NEWS IN BRIEF

Antifreeze in sprinklers prompts NFPA safety alert

As the result of a research study and fire tests associated with a grease fire in a kitchen containing a sprinkler system that held a high concentration of antifreeze, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) issued a safety alert in July recommending that residential fire sprinkler systems containing antifreeze be drained and refilled with water. During the grease fire, the sprinkler system deployed; one person was killed in the fire, and another was seriously injured.

According to James M. Shannon, president of the NFPA, the recommendation is conditional on the results of ongoing additional research on the above fire. He noted: “Seventy/30 percent glycerin and 60/40 percent propylene glycol antifreeze may provide an unacceptable risk of harm to occupants in certain types of fire scenarios, in particular kitchen grease fires.” Shannon explained that there were successful tests in which kitchen grease fires were extinguished or contained with a 50/50 percent glycerin solution. However, more testing is warranted “to more fully understand if there is a risk associated with 50/50 percent glycerin solution.”

The NFPA Safety Alert is at www.nfpa.org/antifreeze/.

Line-of-Duty Deaths

April 22. Firefighter Steven Scott Crannell, 47, Guthrie Center (IA) Fire Department: apparent heart attack.

May 29. Firefighter Donald A. Schneider Jr., 63, Belleville (WI) Fire Department: apparent heart attack.

June 27. Chief Jay C. Brown, 42, Gresston (GA) Volunteer Fire Department: apparent heart attack.

June 23. Chief Chet Bauermeister, 47, Franklin County Fire District 4, Mesa, WA: injuries sustained at a mutual-aid wildland fire call when the fire apparatus he was operating in steep terrain flipped over backward.

July 1. Lieutenant V. Frank William Fouts, 37, Kankakee (IL) Fire Department: cardiac arrhythmia after completing two fire and two EMS calls on his last shift.

July 3. Captain Thomas Araguz III, 30, Wharton (TX) Fire Department: trapped by rapidly progressing fire conditions at a poultry farm.

July 4. Engineer Charles Robert “Bob” Flintom, 61, Pelham-Batesville Fire Department, Greer, SC: injuries sustained when internal bleeding caused him to black out, fall, and strike his head on July 1.

July 9. Firefighter-Chief Driver Douglas L. Smith, 50, Liberty Hose Company No. 1, Williamstown, PA: apparent heart attack.

Source: USFA Firefighters Memorial Database

ANSI approves radio-channel standard

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) approved, in June, APCO/NPSTC ANS 1.104.1-2010: Standard Channel Nomenclature for the Public Safety Interoperability Channel. According to the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) International and the National Public Safety Telecommunications Council (NPSTC), the standard “provides a standardized naming format for each Federal Communications Commission-designated Interoperability Channel in Public Safety Radio Services” and will ensure national consistency of interoperability on related radio channels.

“It is necessary to develop and employ a common set of channel names so that all responders to an incident know which channel to tune their radios to, as well as the band and primary use for the channel,” notes APCO International Executive Director George Rice.

UA study focus on firefighter heart attacks

“Most firefighters who die of heart attacks have underlying heart disease, but in many cases the disease is not discovered early. Standard medical tests for firefighters do not detect early heart disease,” say researchers at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, University of Arizona (UA). Using a $1 million three-year Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Assistance to Firefighters Grant for the research, the College will investigate whether medical treatment can control the progression of early atherosclerotic disease in firefighters.

The effectiveness of statin drugs in preventing increases in the thickness in the artery lining over time in firefighters who do not have high levels of total cholesterol will be among the areas of study. Dr. Jeff Burgess, a UA public health professor and the principal investigator on the study, will work in partnership with the Phoenix (AZ) Fire Department Health Center; Dr. Matthew Allison of the University of California, San Diego; and other researchers.

Preliminary analyses from a previous FEMA-sponsored study revealed that, just like in the general population, cholesterol levels in firefighters were a strong risk factor for increased thickness of the lining of the carotid arteries in the neck, which is a measure of the extent of atherosclerosis. The risks continued even at the level of total cholesterol below that for which medical treatment is currently recommended. The increased thickness of the inner lining of the carotid arteries has been shown to be strongly associated with arterial disease in the heart.

IAFC “Go Teams” ready to deploy

The International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) officially announced in July that its “Go Teams,” a group of responders on call to assist local, state, or federal authorities affected by a disaster, were ready to be deployed. The teams, comprised of two representatives for each Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) region, can readily assist with the following services: command and general staff, resource management, incident action plans, and documentation. The IAFC’s Emergency Management Committee created and administers the program, which receives financial support from FEMA’s National Integration Center.

Go Team members completed a week-long training program in May. To request assistance from the Go Team, call (888) 840-6884. Additional information is at the IAFC mutual-aid Web site, www.iafc.org/mutualaid/, or contact Bill Bullock at (703) 537-4849 or bbullock@iafc.org.

NFPA: Firefighter fatalities drop in 2009

“For the first time in three years, the number of on-the-job firefighter deaths in the United States has dropped below 100,” according to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) annual Firefighter Fatality Report, released in June. According to the report, 82 firefighters were killed in the line of duty in 2009, down from the 10-year average of 98 and the 105 killed in 2008.

As in most years, sudden cardiac death was the number-one cause of on-duty firefighter fatalities, which accounted for 39 percent of the on-duty deaths in the past five years.

Other key findings in the report include the following:

• Six deaths occurred at five intentionally set fires. From 2000 through 2009, 60 firefighters (6.1 percent of all on-duty deaths) died in connection with intentionally set fires.
• Nine firefighters died in crashes of road vehicles, the lowest total since 1983.
• Over the past 10 years, 29 firefighter deaths have resulted from false calls, including malicious false alarms and alarm malfunctions.
• Of the 82 firefighters who died while on duty, 41 were volunteer firefighters, 31 were career firefighters, and the remaining were employees or contractors of federal and local land management agencies or private fire safety crews. The full report is available at http://www.nfpa.org/assets/files//PDF/osfff.pdf/.

Pascrell, King introduce WMD bill

Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) and Rep. Peter T. King (R-NY), ranking member of the Committee on Homeland Security, introduced The Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Prevention and Preparedness Act of 2010 (H.R. 5498). This legislation will facilitate the implementing of the recommendations of the WMD Commission and will improve U.S. efforts to prevent, deter, detect, and respond to an attack by a weapon of mass destruction.

“The WMD Commission has told us that almost nine years after 9/11, we still do not have a comprehensive national strategy to counter the grave threat that weapons of mass destruction pose to our nation,” noted Pascrell. “I am very proud we have the endorsement of the Commission for our bipartisan legislation. [The Act] we introduced is in fact an extensive blueprint to address the greatest catastrophic risk we face …”

“The WMD Commission has offered the sobering finding that a WMD attack is likely to occur somewhere in the world by 2013 …. Public reports from former intelligence community officials indicate that al-Qaeda is seeking to acquire or develop WMDs, which they surely would seek to use against the United States,” King pointed out. “This legislation will enhance America’s capabilities to protect American lives from such a WMD attack.”

Endorsing the bill, WMD Commission Chair Sen. Bob Graham and Vice Chair Sen. Jim Talent issued the following joint statement: “Moving this bill quickly through the legislative process and to the President’s desk for signature will be an incredibly important step in improving America’s biodefense posture ….”

Union pressures paid members to resign as volunteers

If you are a “two-hatter” and are under pressure from your union to stop serving your community as a volunteer emergency responder, visit the National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC) Volunteer Advocacy Committee’s Web site at www.nvfc.org/volunteeradvocacy/. You will find a form you can submit to alert the Volunteer Advocacy Committee to your situation.

The following is a bit of background on this issue. An article (http://www.nvfc.org/index.php?id=1179) published in March on www.mycentraljersey.com and reprinted in the NVFC’s E-update explained that Michael Schaffer, a career firefighter with the Cherry Hill (NJ) Fire Department, was forced to resign from International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) Local 2663 because he serves as a volunteer firefighter in Berlin Township, New Jersey, where he lives. (A “two-hatter” is a union member who serves as a career firefighter and also as a volunteer firefighter in another department.) The IAFF prohibits its members from volunteering as emergency responders in jurisdictions where an IAFF local is present or into which the union may want to expand. The article also indicated that the union intends to bring up other members on charges in the future.

Schaffer is not the only firefighter who has been pressured to quit volunteering or leave the union. In 2006, Vincent Pereira, a career firefighter with the Port Reading Fire District No. 2 and a volunteer firefighter in the Colonia (NJ) Volunteer Fire Company, was expelled from the Woodbridge (NJ) Fire Fighters Association, Local 290, for his volunteer activities. Pereira did not resign from the union and was eventually brought up on formal charges and subjected to a Trial Board hearing on January 5, 2006. Pereira provided the NVFC with a transcript from the hearing, which has been posted on the NVFC’s Volunteer Advocacy Committee Web site at www.nvfc.org/volunteeradvocacy. Pereira was ultimately expelled from membership in the Local and the IAFF.

Unlike Pereira and Schaffer, who stood up to IAFF pressure and continue to serve as volunteer firefighters instead of maintaining their union membership, many two-hatters drop out of the volunteer fire service rather than take on the union and face the personal and professional fallout in the workplace, says the NVFC.