Aircraft Down At BWI

[wadeless28]

Just to bring the world up to date an aircraft crashed into a residential neiborhood just east of BWI Airport. The Aircraft missed any structures but impacted a couple of parked vehicles. Their is one known fatality ATT and unknown if others. The Aircraft was a Mitsubishi MU2. For more details see www.thewbalchannel.com

Now, for what we want to know.

If anyone is/was listening. What TG's are active on AACo's TRS. What MSP freqs.? How about MEMA or the feds?

Lets see what we can gain out of this.

Mike

 

[TinEar]

Mike, I didn't hear much of anything out of the ordinary. MSP out of Glen Burnie on 39.04 seemed to be the epicenter of police comms and there were at least two groups of folks talking all over each other on that freq. But, for some reason, they didn't seem to be bothering each other. Perhaps one of the groups was low power but since I'm so close to them I was hearing all the comms equally as well. AA Police Northern District had most of their troops at the scene for a bit and were using channel H to separate themselves and keep away from A.

Fire TG 336 indicated they were the "Staging" channel for fire. TG592 of course was active as were all the expected fire TGs. They wound up with considerably more fire equipment than was needed and left the rest of the county very vulnerable for a period of time. I heard Fire Alarm announce at one point that they had "nothing" left in the county as the first few pieces of fire apparatus were released from the scene and dispersed to various stations in case of need.

I think the only surprise for me was the MSP calling for the medical examiner from Baltimore to come to the scene rather than calling AA County for this job. I don't know however if this was Baltimore City's ME or a federal ME since air crashes automatically become a "federal" event.

All in all, the response seemed to be excellent and go smoothly. This was one of those "damned if you do and damned if you don't" situations where they sent everything to the scene even though only a small fraction was needed. I don't fault them at all for that. Better to be safe than sorry.

 

[mlevin]

When did this happen?

 

[TinEar]

Mo, it was around 7:30 this morning when it happened. Strange that last evening a plane crash was on my mind as I watched a private jet coming in for a landing that passed over my house with its engines making all kinds of strange noises. As it passed out of sight I kept listening for anything unusual and was thinking they better get that one fixed before taking off again.

 

[wadeless28]

I didnt expect to get much. Maybe some additional comms on the MSP Freqs. Me thinks we have pretty much all of it covered. I will say this. If there is a real disaster (not that this wasnt), say a larger aircraft or train, with multiple casualties, I'm sure you will see additional TG's appear that we could not confirm before.

TinEar.....You're scaring me. LoL

When the planes are departing on 15L and start their left turn to the west, when some aircraft with lighter loads throttle back some and you hear those turbines, it tends to make you look.

Ahh summertime. Laying in the pool. Beer in your hand. Sunglasses on. Watching the planes fly 2-3000 feet over your head.

Mike

 

[TinEar]

Mike, you're right about new talkgroups in the event of something major but those will come after the fact as needed. This response, even though they sent everything they had, was quite normal and was handled with ease by the fire controllers from the point of notification to getting everyone to the scene. I was impressed with how well that aspect went.

I'm under the path for runway 28/10 and see most of the smaller stuff only like all the general aviation, private jets and, yes, the MU-2s passing overhead. It's much quieter than being below the other commercial runways although my guys are much lower than 2-3000 feet.

Speaking of the Fire Department I have a couple of questions for one of you firemen....

What type truck is a "quint?" And on the Baltimore City fire channels during every dispatch there is one truck designated as the "RIT" or perhaps "RET." Or that's what it sounds like. What is it? I suppose the R is for Reserve but that's just a guess.

 

[mlevin]

I'm not a fireman but.....

A quint is a fire truck that can handle five different firefighting tasks. The only ones I can remeber off the top of my head is Ladder and Pump.

RIT satnds for Reactive Intervention Team. It's the RIT engines job to have some guys in front of the fire building and some guys in tha back. In the event that a firefighter get's trapped, their job is to go in and get them out. They are not suposed to carry out any other tasks on the fireground other then sitting there and waiting for their services to be needed. Hopefully they won't have to deploy.

 

[emtLarmy15]

A Quint is a ladder or tower truck that has a pump and a tank of water on it...usually 500-1000 gallons...becoming very common, cause you only have to send a quint to the scene rather than a ladder and a engine...I believe its Richmond VA that has their entire career fire dept riding quints.

A RIT is a Rapid Intervention Team...Around here (Worcester Co) Our RIT's don't consist of a particular engine, usually a few firefighters standing at the door. A RIT is used for firefighter rescue, in the event a firefighter goes down, or runs into some sort of trouble while inside of a hazard.

 

[wadeless28]

A Quint is a combination of 5 pieces of apparatus to put is in layman's terms. The apparatus is design to provide 5 different functions on the fireground. A water tank, pump, and hose of a pumper with the aerial ladder and ground ladder complement of a truck company.

RIT stands for Rapid Intervention Team. When you hear 2-in-2-out called on a working fire. The 2 in is the interior fire attack crew and the 2 out is the RIT team. In AACo an "All Hands" fire called to insure RIT Teams are on scene since all other hands on the initial alarm will be busy.

 

[TinEar]

Thanks guys...your info is much appreciated. I see what you're saying about the "quint" being valuable in many situations and it makes sense to have such a capability - both from the standpoint of fighting a fire and from the budget standpoint of fewer resources needed.

I'm sure glad to have the RIT solved. I've been meaning to ask that question for the longest time and never seem to think about it when I'm posting. I guess it doesn't matter whether you do it the way Worcester County is doing it with designated personnel or Baltimore City's way with a designated truck and its crew peforming the task. The necessity of the function is what is important.

 

[bear105]

Sad someone died in the crash.

But dagnabit, why does the exciting stuff happen while I'm at work.... :x

 

[Llwellyn]

Argh, yes very sad that the pilot lost his life. We're all very fortunate that the only ground effect was minor property damage and that no houses in the neighborhood and no people on the ground were affected.

I remember coming in to work this morning around 9:30 and on my way, passing station 23 and seeing Kent Island Engine 12 as the first due piece and only piece at the station and going "Wow, that's odd!"... I didn't find out about the crash until about noon here at work.

 

[Dispatcher308]

To All

We were very Busy up here at MEMA but we did not have any radio traffic going on, mostly hard-line phones & nextels being used, we did not activate as we found out that it was a small plane and only 1 causualty. But when we first received the call on it they(AA Co) could not tell us much and we were here trying to get prepared to deal with the worst.


Well have fun all


Added:
Ohh I almost forgot that when I called the BWI Operations Center they were using a radio system but it did not sound trunked, poss the VHF High Band Freg. 154.980( I think) or the UHF Freq 453.800. but not really sure

 

[TinEar]

I heard nothing at all on 154.98 or 453.80. There was a little bit of traffic on their 453.90 freq but it died off as soon as the actual situation became known which happened quickly. The difference in this crash was that the type plane and especially the location was known immediately so there was not that period of "uncertainty" associated with it.

 

[troymail]

Hey - do you guys monitor BWI Fire & Rescue on the AA County
trunk system (592/624/656)? I didn't see anyone mention them
(but I do see mention of the old VHF freqs for BWI Fire)....

EDIT: oh, I now see TinEar mentioned 592....

 

[bnglbill]

Something interesting on the rit teams.. This seems to be fairly new to have an actual designated rit engine or team on each fire call in AACO and if you listen to TG. MIKE they have been training on this every day for about the last month. You will here someone call " Mayday, Mayday, I'm trapped in a ventillation shaft, etc." Then you will hear the rit team. Baltimore City has had a designated rit team on each box for a long time. I'm not sure if this is a fairly new concept for AACO or if they are just getting more serious about it.