Occupational Safety and Health for the Fire Service

Occupational Safety and Health for the Fire Service

Introduction

In order to fulfill the needs and wants of our lives all of us adopt and indulge in different professions. Each profession has its own uniqueness, demands and nature. But there are certain professions that command respect and dignity. This is because such professions involve uncertainty, high degree of risk and a strong sense of serving to others. The aim and objective of this speech is also to talk about one such profession. This profession is of firefighting. Every morning when people leave their homes to go to their work they have a fair idea what their day is going to be, what they are going to and what situations they are likely to face? But, the day of a firefighter is completely unpredictable. Every day, every hour even every second of their duty is challenging and risky. But, still there are scores of people that join this profession and continue to serve in this profession. Despite this hard and tough job people are working in this profession so, this shows that there must be some strong reason behind this. One such reason can be fulfilling the God's obligation on all of us to show compassion to others. This paper will present a situation where the firefighter had to face a situation where he risked his life in order to save the lives of others.

Discussion

This part of the paper will present the interview with one of the firefighters involved in this incident:

The incident Scene and Situation

On Tuesday, November 30, 2010 a two storey building was on fire. When the fire fighters arrived, the second storey of the building had caught fire and it was the one that had to be saved. The situation was tense as there was chaos everywhere and people were worried about the fire.

The Members who were Present and their Roles

12 Companies of Los Angeles Fire fighters, 3 LAFD Rescue Ambulances, 1 Arson Unit, 2 Urban Search and Rescue Units, 1 Hazardous Materials Team, 2 EMS Battalion Captains, 3 Battalion Chief Officer Command Teams and 1 Division Chief Officer Command Team, a total of 89 Los Angeles Fire Department personnel under the direction of Battalion Chief Chris Kawai were present at the situation.

The Situation that led to the Incident/Near Miss

The reason of this situation was electric in nature i.e. there was some problem with the electric connection of the building.

The variables that allowed the accident to occur

There was no adequate engineered fire alarm design documents observed with the submittals for this building. As such, the submitted documents could not be reviewed for compliance with the requirements of Los Angeles Administration for the design of the fire alarm system.

With the new emergency lights and fire alarm information, please use the new floor plan showing the required second stairway as the lighting and alarm will also be affected by this design.

There was an elevated platform in the map which appears to be the ...