Public Concerns Applicable to Today’s Fire Service
The historical challenges witnessed in the decade of conflagrations have ensured that modern fire service departments across the United States take into account substantial public concerns that led to these disasters in the early 20th century. According to Fire Engineering (1997), the public concerns that were not taken into consideration during the decade of conflagrations have been fully implemented in modern fire service departments to ensure that such disasters are not witnessed anymore. The public concerns derived from the decade of conflagrations include; educating the public in relation to fire, promoting fire insurance coverage, enhancing building safety codes, and installing communication networks with the fire service departments.
Educating the public in relation to fire prevention measures took center stage as this was one of the best ways of reducing the disasters (Quintiere, 1998). Modern fire service departments have embraced this step and are fully encouraging public awareness on fire disasters. The public are educated on how to respond when there are fire breakages, as well as, preventive measures to ensure that the disasters do not occur in the first place. Another public concern revolved around communication networks to fire service departments in times of fire disasters (Fire Engineering, 1997). Modern fire service departments have ensured that they can be easily contacted when there are fire disasters.
The decade of conflagrations triggered the adoption of fire insurance covers. According to Bogardus and Moore (2005), frequent conflagrations increased the public interest in fire insurance coverage. Modern fire service departments have followed suit in encouraging the public to embrace fire insurance coverage. On the same note, enhancing and promoting building safety codes have been crucial in preventing fire disasters. This is because the decade of conflagrations was clouded by poor building safety codes, thus promoting the risks of fire disasters. However, modern fire service departments ensure that buildings adhere to strict safety codes to ensure that the disasters do not strike due to negligence.
References
Bogardus, J., & Moore, R. (2005). Catastrophes in early twentieth century America. Retrieved
on 16th September, 2012 from
http://www.irmi.com/expert/articles/2005/bogardus12.aspx
Fire Engineering. (1997). Around the fire service-1900-1909. Retrieved on
16th September, 2012
from http://www.fireengineering.com/articles/print/volume-150/issue-4/features/around
the-fire-service-1900-1909.html
Quintiere, J. G. (1998). Principles of fire behavior. Connecticut, CT: Cengage Learning.
