morning lineup firegeezer on 31 Jul 2007 07:09 am
Morning Lineup - July 31
Mutual Aid - Automatic and Otherwise
Mutual aid response has been mentioned a lot lately in the Fire & Rescue world. Most recently it was brought up while reporting on the tragic fire in Contra Costa County. The nearest fire engine to the fire is in the Richmond city limits and they were actually dispatched on the initial alarm. However, before they arrived on the scene they were put back in service because the County had units responding. You can only speculate about how the outcome might have been quite different.
This morning Dave Statter is discussing these issues (HERE) as they relate to the cities of Baltimore and Washington and how they are isolated from their neighboring departments when it comes to the initial dispatching of emergency responses.
Back in 1975 the Virginia suburbs of Washington initiated a landmark pact of automatic mutual-aid dispatching for all fire calls (EMS was excluded at first and it still is but it is now a part of the system). Arlington County, Fairfax County and the Cities of Alexandria and Falls Church initiated the policy that all fire dispatches will be to the nearest units regardless of jurisdiction. While the fire boxes remained configured within the city/county boundaries, the running order of the boxes was rescheduled for the nearest stations.
Not only did this noticeably improve the coverage in the border areas, but there was also another immediate benefit to the taxpayers. This pact eliminated the need for some future fire stations that would have been built in the outlying areas. Fairfax County immediately took 3 future stations off the planning table while Alexandria and Arlington each eliminated one station. Now you have some interesting box assignments such as Fairfax’s station 28 that actually has first-due boxes in three jurisdictions (Fairfax, Arlington and Falls Church), while just down the road in Station 10’s territory they have a box where the first-alarm assignment includes stations from Fairfax, Arlington and Alexandria.
The communications problem was dealt with right at the start. A new radio frequency was licensed to Arlington and was dubbed the “NoVa” frequency. It is a selection on every fire and rescue unit in the group and can also be transmitted from the dispatchers of all jurisdictions. Whenever any “mutual box” is dispatched, all units responding will be on the NoVa frequency and the dispatch center of the jurisdiction housing the box handles the call.
This mutual aid system worked so well right from the start that a few years later all the jurisdictions re-adjusted their shift schedules to run concurrently with each other. Now when a shift is working the same people are on duty in all stations every day, leading to even better fireground coordination.
This particular mutual aid pact has been tremendously successful. Its success over the past 30 years is testimony enough. There are literally scores of communities in the U. S. that could benefit from a similar arrangement, if they would only put aside their petty political differences and put the citizenry first for a change.
on 31 Jul 2007 at 2:01 pm 1.Paul said …
Great article, just wanted to correct a few facts. First, the mutual aid DOES include EMS as of about 2 years ago. Now the first ALS/BLS unit is dispatched in Arlington, Fairfax County, or Alexandria based on proximity and not jurisdiction. Also, the old NoVA comms channel is out now with the use of digital 800mhz trunking. Now units are dispatched on their respective channels, and then actually switch over to the destination jurisdiction’s response channel. So all units responding are on the same channel. You also did not mention that the government fire departments are also fully integrated into this system (Dulles Airport FD, Ft. Myers FD, Ft. Belvoir FD, and National Airport FD) so that they also fully participate.