My dad told me stories of when he was a fire fighter in Toronto, about cars in front of hydrants. If they found a car blocking a hydrant and the windows were open, they would run the hose right though one side and out the other before hooking it up. The car would be blocked for quite a while and would be a little wet after.

That's "Visual Effects" Not "Special Effects"
Special effects are in-camera effects like explosions or costumes/makeup. Visual Effects are post work including rotoscoping, paint models shop work, stop-motion or modern CG animation.