Firefighter Blog

My old department, the California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection is in the news. Governor Arnnold Schwarzenegger closed a pension loophole preventing some retirees from a form of double dipping.
I was more surprised at what the guys are making now. You won't get any arguments from me that the pay is high, they earn every penny!

Charles Angione, former Operations Chief for the City of Plainfield (NJ) Fire Department, author of Days and Nights of Fire, decorated 25-year line veteran, long time incident commander of note and National Fire Academy Alumnus writes in his column in Firefighting.com in part;

"....police lieutenants who sat at desks and worked on administrative support and supply functions were considered true leaders, while fire captains who got their hands dirty leading their people into fire buildings were somehow less so. Chief officers, the reasoning followed, should therefore be as far removed from firefighting as possible, where they are just too close to their men. Who knows how many lost structures, injuries and, perhaps, even fire deaths can be attributed to taking our most experienced and capable officers off the firefighting force...."

I encourage all persons in the fire service to read his (fire related) works including his book.

From IAFF.org:

"An Influenza pandemic could potentially result in widespread illness and death around the world. Because all disasters and emergencies are dealt with locally, each local fire and emergency medical department must collaborate with its local government, public health department and community stakeholders to devise a plan of action.

The recent hurricane disasters illustrate the need for planning and preparation for effective and efficient response in an emergency. Some localities already have task forces established or are in the process of putting them together and developing their plans. It is critical for IAFF affiliates to have representatives on these task forces to ensure that policy and care delivery models are developed with first responders’ concerns at the forefront. ..."

"For example, if an outbreak of pandemic flu were to occur and mass inoculations needed among the general public, the best delivery system may be for trained fire fighters and emergency medical personnel to provide such vaccinations, and their fire departments and fire stations serve as inoculation centers. Attempting to deliver such a mass inoculation through hospitals or local health departments that are not available on a 24/7 basis could be a miserable failure and harm their ability to treat what would already be an extremely high load of patients during an outbreak. ...."

IAFF Pandemic checklist

IAFF Pandemic bulletin

Tag: iaff

Blogs are like pets, they need to be fed. The blog is hungry but I have too many items on the table.
For the record I make no money to speak of with Firefighter Blog. My readers have ad-blindness. This is not a bad thing. It means when readers visit they are looking for a new post or are sent here on a particular search query from search engines.
Some blogs do well getting people to hit an -a d- if the visitor is surfing a site with no particular intent.
I am looking forward to seeing what the upcoming fire season brings. Soon state and federal crews will be filling positions and training will begin.