There is often the assumption that a fire or other incident is so severe that the FFD needs to request additional assistance in order to manage the emergency. While that is sometimes the case, most often we request assistance from a neighboring community in order to comply with the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Standard 1710.

NFPA 1710 is a national standard that sets the minimum requirements for how career fire departments should respond to emergencies, with the goal of ensuring both public safety and firefighter safety. NFPA 1710 sets guidelines related to emergency response times and minimum staffing based on the occupancy of the emergency. Essentially what this means is- the larger the building that is on fire, the more firefighters that are recommended to respond, based on the size, complexity and life safety risks that may be involved in fighting a fire in such a building.

 Over 60% of the FFD’s structure fire responses are for multi-dwelling buildings (apartments) or commercial structures- which according to the NFPA, 28 firefighters are recommended to respond on the initial alarm to an incident in both types of structures. Because the daily staffing of the entire FFD is a total of 18 firefighters, who may or may not all be available to respond at the time of the call, we utilize an automatic mutual aid agreement with neighboring fire departments to reach the recommended response strength of 28 firefighters. Under these mutual aid agreements, the FFD also responds to structure fire responses in neighboring communities when the need arises. We are very grateful to be supported by such effective and reliable departments, and hope our Fairfield residents will especially welcome and thank the departments that help us most frequently- Springdale, Forest Park, Colerain, Fairfield Township, West Chester Township and Hamilton.