Firefighting in the United States
The fire department in the United States is based in technology, organization and tactics of the widespread wood construction of houses.
Emergency call
The emergency call the fire department in the United States can be reached by dialing 911. A Customer Service Representative ( Dispatcher ) manages the data of the emergency call to the respective institutions (police, fire or ambulance service ) on. The Customer Service Representative provides the calling telephone number and can locate or recall when needed. The emergency is financed by a fee that is included on each phone bill, wherein a respective state and federal tax.
The Customer Service Representative is trying more details about the emergency to ask for and can by pass first statement on measures to be taken to the caller (eg, respiration ). He is assisted by an emergency catalog, which contains possible answers to each question to be asked, which leads either to an in-depth question or a statement initiates emergency.
The Customer Service Representative has the call ends calming influence to give the caller the feeling of not being alone and thus avoid panic and related hazards.
Structure and organization
Each state regulates fire-brigade with its own laws and organizations, with the county enjoy a large measure of independence. It comes between the counties of any state to large variations in organization and equipment, perhaps due to the different colors of the emergency vehicles and personal equipment will most likely be visible. Vehicle colors can be, among others red, yellow, yellow - green, white and blue.
In several counties, the fire services are not provided by the public sector, but contracted out to private companies who will then ensure fire safety in the region. These contracts will expire over a certain period of several years and are then written out again, which has already led to disputes between parties.
In addition to volunteer fire departments ( Volunteer Fire Department ), there are the professional fire services, usually called "City Name Fire Department ". With a workforce of approximately 16,000 employees, the New York fire brigade is (New York Fire Department ( FDNY )) is the largest in the U.S. and worldwide.
The ranks and insignia of the American fire departments are based on those of the military. A fire engine is usually done by a "Captain "; the groups of second lieutenant. " Chief" may generally mean commander or, especially in a professional military, graduated be several degrees. There are also staff positions and usually a civilian leadership structure under a civilian officials. This is subject to the mayor, but sometimes he wears uniform ( " ( Fire) Commissioner "). The American designations are as follows:
- Chief of Department
- Chief of Operations
- ( Deputy ) Assistant Chief
- Division Commander
- Deputy Chief
- Battalion Commander
- Battalion Chief
- Captain
- Lieutenant
- Firefighter.
Technique and tactics
Rolling stock
The most common fire engines are ladder ( "ladder" ) and engine ( " engine").
The engine is similar to the classic German Löschgruppenfahrzeug. They usually leads with a basic equipment to provide technical assistance and a water reservoir.
The Ladder (also simply called Truck ) has usually a larger crew than the German aerial ladder. Your crew is next to the " ventilation ", ie the creation of the exhaust vents in the roof, usually also responsible for human salvation. In addition to the mounted on the vehicle chassis turntable ladder ( turntable ladder ) there is also the tiller ladder that is installed on a semitrailer.
A combination of Engine and Ladder is the bottom (short for quintuple combination pumper ), which combines five equipment functions: pump ( with a minimum flow rate of 1,000 gallons per minute), ladder (or Hubrettungseinrichtung with a fixed water supply), water tank ( minimum capacity 300 gallons), tube supply (suction and pressure hoses ) and various moving conductors ( at least 85 running feet).
Pumpers and tankers are used for water extraction and transport.
Another, in the function about the German Rescue Vehicle corresponding vehicle ( but again with a larger crew) is usually performed as Rescue. There are also HazMat teams and vehicles (short for "hazardous material", hazardous material ), see equipment cart dangerous.
Battalion called the vehicle of a commander, or about a command car. There are also so-called, as well as command and control vehicles, according to a command vehicle.
Crew transport vehicles are rare due to the higher capacity of the team's other vehicles. The requirements for fire fighting vehicles are defined in the standard 1901 ( "Standard for Automotive Fire Apparatus ") of the National Fire Agency Protecrtion.
Staff
While it is aimed at German fire brigades, to be able to use the fire fighters as universally as possible, members of U.S. fire departments such as fire fighting, rescue people, etc. are often a particular vehicle and thus a specific task assigned to determine a rough classification results from the separation of truck and Engine Companies. The Engine Company accepts the deletion of the fire while the truck company (whose vehicle is usually a turntable ladder with season / group cabin is ) "Fire Ground support operations" takes over. These include the inflation and deflation, people rescue, carry ladders, establish a water supply, etc.
Fire-fighting
In the control of building fires, " Tactical ventilation " plays a significant role; while discs are smashed and torn holes in the building roof to allow pull smoke and gases. However, the disadvantage of this tactic is an emergent circumstances chimney effect. Also in Germany the positive pressure ventilation is increasingly taught and implemented.
The forest fire fighting is a specialized field, in which not only the fire service a variety of other facilities such as conservation agencies, private companies, reserve administrations are, inter alia, each with their own units for use; the best known are probably the so-called smoke jumpers that jump with parachutes in remote fire areas. The vehicles and tactics here differ greatly from fire fighting in urbanized areas: the main focus is on the (very effective ) manual work in undergrowth is placed with special hoes and axes. In Western Europe, these tactics are only at the stage of testing and are often still unknown.
FEMA
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA ) is a State civil protection organization at the federal level. It is located after restructuring in 2002 within the Department of Homeland Security and the United States Fire Administration ( USFA ). It is used for coordination of local units and the exchange of experts, which are not present at the level of all U.S. states. Their expertise lies in guiding, consulting, coordination and support of the Local Forces. Their main task is to avoid losses in life and to keep damage to the economy of the United States as small as possible. She is also responsible for the allocation of resources following a disaster.
Organized FEMA 's ten regional and two field offices. Each office is responsible for several states or dependent areas. The regional staff work directly with the official institutions of the States to draw up plans for disasters and their prevention. In the case of already occurring disasters, FEMA is working locally with the relevant emergency organizations of each country together.
Region 1: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Iceland, Vermont
Region 2: New Jersey, New York, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands
Region 3: Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia
Region 4: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee
Region 5: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin, Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas
Region 7: Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska
Region 8: Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming
Region 9: American Samoa, Arizona, California, Guam, Hawaii, Nevada, Northern Mariana Islands, Marshall Islands, Micronesia
Region 10: Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington
Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (Public Law 93-288 ), also briefly called The Stafford Act, regulates the support of the states and their citizens in the event of disasters that exceed the capabilities of local organizations. The Act was passed in 1988, regulates the delivery of emergency by the President and the possible help and their organization by FEMA.