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Wildfire activity in the western United States has been on the rise since the mid-1980s, with longer, higher-risk fire seasons projected for the future. Prescribed burning mitigates the risk of extreme wildfire events, but such treatments are currently underutilized. Fire managers have cited lack of firefighter availability as a key barrier to prescribed burning. We use both principal component analysis (PCA) and logistic regression modeling methodologies to investigate whether or not (and if yes, under what conditions) personnel shortages on a given day are associated with lower odds of a prescribed burn occurring in the Okanogan–Wenatchee National Forest. We utilize the logit model to further assess how personnel availability compares to other potential barriers (e.g., meteorological conditions) in terms of association with odds of a prescribed burn occurring. Our analysis finds that fall and spring days in general have distinct constellations of characteristics. Unavailability of personnel is associated with lower odds of prescribed burning in the fall season, controlling for meteorological conditions. However, in the spring, only fuel moisture is observed to be associated with the odds of prescribed burning. Our findings suggest that if agencies aim to increase prescribed burning to mitigate wildfire risk, workforce decisions should prioritize firefighter availability in the fall.

In 2010 the Forest Service, and its Northern Region, celebrated the centennial of the Big Blowup with far greater fanfare than they had the 50th anniversary. There were public lectures and memorials. The Museum of Northern Idaho installed an exhibit. The town of Wallace held a formal symposium in the high school gym, with Chief Forester Tom Tidwell and FAM director Tom Harbour in the audience. Former Chief Dale Boswell spoke of growing up in a Forest Service home before starting his own entrylevel job on an engine crew. The culmination came at the Woodlawn Cemetery in St. Maries, where

Since the mid-1970s, the city of St. Louis has encountered frequent litigation and court involvement surrounding the testing procedures used to evaluate candidates for promotion in the fire service. During this period, the city has expended a considerable amount of time, effort, and money to develop valid and defensible methods of testing. In light of this experience, we have decided to review the past history to see if any conclusions can be drawn that would be helpful to other organizations. This article contains a brief history of the city's fire service testing and litigation, and a description of the current testing model used by the city. It also addresses the use of various testing components and their impact on all candidates. Finally, some practical considerations are discussed.

This paper presents a semi-empirical method for the analysis of manning policies in firefighting. Since manpower costs account for a major share of non-volunteer fire departments' budgets, manning level is one of the most important policy issues relating to fire departments faced by local government decision makers. Yet, practically no analytic research of manning levels has been previously carried out. The method described in this paper uses an activity network approach to describe fireground command operations and a structured interview to obtain data. The technique was used to analyze the effect of manning level in one- and two-family residential fires in the city of Calgary, Canada. A series of structured interviews with fire department officers generated data concerning precedence relations among activities, their durations, and their manpower requirements. These were used to establish a relationship between manning levels and time needed to extinguish the fire. The analysis indicated that there is a limit on manning level above which only marginal improvement can be obtained. Also, the effect of an additional firefighter depends on the existing manning level. The results presented here are of a preliminary nature. However, they seem to lend credibility to the technique. In addition, we discuss some qualitative conclusions and other possible uses of the method.

Five core concepts from the Fire Dynamics Boot Camp In April 2017, the Howard County, MD, Department of Fire and Rescue Services hosted the NFFF and Underwriters Laboratories (UL) Firefighter Safety Research Institute's pilot course of Fire Dynamics Boot Camp. The course was designed to illustrate how fire service leaders and instructors can incorporate current research findings about fire behavior and firefighting tactics into their training programs with the ultimate goal of improving safety on the fireground. THERMAL IMAGERS AND BASEMENT FIRES * Thermal imagers provide additional critical information regarding the source of heat. * Thermal imagers may help indicate there is a basement fire but can't be used to assess structural integrity from above. * When encountering a basement fire, don't fall through or get caught in the flow path.