South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Service News

High-rise buildings on an inspection list are not inherently unsafe say fire officers, as they report good progress in their mission to visit every high-rise residential block in South Yorkshire. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue (SYFR) has published the list of high-rise residential buildings forming part of its ‘Building Risk Review’ project.  The list includes buildings identified by the central government plus extra buildings identified by the SYFR- which made the deci...

A massive fire service recruitment drive aims to boost its work enforcing safety laws. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue has (Wednesday 7 July) launched a major new campaign calling on people to consider a role within its business fire safety team. The team is responsible for everything from inspecting businesses and licensing fireworks retailers to checking high-rise buildings – work which has increased significantly following the Grenfell Tower disaster. fire safety officers Area...

Firefighters in South Yorkshire have started carrying fire escape hoods to protect members of the public from toxic smoke at fires. The smoke hoods provide members of the public with up to 15 minutes of protection from four of the main fire gases (carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide, hydrogen chloride, and acrolein) and can be worn by conscious or unconscious people. If more than 15 minutes of protection is required then another hood can be given to each wearer. They do not provide oxygen but te...

Three fire and rescue staff from South Yorkshire are named in the Queen’s Birthday Honours 2021. Jess Grayson Control room operator - Jess Grayson has been awarded the British Empire Medal. She was named a BEM for services to mental health, having used her own mental health experiences to spearhead attempts to tackle the well-being issues firefighters and other emergency services workers face. Alongside her day-to-day duties in the control room Jess, a Watch Manager, also trained resili...

Firefighters from South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue (SYFR) will be supporting Sheffield GP practices by delivering COVID-19 vaccines. This comes just over a month after several fire service volunteers were trained up as vaccinators by St John Ambulance, and is part of a huge national effort from fire services across the country to help with the pandemic response. vaccinations at practices The agreement struck by Chief Fire Officer, Alex Johnson, and pioneers at NHS Sheffield Clinical Commissi...

Ambulance crews have started responding to 999 calls from a fire station in Doncaster where a new local ambulance response point has been located. Following a year of planning and preparation between South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue and Yorkshire Ambulance Service, the construction of a multi-use Portakabin has been completed on-site at Rossington Fire Station. The Portakabin The Portakabin, which is fully operational, will act as a base for ambulance crews working in and around the Rossingt...

Firefighters across South Yorkshire are asking the public to help them crack down on deliberate fires across the county, by reporting incident details to a dedicated new fire line. In response to the 3900 deliberate fire incidents they were called to in last year, South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue has joined up with an arm of the national charity, Crimestoppers. Report information on Deliberate fire-setting Once reported, the details will be anonymized and used as part of fire and police inve...

South Yorkshire’s police and fire services have hailed the success of a new joint facility for collision repairs, less than six months after opening. South Yorkshire Police and South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue worked together to develop the new building, which is next to Rotherham fire station in Eastwood. central store facility Everything from paint jobs to high-tech diagnostic work and repairs gets carried out at the workshops, with hundreds of vehicles from across both organizations...

South Yorkshire’s fire service is asking people to stay out of the water this summer unless they are part of an organized open-water swimming group. The message comes as part of a national week of action, run from Monday 26 April to Monday 3 May by the National Fire Chief’s Council, in which fire services across the country are urging people to stay safe near water. reducing water rescues Firefighters hope that by joining forces and gaining the support of partners such as the Roya...

A brand new, energy-efficient station for Barnsley’s firefighters is taking shape. The former three-story building on Broadway, Kingstone has been demolished and the steelwork for a new two-story, three-bay facility on the same site is already up.  Firefighters are being housed in a temporary facility off-site whilst construction of the new building takes place. energy-efficient spaces Director of Support Services - Stuart Booth, said, “We’re making really good pro...

An emergency services team on the frontline of keeping people safe during the pandemic has revealed the full breadth of its work, as it reflects on a year’s activity since the UK’s first lockdown. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue and South Yorkshire Police’s joint community safety department has delivered education packages to more than 8,000 children, visited 2,500 high-risk vulnerable people and given guns and knives training to over 2,100 pupils. Top of the team’s e...

Misinformation is the target of a new campaign in South Yorkshire, which seeks to curb the spread of false content online. tongue-in-cheek campaign Health chiefs, emergency services, and councils across South Yorkshire are coming together to warn people to think twice about the things they share- and to get their information from official sources. The tongue-in-cheek campaign draws on local references and familiar conversations to point out how well-meaning conversations online can quickly de...

Fire service staff have been trained by St. John Ambulance, as part of a volunteer scheme to help deliver the NHS vaccination program. administer the vaccine Staff including firefighters, officers, and support were trained to administer the vaccine and to support people as they go through the vaccination process. The volunteers will complete up to two shifts a month with St. John Ambulance as part of the huge national effort to get the country vaccinated. skills, training, and opportunity C...

South Yorkshire’s firefighters have a new weapon to help them tackle moorland wildfires- off road vehicles. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue has added two Polaris vehicles to its fleet, helping crews to respond more effectively to wildfires and other incidents, which might be hard to reach using a traditional fire engine. Polaris vehicles fitted with water pumps Fire crews will spend the next few months being trained in their use The vehicles are to be fitted with water pumps, which c...

These are just three of the myths around women in the fire service that South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue has set out to bust, as part of its latest International Women’s Day campaign. With a brand new video, Monday 8 March, the service is looking to celebrate its current group of female firefighters, control operators and support staff. It’s also trying to encourage and empower women who have previously considered a role within the fire service but been put off by traditional ster...

The fire service’s governing Fire Authority has decided to increase its portion of Council Tax by 1.99% next year, at its budget setting meeting on Monday. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue says the increase will help to support investments its making to its frontline service- including the recruitment of additional firefighters-as well as helping it to prepare for potentially more uncertain times ahead. Annual funding for the fire service Householders in Band D will pay £76.07 pe...

Firefighters are deploying two high-volume pumps to Sykehouse in Doncaster in a bid to aid the removal of surface water which is currently lying on flood plains in the area.  River levels in the area are falling and existing drainage pumping arrangements are working well. Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue However, South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue has deployed the pumps-one of which is being sent by Nottinghamshire Fire & Rescue-to support the speedy removal of the water and to help...

Firefighters are urging people to stop leaving their cooking unattended in a bid to crack down on house fires across the county. New figures, released by South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue, show that half of all house fires across South Yorkshire last year started in the kitchen. An even deeper look into the issue, fire officers say, shows that the majority of these fires could be prevented and start when people leave pans on the hob or food in the oven. The service is now appealing to people ac...

A national inspection has praised the response of South Yorkshire’s fire service to the COVID-19 pandemic. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue adapted to the pandemic effectively, carried on delivering its core services and provided additional support to the community during the first phase of the pandemic. Inspectors also found that staff well-being was made a clear priority for the service and praised senior pioneers for actively promoting well-being services, in a report published b...

Councillors have approved a new set of response times for South Yorkshire’s fire service. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue says it will still aim to attend every single 999 call as quickly as it possibly can, but that having a set of published response times will make it more accountable to local people, help it to improve its service, and bring them in line with most other fire and rescue services around the country. national inspection report A national inspection reported that t...

This is a national effort, led by the Government, to make high-rise residential buildings safer, and give a better understanding of high-rise residential buildings across the country. It has come off the back of the tragic Grenfell Tower disaster and is in its second phase. ACM cladding The first phase of the program focused on Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) cladding. This saw SYFRS, and other fire services right across the country, work with building owners to identify buildings with ACM...

A team of fire safety inspectors is embarking on an ambitious project to inspect all high-rise residential buildings across South Yorkshire, over 18 meters or with six or more storeys, by the end of next year. This comes as part of a Government-driven ‘Building Risk Review’ program that seeks to ‘significantly increase’ the pace of high-rise residential inspection activity across the country. Made up of staff from South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue’s (SYFR) bus...

The fire service’s recovery from flooding which hit South Yorkshire last autumn has been recognized with a major international award. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue was awarded ‘Most Effective Recovery’ at the Business Continuity Institute’s Global Awards. The award-presented to the service’s Resilience, Planning, and Contingencies team at a virtual ceremony- recognizes organizations that have effectively managed major incidents. The fire service rescued more th...

A Sheffield building owner has been fined after obstructing the work of fire safety inspectors. Mr. Gunes Ata, trading as Noble Design & Build, was found guilty by Sheffield Magistrates Court of failing, without reasonable excuse, to comply with requirements imposed by an inspector from South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue. Mr. Ata did not attend the hearing on Wednesday (18 November) and did not enter a plea, but the court heard the case in his absence. Fire safety laws Court ordered M...

A man from Sheffield, who set himself on fire when using petrol on his seemingly unlit garden fire, is urging people not to follow in his footsteps and make the same mistake. Paul Wyatt, 50, was burning hedge trimmings in his garden earlier this year. He put paper on the bottom and hedge trimmings on top, before adding a match, which didn’t light the fire. He decided to apply a drop of petrol, planning to step back and throw a match on. Unbeknown to him, the original match was still smold...

If users are planning to have a bonfire at any time, but particularly during this firework period, please follow some simple safety guides to help users, their families, pets, and wildlife stay safe. Building bonfire Build bonfires well away from, and clear of, buildings, garden sheds, fences, hedges, and overhanging branches. Keep it to a manageable size and evenly built, so that it collapses inwards as it burns. Do not include plastics, household items, or rubber in the fire. Lighting...

South Yorkshire’s emergency services are urging people to be sensible and stay safe over the coming weeks, during what they say will be a ‘very different’ bonfire period for everyone. Trick or treating is being discouraged, to prevent the spread of COVID-19, as are Halloween and bonfire parties that break the current social distancing rules set out by the Government. Operation Dark Nights Meanwhile, firefighters are asking people to take extra care with fireworks and to avoi...

South Yorkshire’s fire service wants people to have their say on its draft Integrated Risk Management Plan 2021-2024. This is a plan that explains how the fire service will keep local people safe over the next few years. Among the issues, SYFRS wants views on their expected response times for different types of incidents, which have been published in the draft plan. Set of response standards The proposed new response time arrangements take into account whether a person’s life...

South Yorkshire’s fire service is taking its one-of-a-kind Black History Month exhibition online in October, in a bid to attract more people from BAME backgrounds to consider a fire and rescue service career. Family, which was put together to pay homage to the diverse heritage of fire service staff, features portrait photographs of 11 employees past and present. portrait exhibition The portraits were exhibited at various locations across Sheffield in October 2019 including the train sta...

Fire officers in Sheffield are asking local students not to cook while drunk in winter and, instead, help keep fire engines free for more serious emergencies. The plea follows the Government’s recent announcement that pubs must now close at 10 pm, which firefighters feel could prompt an increase in home drinking, cooking, and parties. increase in callouts They say that this, in turn, could lead to an increase in callouts to student accommodation across the city, something South Yorkshir...