Using static life-safety rope for equipment lifting
US small suburban fire department out drilling tonight. The drill was to lift a heavy weight off an entrapped patient. We had two scenarios: a large concrete block on one patient and a 800# snow blade on another patient. The key was to use various tools on our apparatus such as high-pressure airbags, hydraulic spreaders, bars as levers, cribbing etc.
I turned around and found a Sr officer using an aluminum tripod (similar to CMCs SKED-EVAC INDUSTRIAL TRIPOD) and static rope in a 5:1 MA configuration to lift one side of the plow off the patient (not the full 800# raise - maybe 500 as a guess). While I identified 2 other major use errors with the tripod, what I have no reference to is using 9000 pound rated static line in a 5:1 mechanical advantage to perform an equipment lift. If I use the 15:1 safety ratio, that’s 600 pounds of lift. The Sr Officer reported that the “safety ratio doesn’t matter in this case as we’re not lifting patients/rescuers”. I had never heard that statement like that before and I had never seen a department purposefully lift hard equipment using life safety rope. Quick perusal of NFPA and CMC gave me no additional clarity.
Hopefully someone here can educate me one way or another. Happy to be wrong.
Thx