Jim Casey

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Arson Battle Gains as Tactics Improve

The fire service always faces problems of one sort or another, not the least of which is the problem of arson. Indeed, arsonists had a boom year in 1978. National estimates for that year put the toll at 700 lives and $1.3 billion in property loss. Figures for 1979 are not yet available, but apparently they will be just as high, if not higher than 1978. This, of course, should not be, as witness the number of cities—notably Dallas—that have cut their arson losses way down (see Fire Engineering, September 1979).
Fire Department LeadershipFirefighting

What the Fire Service Achieved in the 70s

In Chicago, back in 1967, Fire Engineering conducted a symposium that was themed to “The 1970s—Challenging Years for the Fire Service.”
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Era of Growing Pains For Fire Service EMS

According to the United States Fire Administration, 80 to 85 percent of all pre-hospital emergency medical service is being delivered by the fire service. Figures also show that 65 to 70 percent of all fire departments are now delivering some level of EMS and nearly all successful advanced life support programs in medium to large cities are delivered by fire departments. The percentages given above show what has happened in the last 12 years.
Fire EMSFirefighting

National Fire Academy Needs Your Support

We have been following the “federal focus on fire” since way back in 1967 when we went down to Washington, D.C., to sit in on the Senate and House hearings on a bill that eventually became the Fire Research and Safety Act of 1967. Among other items, the act established a National Commission on Fire Prevention and Control, whose report “America Burning” led to the establishment of the National Fire Prevention and Control Administration, now called the United States Fire Administration.
Fire PreventionFire Safety

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Volunteer Fire Service Gets National Attention

The volunteer fire fighters in this country have a tradition that goes back all the way to colonial times, a tradition that involves service to one’s neighbors and one’s community—freely given and without thought to life and limb. They started with a bucket brigade, changed to the primitive, manually operated piston pumps, then to the steam fire engine and finally to the glistening pumpers and aerials that we find today.
Fire Department LeadershipFirefighting

Fire Prevention Best As a Local Function

We have always felt that fire prevention was a local function and one that could be best handled by the local fire department in cooperation, of course, with the local population. But it’s no easy job. If you approached a hundred people at random and asked each one if he had ever had a fire in his house, chances are the answer would be “no,” 98 out of 100 times. To those 98, fire has never been a problem and they are therefore almost completely indifferent to the hazards of fire.
Fire PreventionFire Safety

Police-Fire Consolidation Resurfaces

One of the offshoots of Proposition 13 is a revival of interest (by city officials) in police-fire consolidation. This, despite the fact that consolidation has never really worked wherever it was given a fair trial—notably in Peoria, Ill., and Daytona Beach, Fla., where it was eventually dropped. Under the consolidation concept, the duties of a policeman and a fire fighter are merged in whole or in part. Usually, the fire fighter (who would only be sitting around doing nothing anyway) rides a patrol car—complete with gun and handcuffs—and performs the functions of a policeman.
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Metro Chiefs Tackle Fiscal Restraints

According to the attendees at the recent IAFC Metropolitan Chiefs Committee spring conference in Memphis, Proposition 13 has definitely had a ripple effect on the fire service. And “fiscal restraint” was probably the most bandied about phrase that we heard. While gloom did not prevail, frustration was on everybody’s mind. The Metro Chiefs, incidentally, represent every fire department with at least 400 members or which serves a population of 200,000 or more.
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Breathing at a Fire Not All That Simple

There are few, if any, fire fighters who cannot properly don a self-contained breathing apparatus and go into an unfriendly atmosphere. But there must be a lot of fire fighters who are unaware of the physiological and psychological effects of using the apparatus during fire combat or high stress conditions. According to the authors of the article on page 36, “Not enough time and attention has been given (in training) to examining such things as the effect of change in a fire fighter’s blood pressure, heart rate and blood gas while using breathing apparatus.”
Firefighter SCBAFirefighting Equipment

Smoke Detectors No Substitute For EDITH

There are a lot of people in this country, including some in the fire service, who seem to feel that the home fire and smoke detector is the greatest thing that has happened since the invention of the automatic sprinkler. But this detector has only one function and that is to alert the occupants of a home that there is a fire. Once alerted, the occupants should leave their home by the quickest and safest route possible (it might mean dropping from a second-floor window).
Fire Department LeadershipFirefighting

Don’t Wait for Disasters to Happen

Canyon City sits out on the plains of the Texas Panhandle and, with a population of some 8000 persons, it is not a place where one would expect to find big things happening—especially in the fire service. But Canyon City also sits on a point where the Houston-Denver rails connect with the Santa Fe mainline from Chicago to Los Angeles. And thereby hangs the tale which you can read in full on page 24—three BLEVEs and raging flames caused by the derailment of 35 cars in a 92-car freight train.
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Proposition 13 to Affect All Fire Departments

California’s Proposition 13, which was passed in June of last year, limited property taxes to 1 percent of market value and generated forecasts of large layoffs of public employees and major cutbacks of services. The forecasts for fiscal 1978-1979 proved wrong, however, since the state bailed out the municipalities with surplus funds. But what of the fiscal year 1979-1980 and beyond? According to our California correspondent (page 24), “the majority of municipal fire agencies foresee no major cutbacks, but do believe that capital construction and acquisition of apparatus will be seriously curtailed.”
Fire Apparatus

Fiscal Budget Requires Thought and Effort

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Federal Focus on Fire Gets New Name And New Director

Fire PreventionFire Safety

EMS and EMT Now Part Of Fire Service Vocabulary

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NFPCA Transfer Looks Good

Fire PreventionFire Safety

Tanker Explosions—Problem in Inspection

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Swift Prosecution A Must for Arson

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Insurance Industry Enters Arson Battle

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Citizens, Media Can Help Fight Arson

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Tackling America’s Malignant Crime

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Fire Chiefs Need F. P. Engineers

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Women Fire Fighters Are Here to Stay

Fire EMSFirefighting

National Fire Academy On Its Way Out?

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