A reporter who gets it
Structural Stability of Engineered Lumber in Fire Conditions from UL University
I read with great interest the item both Billy Goldfeder at FirefighterCloseCalls.com and Firehouse.com ran on Thursday about manufactured wood I-joists. It is a follow-up to a story many of us read last May when Milwaukee Captain Ted Stribling and Firefighter Tony Rueda experienced a very close call because of a floor collapse. The latest story comes from WISN-TV.
Having covered building construction issues for many years and tried to explain the impact on fire safety to a general TV audience, I was interested in seeing the video that goes with the article.
I urge you to clink the link above and watch the story yourself. It is an impressive bit of television news, educating viewers about something they likely never thought about.
Once you get beyond the usual and universal TV hype of “exclusive” and “investigation” that leads up to the story, reporter Kent Wainscott does a remarkable job of telling the viewers why this important and then illustrates the potential danger. Clearly Mr. Wainscott is a veteran reporter who did his homework and knows how to translate what could have been a boring topic into good television. I am sure at some point I will steal some ideas from the presentation.
It is good to know there are others in the news business who are starting to think this is a topic important enough that it needs to be on the radar screens of those outside of the fire service.
