The Pennsylvania State Fire Commissioner's Office, in coordination with the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation, has created a new no-holds-barred course to reduce firefighter fatalities that is touring the state.

“The Courage to be Safe: Everyone Goes Home” is a 3H-hour course focusing specifically on what is killing firefighters in Pennsylvania and across the nation.

Pennsylvania is the first state to commit to a statewide program to implement the 16 life-safety initiatives set forth by the NFFF, and with good reason. With 18 firefighter deaths in 2004, the state had the highest number of line-of-duty deaths in the nation.

State Fire Commissioner Edward Mann said the new class takes off the gloves, driving home a firefighter's personal responsibility for safety like no class has before.

Mann personally introduces the course to warn firefighters “we may get a little loud with you” and that instructors are going to make the message very personal: “If you don't want to pay attention to the numbers, that's fine. If you don't want to pay attention to the statistics, that's OK. But understand something: If you die, you're creating a problem for your family. So if you don't want to do it for yourself, you need to think about your 10-year-old son.”

Before the end of the class, students are put into groups with their own fire companies. Each group puts in writing one change it can institute in its company to reduce firefighter fatalities and injuries and commits to instituting it in the next 60 to 90 days.

At the end of that time, Mann's office will check in with each company to see how it's doing with the objective and if its members need any help to achieve it.

The program is already having some effect, Mann said. “I had one fire chief e-mail me a copy of his new seatbelt policy the day after taking the program. It was pretty straightforward: ‘You will wear your seatbelt any time you are in any vehicle owned by this fire company, or you will be suspended.’ Period.”