Firefighter Safety

And yes, the flashover was just as it is described in all the firefighting textbooks. That, I can verify. I don’t remember much after that. I remember my arms in front of me, falling, my head and body striking something, which turned out to be the first floor. I remember hearing the horn sounding for a firefighter evacuation.

Sponsored content from RESCUE Intellitech By: Robert Avsec, Executive Fire Officer When historians look back on the COVID-19 pandemic and how it was mismanaged in the U.S., one of the key failures at the federal level will be the lack of a communication strategy that’s familiar to anyone who’s has education, training, and experience as an emergency manager. The coronavirus ...

I'm grateful to know three very special people, Dawn Balstad-Johnson, Dr. Burt Clark, and Asst. Chief (Ret.) Linda Green, and even more grateful to have read all three of their incredible books. Here, for my money, are three outstanding books that should be in your firefighter library or that of a firefighter you love.

I wrote several pieces for FireRescue1.com in 2015 on this topic of roadway safety that, unfortunately, are still relevant in 2020. I encourage you and your firefighters to review these articles—and others like them—in preparation for this week’s Safety Stand Down.

How many of our leaders are taking the information from NIOSH Firefighter Fatality Reports and using that information to take a good, hard and objective look at their organization and asking the tough question, "What are we doing to prevent this from happening here?

By: Robert Avsec, Executive Fire Officer Photo Source: http://tinyurl.com/y5vllmj2 One of my earliest memories from my Hazardous Materials-Operations course was hearing the instructor say, “Your structural firefighting PPE is not acceptable chemical protective clothing.” That was true in the mid-1980’s when I took that course and it’s still true today. As concern within the fire service about firefighters developing cancer ...

By: Robert Avsec, Executive Fire Officer A couple of years ago, I wrote a piece entitled, Stop Romanticizing Firefighting. Apparently some people didn’t get the memo. Source: YouTube, https://youtu.be/znBtV5t4j9U This video was posted on a Facebook Group I follow with the caption “Fearless.” Along with a bazillon hastags: #firefighter #fireman #rescue #firstresponder #thinredline #firedept #firelife #firefighters #firerescue #firetruck #firestation #firemen #fire#wildlandfirefighters #firstrespondertaskforce For me, fearless is not the first word that came to ...

By: Robert Avsec, Executive Fire Officer Read a great piece, and even better guidance and direction, on this critical issue from my fire service colleague and Situational Awareness Matters guru, Richard Gasaway! I recently was contacted by a fire officer asking whether their mayday procedure should include a provision for a dedicated mayday channel for the distressed crew to transmit ...

Hearing loss for firefighters is a real risk of the job, so does your helmet provide hearing protection just by putting it on? Eye injuries are another risk of firefighting and other emergency service delivery tasks (e.g., auto extrication). Does your helmet have built-in full-face protection that’s protected from heat and physical damage until you need it?

Firefighters will very well find themselves in the same position in the future as a growing number of firefighters develop cancer from doing their job will find themselves being crushed financially paying for cancer-related treatment and cancer-related deaths prompted by firefighter cancer presumption laws. When that happens, we should not be surprised when efforts begin to reduce or even dissolve the social compromise between firefighters in those governments.