Fire & EMS Leader Pro The job of old firefighters is to teach young firefighters how to become old firefighters!

In memory of our brother firefighters from the Prescott, AZ Hotshot Crew who lost their lives in the service to others during a firefight outside Yarnell, AZ on Sunday, June 30, 2013.  My deepest sympathies to their families and the community they left behind. —Robert Avsec

Gender issues. Did you know that researchers have found that when a large percentage of both men and women hear those two words, what they really “hear” is “woman’s issues.”

See how Union City, GA, the Department of Defense, a growing number of colleges and universities, and more are eliminating FOS fires using HEHLT!

Your department’s website still needs to be the bedrock for your Internet presence, but with Web 2.0 there is so much more. Let’s take a look at some of the tools in the toolbox, shall we?

By:  Robert Avsec The vast majority of fires that Fire & EMS department personnel will experience during their fire service career will involve fires in residential occupancies: single and multi-family dwellings.  Fires in commercial and industrial properties, aka, “big box” occupancies are what Gordon Graham, a noted subject matter expert in risk management for emergency services, refers to as, “high ...

Power saws have been an important part of the firefighter's tool cadre for many years. Today, most departments carry a variety of power saws including, but not limited to circular or rotary saws, chainsaws, and reciprocating saws.

In these days of budget reductions and inadequate staffing, the best use of RIC is the non-deployment of RIC because our proactive fireground behaviors ensured that they were never needed.

We are all together in recognizing and addressing the significant unmanaged risks posed by Fire & EMS personnel suffering from fatigue. The dots are out there. We just need to start connecting them before, once again, someone else does it for us.

I think we can all agree that SCBA is one of the most critical components of the firefighter's protective ensemble. It is also the most sophisticated — and becoming more so every year — and it's the only piece of the protective ensemble that we don't issue to the individual.

I’ve got a huge sign under the lid on my washer machine that tells me at least 10 things that I should not do when using the machine, e.g., don’t put gasoline or oil soaked clothing in the machine as this can create an explosion hazard. Shouldn’t we at least require such labeling on occupancies not protected with fire sprinkler-based suppression systems?