RIT instructors from When Things Go Bad Inc. put a group of Colorado firefighters through the “Denver Drilling Training” exercise during a recent Colorado State Firefighters Association training event in Parker, Colo. The exercise was created in honor of Mark LangVardt, a Denver firefighter who died from carbon monoxide poisoning when crews could not extricate him quickly from a two-story location. The Firefighter Denver Drill was created in hopes of preventing similar tragedies.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:

This is a high anchor hall station. This is in memory of Mark LangVardt of the Denver Fire Department. He died September 28th, 1992, on the 1600 block of South Broadway in a two-story commercial building. He was a standard fireman at six foot one and 190 pounds. His gear was ripped off and under intense heat and the floor was burning behind him.

There wasn’t a lot of room to work. There were filing cabinets on each side of him. It was just hard for them to get in there. Unfortunately, no one ever talked about a way to remove a fireman from such a confined space with such a high lift. Since then, the fire service has come up with a lot of different ways to remove a firefighter from a second floor.

This is in honor of Mark LangVardt. We’re going to go through this station and teach everyone how to easily remove a firefighter from a second-story window, using mechanical advantage.