bob Mete is the Emergency Light product specialist at Brooks Equipment and is also an instructor at the FED Learning Center, where he teaches FEDs the why and how of selling and servicing Emergency Lighting.

Extinguishers for Military Facilities

At a recent meeting of the Fire Equipment Manufacturers’ Association (FEMA), it was reported that the Dept of Defense (DoD) has committed to updating Uniform Facilities Criteria (UFC), in accordance with the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), to require portable fire extinguishers throughout military facilities, in accordance with the requirements of NFPA 1, Fire Code. Implementation guidance is also being developed for existing facilities where portable fire extinguishers were removed, based on an earlier edition of the UFC. FEMA is now seeking a timeline from DoD for updating the UFC and developing the guidance document.

NFPA 10, Standard for Portable Fire Extinguishers

Brooks sent two engineers (committee members) to the recent meeting of the NFPA Technical Committee on Portable Fire Extinguishers held Oct 31 – Nov 2 in Quincy, MA. The first draft report developed at that meeting contains the proposed revisions to NFPA 10. The report will be posted for review and public comment on March 21, 2024. The committee will meet again later next year to review and act on any comments received on the first draft report.