Firefighters in Prince George will be changing how they respond to medical calls.
According to Fire Chief Cliff Warner, it will utilize an equipped pickup truck carrying two firefighters, and a dedicated medical unit serving as an alternative to dispatching a fire truck.
During a year-in-review chat with MyPGNow.com, Warner this will also allow them the opportunity to add more firefighters heading into 2025
“We were able to achieve support through council in the budget to hire staff this year and next year (2025) we are seeing approval again to hire more staff primarily support staffing another fire truck, which will support us responding to larger structure fires in the community.”
“The ask this year coming up is to hire five more firefighters and we would then train and bump our senior firefighters up into that supervisor capacity so it would allow us to have supervisor on for that medic unit and that staffed fire truck.”
If approved, the supervisory position and the addition to the new firefighter roles would bring local crews closer to meeting response standards for structure fires.
In 2024, PG Firefighters responded to over 10-thousand service calls ranging from blazes to medical incidents such as overdoses.
Getting quality firefighters outside of city limits continues to be a successful practice for the PG Fire Department.
Warner noted while the volume of applications has gone down in recent years, the people they are getting have filled a number of voids.
“The number of applicants we get over the years has reduced over what we used to get but we are still able to secure good, qualified and, capable individuals to be firefighters meeting the numbers we need to satisfy attrition, people retiring as well as these additions we are looking to add to.”
“Geography has a little bit to play with it but we have found in the last number of years that we are getting firefighters from other communities that are wanting to come to Prince George because of the quality of life. They are coming here and are happy here – it is a little less expensive than the Lower Mainland or big centres in Alberta. We see a little of each.”
Warner stated the most impactful fire of 2024 took place in mid-April as a house fire occurred on the 4000 block of Chestnut Drive.
Crews from three fire halls worked for three hours to extinguish the blaze.
One occupant of the residence was fatally injured in this fire.
Property loss was estimated at $250,000.
A close second on the list was concurrent blazes on July 4th that took place in the Lower Patricia encampment near 5th Avenue and Ottawa Street.
Crews found one structure fully involved in flames, with several nearby structures began to burn.
While extinguishing the blaze, another fire was observed in a nearby structure.- it was put out with handlines.
“Fortunately there were no injuries. There was nobody around in the two outbuilding fires in the encampment and thankfully, the blaze in the social housing building was an item fire in the kitchen and turned out to be minor in nature. Everyone was able to go back in once everything concluded,” added Warner.
“The reality is the social issues downtown have had a strain on everybody. It would be included in our organization and it’s sad to see people that are struggling and our members when they go to them often can be troubling but it hasn’t put a strain on our continued ability to respond.”
Over the weekend, the BC Government determined that the 2024 wildfire season saw 1,688 wildfires burn around 1.08 million hectares in the province this year.
More than 70 per cent of those fires were caused by lightning, while less than 30 per cent were attributed to human activity, and a small percentage remains undetermined.
Warner admitted while local crews don’t respond to wildland firefighters he stated the best thing for a local home-owner to do is to fire-smart their property to avoid any sort of massive loss or a repeat of the Fort McMurray wildfire that ravaged through the Northern Alberta community.
“A study was done in that area following the fire and it was found that were fire smarted either by good design or good luck didn’t burn and those that weren’t fire smarted did burn those are key factors and they are finding that in subsequent years where areas where homes didn’t burn because it was appropriately fire smarted.”
Another highlight in 2024 was the British Columbia Fire Smart Wildfire Resiliency and Training Summit that was held in the Northern Capital this past spring.
Warner said the event was a very beneficial experience for local crews who were able to expand their skill set.
“We probably had the best minds in the country during that week talking about these kinds of events that we have been experiencing and it was a huge benefit for us to be involved in that. It’s opened our eyes and our ability to partake in those events in future years.”
“We have members that are trained to manage running fire engines and to support wildfire events. We actually deployed two trucks down to Williams Lake to support and we were able to do that because of the training. We have trained individuals in structure protection and we have a trailer now from the city that is a benefit from the Miracle Theatre. We have had many great things happen in the past year to help increase our capacity,” said Warner.
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