Fire Industry News for November 2023

"The BAFE SP205 scheme provides a route in evidencing competency to deliver the vital service of Fire Risk Assessment," said Chris Auger, Director of Schemes. He adds, "We encourage registered organizations, specifically SP205 registered organizations, to provide your input to help greater understanding and steer decision making." Information provided by Office As users will be aware, there is considerable work underway to strengthen the building and fire safety regulatory systems, not least...

Three generations of the same firefighting family attended an extra special ceremony to mark the graduation of the latest recruit to join the ranks at Askern fire station. Ellie Adams, aged 23, has become the third generation of her family to serve at Askern, Doncaster after completing her initial training and ‘passing out’ in front of family and friends at South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue’s Sheffield training base. initial training Amongst those watching were Ellie’s...

Inspirational women from across South Yorkshire’s fire service are being celebrated this week, as part of a brand new ‘Women of Fire’ exhibition. Pulled together by South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue, as part of International Women’s Day, the exhibition features portrait photographs of eight women currently working within the service. #BreakTheBias Organizers say that the exhibition has been designed to support the official women’s day theme – #Brea...

South Yorkshire firefighters will be practicing new procedures for responding to fires in high-rise blocks of flats, as part of work to adopt learning from incidents in tall buildings. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue is carrying out multiple training exercises in each of the county’s four districts in the coming months. practical, live training The practical, live training will particularly focus on changes to evacuation procedures when fire compartmentation in tall buildings fails....

South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Authority (SYFRA) has appointed Chris Kirby as the new Chief Fire Officer. selection and interview  Barnsley-born Chris joined South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue as Deputy Chief Fire Officer in 2020 Chris Kirby was appointed following a selection process which included a written application, interview with members of the Fire Authority, and presentation to members of a staff stakeholder panel. Barnsley-born Chris joined South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue...

All high-rise residential buildings in South Yorkshire have now been inspected by the county’s fire service, as part of a mammoth Government-backed project. The team of inspectors made up of staff from South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue’s business safety department, started their ambitious inspection program in November 2021. Building Risk Review project This came as part of a Government-driven ‘Building Risk Review’ project that sought to significantly increase the pac...

Young people across South Yorkshire are being allowed to change their lives in the New Year, thanks to the county’s police and fire services. South Yorkshire Police and South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue will once again be teaming up to deliver the ‘life-changing’ Prince’s Trust Team Program course in January 2022. Prince’s Trust Team Program This is a course for people who are between 16 and 25 years old and not currently in work or full-time education. Lasting 1...

Firefighters across South Yorkshire are urging people to put smoke alarm testing at the top of their Christmas preparation list, as the big day draws closer. The plea comes following several examples in recent weeks, from right across the country, where working smoke alarms have saved lives, pets, and homes from serious harm. With everyone busy buying gifts, putting up decorations, and making plans, officers are hoping people will be able to find 60 seconds to test their alarms. They...

Fire services across Yorkshire are re-iterating their advice to road users on what to do when coming across blue light vehicles, with more cars now on the roads due to lockdown restrictions easing. Stay calm, pull over safely and give as much room as possible is the key message from the four brigades–South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, North Yorkshire, and Humberside. Drivers are also being urged not to perform emergency stops in the middle of a road. This, the services say, can end up slowi...

South Yorkshire’s fire service has won a national award for its response to a major wildfire, which crews spent 22 days tackling last year. The fire affected a huge area of rare peat moorland, which is a site of special scientific interest and home to several rare species of animals and plants. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue won the Incident Management Award at CIR Magazine’s Business Continuity Awards 2021 for its work in coordinating the response to the incident, which inv...

South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Service is once again calling for people in Askern, Rossington, Stocksbridge, Dearne, Birley, and Cudworth to join their on-call firefighting teams. Despite two hugely successful recruitment campaigns in the last year, there are still some spaces at each of the above stations that the service would like to fill. On-call firefighters play a vital role in crewing fire stations right across the county. Trained to the same high standards as full-time firefighters,...

South Yorkshire’s fire service is up for a major national award celebrating its work with diverse communities. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Service has been shortlisted in the ‘diverse company’ category at this year’s National Diversity Awards. The service has been shortlisted for its work to train and empower staff, promote inclusive recruitment processes and involve diverse communities in its work. The nomination pitches SYFR up against seven other organizati...

Firefighters have begun responding to 999 calls from South Yorkshire’s newest fire station for the first time. The new two storey, three-bay Barnsley fire station was completed earlier this month and went operational on 17 August. The energy-efficient building on Broadway, Kingstone replaces the 60-year-old fire station on the same site which had reached the end of its operational life. Firefighters had been housed in a temporary facility off-site while the year-long construction of...

The fire service has marked the lifting of coronavirus restrictions by attending its first public safety event in months. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue firefighters and safety officers were among those who attended a family fun day at Shirecliffe Heliport-with the event doubling up as a charity fundraiser. A fire engine and chip pan display unit- which educates people about the dangers of pouring water onto hot oil – were also there, alongside vehicles and staff from other emerge...

A team at the heart of coordinating fire service volunteers who supported South Yorkshire’s pandemic response has been honored with a special award. South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue’s three-strong ‘volunteers cell’ oversaw the work of 200 fire service staff who volunteered to fulfill multiple requests for support from partner agencies as they strived to keep essential services running during the first stages of the pandemic. Those tasks included making food and pre...

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...

The UK’s national fire safety organization, the Fire Protection Association (FPA), is further developing its collaboration with UL, a global leader in safety science, to support fire testing in the UK by expanding testing and laboratory capacities at the FPA’s test laboratory in Blockley, Gloucestershire. UL is investing in the installation of fire-resistance test furnaces at the FPA’s test laboratory. As part of the collaboration, tests for fire resistance, which form the bas...

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...

On Monday 5th July 2021, the Building Safety Bill was published. In their press release, the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, Lord Stephen Greenhalgh, and The Rt Hon Robert Jenrick MP state this “will create lasting generational change and set out a clear pathway for the future on how residential buildings should be constructed and maintained.” Building Safety Regulator The newly established Building Safety Regulator “will oversee the new regime and w...

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...

Chris Auger, Director of Schemes, joins Interim Industry Competence Committee (IICC). BAFE is proud to announce that Chris Auger, Director of Schemes, has accepted an invitation from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to be a member of the Interim Industry Competence Committee (IICC). The committee has been established to act in an advisory position which will support the HSE’s Building Safety Regulator (BSR). The committee will aid in developing new regulatory measures regarding l...

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...

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...

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...

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...