Community Corner

Firefighter Deaths at Near 35-Year Low

"Situational awareness" decreases injuries and the likelihood of death for Montgomery County Fire and Rescue workers.

By Whitney Teal

Sixty-four firefighters died while on duty in 2012, one of the lowest number of national deaths since the National Fire Protection Association began tracking the data in 1977. 

The report from the association tracked deaths of career and volunteer firefighters, categorizing deaths during a structure fire, during a vehicle crash and as the result of sudden cardiac arrest. 

In Montgomery County, the last on-duty fatality occurred in the early 1970s, said Assistant Chief Scott Graham, a Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service spokesman.

The department "puts a very strong emphasis on our firefighters' safety, our firefighters' situational awareness—things like that—as something that we use to reduce our injuries and the potential for a line of duty death," Graham said.

With 120,000 calls each year, county firefighters are trained to assess how to fight fires in ways that prevent injuries, he said.

"We just don't run into burning buildings," Graham said.

MCFRS also requires yearly physicals that include heart and stress tests to prevent sudden cardiac arrest deaths, he added.

To read the full report on nationwide firefighter fatality statistics, head to the National Fire Protection Association's website

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