The historical effects of the military on the U.S. fire service are hard to deny. Several years ago in the two-part “Wave of the Future,” my son Dale (currently a lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy serving overseas) and I explored those effects. We focused on recent attempts by the military to hone the specialities of the separate service branches into a single, unified and synergistic fighting machine that could respond to a variety of assignments.

These included any response for civil support in a domestic emergency to defense of the country from a nuclear attack. The development of this more-fluid approach has been seen in many ways since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the subsequent acts of terrorism worldwide. The military has been called upon to fight both a conventional war in Iraq and an unconventional one in Afghanistan in less than two years.

While none of us could have predicted the heinous terrorist attacks and the subsequent heroic role of the fire service at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., our new role in homeland security has once again accelerated change in the fire service.

Great Britain's structure

Anyone who has read even a brief account of World War II, or for that matter watched The History Channel, has been exposed to the heroic efforts of the British Fire Service. During the 1940 Battle of Britain, the German Luftwaffe tried to break the will of the civilian population through incendiary air raids aimed at destroying major cities and manufacturing centers.

In the historic photographs of those raids, British regular and auxiliary fire brigade members in their familiar steel pot helmets could be seen silhouetted against sheets of fire and crumbling buildings. Their heroism not only saved the lives of countless citizens, it also stood as symbol of freedom to many during those very dark and tumultuous times.

Even though Great Britain was successful in stopping the anticipated German invasion of its homeland, extensive enemy bombing raids continued for the next five years. Those raids included the unguided and randomly targeted V1 and V2 rockets, buzz bombs specifically designed to strike terror and disrupt the homefront sufficiently in the hope of forcing the British to accept an end to the war short of an all-out victory. During those years, the fire brigades stood shoulder to shoulder with the military and Home Guard to defend their country.

The structure of the brigades prior to World War II was very similar to what we have in the United States today. Career firefighters were found only in the largest cities, while volunteer brigades staffed the suburban and rural areas. Prior to the advent of the war there had been very little attention from the central governing authority to the growth or direction of the local fire authorities. The war changed this idea, as the brigades were “mobilized” as part of the national defense effort with their equipment and personnel being assigned to specific areas of the country on a priority basis. The brigade command structure coordinated their efforts with and ultimately drew most of its direction from the Home Defense effort.

The experience obtained during the war lead to a series of reorganizations within the British Fire Service where today the United Kingdom, with a population of nearly 59 million citizens, is served by a total of 50 fire brigades. It may surprise most of us in the United States to learn that the United Kingdom has 595 staffed fire stations, 874 retained stations and 115 daytime-only staffed stations. These categories equate to our career, volunteer and combination categories.

New challenges

Within the past year, an independent review of the U.K. fire service has again set change into motion. The report, “The Future of the Fire Service: Reducing Risk, Saving Lives,” was completed by a distinguished panel headed by Professor Sir George Bain, the president and vice chancellor of the Queen's University of Belfast.

Commonly referred to as the Bain Report, this review recommends a changing role for the fire service with policy-making in the central government at the level of the deputy prime minister and stronger regional coordination among the local governing authorities. The direction of the fire service currently comes in part from the Central Fire Brigade Advisory Council and the local governing authorities.

The Bain Report is a foundation for discussion within the United Kingdom concerning how the British fire service will reshape itself to meet the challenges of the 21st century. These challenges include terrorism as well as the more traditional prevention and response to fire and other life safety emergencies. Certainly, the report is an avant-garde attempt to shape the changing role of the fire service in the United Kingdom.

The fire service in the United States in the past decade has taken a new role — that of first responder to acts of terrorism. Following the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993 and then that of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building two years later, the fire service realized it had to be better prepared to meet the challenges of a new era of foreign and domestic terrorism. A major part of this preparation came in the form of assistance grants to metropolitan areas for wmd training and equipment through the Nunn-Lugar-Domenici Act.

Following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, even the best-prepared fire departments across the nation realized their response capability limitations due to issues such as interoperability and compatibility of communications and interchangeable equipment components.

Federal dollars, federal orders

In the days that followed the attacks, President George W. Bush outlined a then-sketchy concept for an Office of Homeland Security. He asked then — Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge to accept this leadership challenge.

In its two years of existence, the Office of Homeland Security has become the Department of Homeland Security, and the focal point of the most sweeping changes in government since the mobilization of the United States in World War II. Twenty-two federal agencies and more than 170,000 federal employees have been melded into DHS. For the federal government this represents an unprecedented dedication of resources in a minimum amount of time.

Along with these changes, an unprecedented amount of federal money has been allocated to all elements of law enforcement, fire, EMS, public health and emergency management at the state and local levels. This level of support clearly acknowledges the role of the fire service as the nation's first responders in the defense of the United States through the prevention, response and mitigation of any future attacks on our soil.

As we learned in the extensive operations surrounding both natural disasters such as the recent wildfires in California or the devastating terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, no single fire department, no matter how large, dedicated or well trained, is capable of handling such large-scale emergencies without outside assistance involving elements of local, state and federal resources.

For that reason an integrated incident management capability was stated as one of Homeland Security's top priorities in its “National Strategy For Combating Terrorism,” issued in February 2003. By September 2003, the DHS unveiled its Initial National Response Plan, which not only affects the response of any federal agencies under DHS, but also calls for state and local agencies to coordinate their efforts and resources through a national incident management system to avoid redundancy.

It makes sense that a probable direction for DHS will be in building regional capacity as an effective use of future federal dollars. Planning, especially on the regional and state levels, is key to funding the needs of first responders in every area of the country. Trained and equipped personnel who can be coordinated and drawn from a larger, more regional area yet with a demonstrated timely response to a major incident should be assured of receiving federal funds. How can a local fire department be a part of such a plan? There are already several examples for us to examine.

Current mobilizations

Perhaps the most effective to date is the mobilization that occurs each year in California during the wildfire season. Through planning, coordination, interoperability and uniform training, firefighters from across the state respond or back-fill into other stations in a perceived seamless operation as part of the state's command and control system. The subsequent expansion of the system with the addition of other state and federal assets results in the mobilization of tens of thousands of firefighters and other workers into an integrated response plan.

Another example is MABAS, Illinois' Mutual Aid Box Alarm System. This ever-expanding series of box alarm assignments is currently under the direction of Northbrook (Ill.) Fire Chief Jay Reardon, Fire Chief Magazine's 2002 Career Fire Chief of the Year. MABAS is a testament to how local fire departments, while keeping their autonomy, can band together almost instantly into a response plan that encompasses not only most of Illinois but also reaches into the neighboring state of Indiana.

Ohio, which has 1,280 separate fire departments, initiated a Statewide Fire/Rescue Response Plan in December 2001. This plan organized fire department resources from each of Ohio's 88 counties into seven regions and appointed, through the Ohio Fire Chiefs Association, both county and regional fire coordinators. The Columbus Fire Alarm Center currently provides a centralized statewide dispatch through a toll-free number funded by the State Fire Marshal's Office. That office and Ohio's Emergency Management Agency jointly fund two individuals who work with the local and regional coordinators to update equipment lists and to assign resources in an emergency.

Although designed to handle large-scale emergencies, the first test of this system came not in a terrorist attack, but with the power blackout that hit the Northeast on Aug. 14, 2003. Thirty-three water tankers were dispatched from several regions to the city of Cleveland and surrounding Cuyahoga County, where the outage had disabled the entire metropolitan water system. The ability to quickly deploy and use these tankers in an urban setting greatly reduced the potential property loss from the fires that occurred in subsequent days while the water system was inoperable.

Some hard questions

Are systems like the ones in California, Illinois and Ohio a glimpse of the future in the fire service? In a word, yes. Once again, it's important to remember that during both World Wars the federal government saw fit to nationalize many heavy industries such as railroads, steel mills and petroleum refineries. Other industries were given production quotas as part of the war effort.

In this new kind of war on terrorism, the federal government itself has shifted nearly 170,000 employees to DHS. As the fire service in the United States provides a vital part of the country's domestic preparedness effort, perhaps the following questions might begin an interesting dialogue:

Under what circumstances would it be reasonable to mobilize elements of the U.S. fire service? Simultaneous massive attacks similar to Sept. 11? Before saying “never,” aren't we doing that now with US&R team deployment?

When should the U.S. fire service take the initiative in discussing a contingency plan for such a mobilization? Should such a contingency be in the form of a statewide plan that can supplement the federal government's National Response Plan?

Is it time for the fire service to consider regionalization? The continued trend toward consolidation, joint fire districts and regional dispatch centers may point in that direction. Should the federal government encourage regionalization, especially in its funding for training and equipment grants?

Frankly, I don't have the answers to these questions, but unless we as fire service leaders explore all the possibilities, we'll never truly be able to govern our own future.

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Robert R. Rielage, CFO, EFO, MIFireE, is the chief of Wyoming (Ohio) Fire — EMS, a full-service combination fire department bordering Cincinnati. He previously served as the Ohio state fire marshal, was a member of the State of Ohio Security Task Force and a delegate to the National Governors' Association on Homeland Security. Rielage also served as a contract consultant for FEMA in New York following Sept. 11. A graduate of the Kennedy School's Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government at Harvard University, Rielage holds a master's degree in public administration from Norwich University and is currently the president of the Institution of Fire Engineers — USA Branch. He is a member of the Fire Chief Magazine Editorial Advisory Board.

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Visit our Web site to read the two-part “Wave of the Future” from the Jan. and Feb. 2000 issues.