Talked with Todd this morning...

He wanted you to know the circumstances of his situation.

Todd was notified by Bank of America that his credit card was compromised in July or early August. The charges were made earlier in the spring. Someone had used his number to buy a camera and there were charges made to a Yahoo account. There was no description of these charges. Whoever had made the charges had used the wrong names and birth dates. Todd canceled the account immediately. He had no idea what the Yahoo account charges were about. There was no description.

Todd wanted all of you to know that he very much appreciates your support. Your phone messages to him have meant a lot after what he has been through.

Todd says that this has been a very humiliating experience for him, and your confidence in his strength of character has helped him a lot.

Todd, know that here in the stations you have our support and you'll get through this.

When Fire Strikes, Stop, Drop and... Sing?

Interesting article on the future of soundwaves in firefighting. Click link above to read the whole thing.


An excerpt:

"I throw more power into my voice, and now the flame is extinguished," wrote Irish scientist John Tyndall about his experiments with sound and fire in 1857. Countless public demonstrations and a handful of lab tests later, researchers are still struggling to determine exactly how sound snuffs flames.

Sound travels in waves, which are simply variations of pressure in a medium—whether solid, liquid or gas. The energy from vibrating objects, such as speaker membranes, moves from particle to particle in the air in a repeating pattern of high- and low-pressure zones that we perceive as sound. According to the ideal gas law, temperature, pressure and volume are related; therefore, a decrease in pressure can lead to a corresponding decrease in temperature, which may explain how sound can extinguish a flame.

In 2004 Dmitriy Plaks and several of his fellow students at the University of West Georgia tested whether sound waves can douse fires in hopes of using sound to extinguish flames in a spacecraft. VIDEO They placed a candle in a large topless chamber with three bass speakers attached to the walls. The candle was lit and the Canadian rock band Nickelback's "How you remind me" was pumped through the subwoofers. Within roughly 10 seconds, once the song hit a low note, the flame was out, according to results published in 2005 in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America.

Oakland Firefighters Overtime Extravaganza!

WARNING:There is no nudity in this clip, but there are some scantily clad women with flaming pasties. The Oakland Firefighters discuss the hazard with which these present. You make the call on whether you will be offended or whether this is safe for work viewing.

Now that the city has their own fire-department-related blog, the Local 29 blog will try to raise the bar, in an effort to bring you the highest-quality, timely articles and information.

And in a nod of collegiality, we invite the fire department blogsters a link to this video for their use, as well.