Dear Ezra and All,
An interesting situation arose in Australia a few summers ago when one state
(Victoria) was experiencing a worse than usual bush fire (I think these are
called wild fires in the USA). They called for help from a neighbouring
state (New South Wales) only to discover that each of the two states had
decided to use differing standards for purchasing of their hose fittings ­
the two fire service's fittings wouldn't fit.
At the post mortem held after the fire, I don't think that issue such as
'market forces' and 'individual freedom' were very high on the agenda. All
Australian states now have fire fighting fittings that are made to uniform
standards.
A catastrophic fire in Baltimore, over 100 years ago, helped get the National Bureau of Standards (now NIST) going. The responding fire companies (Washington, Philadelphia -- all over) each had different hose fittings. They couldn't couple up to the hydrants, and Baltimore burned to the ground. The immediate need for the heavy hand of government in dictating a common firehose coupling standard was recognized by all.
Carleton
