Questions:
1. What is crew integrity?
2. How does crew integrity play an important part in the fire ground operations?

Summary:
This article begins with reviewing two case studies that lead to a tragic loss of life, due to a breakdown in the crew integrity. The author gives his personal definition of crew integrity with putting together the dictionary definition of “crew and “integrity”, is “a group of people working together in a perfect condition. However, he states that for some reason “we continue to be against this basic rule, which sometimes cost us the ultimate price—the loss of one of our own.” The author list some ways we can follow the basic rules on crew integrity.
1. Always remain in visual, verbal, or direct contact with your partner.
a. Visual- In a smoke filled environment it is difficult to remain in visual contact with your partner. With modern technology i.e. the thermal camera, this task makes it a little easier. However, don’t always rely on technology it will fail.
b. Verbal- Always be in verbal contact with your partner smoke fill environment will aid in muffling the sounds. Make sure you and your partner understand each other’s messages.
c. Direct contact- This can be accomplished by tapping your partner’s shoulders or back of their boot with your hand or tool. Also, search rope can be used during search operations of a wide area to remain in direct contact.
2. Enter as a crew and exit as a crew – A good practice is to enter in a structure as a crew and exit the structure as a crew. This is even so when one of the crew members develops a problem and needs to exit the structure, the remaining crew members should exit the structure with that member. This is so that the accountability remains the.
3. Have the proper tools assignment and