Will the Next Hugh Halligan or Red Adair Please Stand Up?
Leveraging A Homeland Security Leader’s Greatest Tool: The Mind. If you are in the fire service, you should know these two men. They need no introduction. If you don’t know them, or more succinctly, their innovative spirit, then please put down that copy of Fire Engineering and listen up.
Both were firefighters at their core, yet each coming from different backgrounds that influenced their problem-solving skills, leveraging their minds and subsequently their innovations, that made their names infamous. Moving to today’s first responders on the frontlines against domestic and international terrorism, where is the next great mind that will revolutionize how first responders respond to acts of terrorism, or any threat to our homeland? Will it be a tool or a concept that is key to how firefighters, police, and emergency medical services respond to incidents?
Hugh Halligan
Let’s first look at Hugh Halligan, whose 8.5 pound invention changed the face of forcible entry forever. For those that don’t know, the term “forcible entry” refers to the actions taken by firefighters to gain access to a structure, primarily through doors. This normally requires breaching heavily secured doors, using various tools. “Back in the day” there were some tools used to gain entry through doors, among them the Kelly Tool, but such equipment was cumbersome to use and heavy. Halligan, who was a member of the prestigious FDNY (Fire Department of New York), had come up through the ranks to Deputy Chief, having joined the department in 1916. Asserting that Halligan understood the drawbacks of the Kelly Tool, he developed an alternative tool, which eventually bore his name, the Halligan Tool.
The “Halligan” would quickly prove to be superior to the Kelly tool, whose time had come and gone. Its effectiveness is multiplied when “married” to a flathead axe, known collectively as a “set of irons.” Chief Halligan was able to perceive the necessity of a new way of doing things. Halligan’s ingenuity, whether fully realized or not, leveraged specific mechanical advantages to enhance the firefighter’s capabilities. For a more comprehensive explanation, check out this article, Halligan By The Numbers. In conclusion, Halligan saw a need, and put the greatest tool in the first responder’s toolbox to work; the mind.
Red Adair
Another innovator within the fire service was Paul Neal “Red” Adair. Adair is best known as a pioneer in suppressing and “capping” a very unique type of fire, offshore and land-based oil well fires. Adair had worked with another pioneer in the oil well fire fighting arena, where they incorporated explosives detonated near burning oil wells, that when exploded, earthen material cascaded on the oil well, smothering the fire. Afterwards the oil or gas well could be capped. Such innovative techniques to mitigate large, uncontrollable fires, were revolutionary in such instances, but it worked. Perhaps Adair’s most notable fire was the 1961 Gassi Touil fire, better known as the “Devil’s Cigarette Lighter,” in the Algerian Sahara Desert. This YouTube video chronicles Adair’s efforts to extinguish and cap the monstrous gas well fire: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-Wd2ZTrUHc
Adair leveraged the effects that nitroglycerin-based shaped charges had on moving materials for maximum effect in suppressing fires of enormous size. The technique was groundbreaking; cementing his name in firefighter lore. Even John Wayne would play an Adair type figure in the movie, Hellfighters.
In retirement, Adair would reflect about his storied career, stating: “Throughout my years, I’ve had the pleasure of assembling and training what I believe to be the best group of people in the world. People with the presence of mind to deal with any flare-up, including my own. People who share the belief that anything is possible.” It is this last statement that separates Red Adair from many; that anything is possible. Adair embodied this mindset in his work. In conclusion, Red Adair highlighted the enduring and innovative leadership that transformed an industry.
Will It Be You?
In the early stages of the twenty-first century, the fire service, as well as first responders in general, still face challenges that require measurable solutions. While Chief Halligan and Red Adair didn’t have to incorporate counterterrorism strategies into their work as responders do today, those in the homeland security enterprise are awaiting the next revolutionary idea, invention, or process that will equip America’s first responders. Who will answer the call to lead the homeland security enterprise with imaginative and groundbreaking ideas? Will it be you?
This article was written by Lt. Charles Cavnor (from Dallas Fire and Rescue), a member of Inside the Yellow Tape.
Inside The Yellow Tape is pleased to bring content that seeks to educate and reveal to the public the inner workings of first responders. Please visit https://medium.com/@insidetheyellowtape to see more exciting articles like this!
