FireFighterNation

Athletes track every possible aspect of their performance, seeking to squeeze out improvements wherever they can. FireRescue editor-in-chief Tim Sendelbach argues that the fire service needs to do the same.

Response times are a critical and much-scrutinized quality measure for fire departments, but too often the focus for reducing them is on driving to the incident. In this article, Jake Rhoades and Tom Jenkins look at some technological solutions that can shave seconds off response without encouraging poor driving practices.

The issue of fire department staffing has been under scrutiny ever since the economy took a turn for the worse. But as Mike Kirby and Tom Lakamp point out, decreasing staffing only increases the amount of time it takes to successfully respond to and mitigate fires. Additionally, they examine NFPA 1710 and recent NIST research to support their argument for proper engine company staffing levels, as well as the need for decreased response times.

In his final column before retiring from the fire service, Chief Brian Crawford reflects back on his career and the lessons in leadership he learned along the way.

Remember when you were a line firefighter and the firefighter in front of you would hesitate to go into a house fire? You would respond by giving them a push in the back, and they would either go in and face the fire, or they would peel off, leaving the nozzle for you.