Almost three years after the deadliest day in the history of the Houston Fire Department, the families of four firefighters who battled a catastrophic hotel blaze have filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit over the department’s troubled digital radio system. As flames engulfed the Southwest Inn hotel on a hot day in May 2013, firefighters battling the five-alarm blaze also had to fight problems with their new radios.
- PUB DATE: 2/11/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KHOU-TV CBS 11 Houston

A 44-year-old EMT died Wednesday evening (Feb. 10) when an equipment failure at the West Jefferson Emergency Medical Services Headquarters caused an ambulance to fall on him, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office said. JPSO officers were called at 5:32 p.m. and the victim was taken to West Jefferson Medical Center where he was pronounced dead.
- PUB DATE: 2/11/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: New Orleans Times-Picayune & Nola.com

Fillmore has been talking for a month about the suicide of Fire Chief Rigo Landeros, but it wasn't until Tuesday night's City Council meeting that people began to speak openly and publicly about the events leading up to Landeros' death. Landeros, 51, shot himself on Jan. 7, while parked in his city car on a rural stretch of Goodenough Road.
- PUB DATE: 2/11/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Ventura County Star

Mayor Kenney will announce on Thursday the end of two Fire Department policies he vowed to get rid of as mayor - rotating firefighters through stations and the temporary closure of firehouses. Both practices were implemented by then-Mayor Nutter as cost saving measures. In 2010, Nutter instituted rolling "brownouts" to temporarily close firehouses and reassign their firefighters elsewhere.
- PUB DATE: 2/11/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: philadelphia inquirer

VIDEO - A million fans lined the streets Tuesday to celebrate the Denver Broncos' Super Bowl 50 win over the Carolina Panthers. The parade, however, did draw some criticism from firefighters after players, spouses and children were seen riding on top of fire trucks. The group of players traveled the parade route in a series of fire trucks.
- PUB DATE: 2/11/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: firerescue1

On February 4, 4 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

She was brought in to help reform the EMS wing of the D.C. Fire Department. Seven months later, Dr. Jullette Saussy is done. Not with the reform but with the department after she says her attempts, as medical director and assistant fire chief, to make even basic changes to the troubled agency have been met with resistance from the top down.
- PUB DATE: 2/10/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WUSA-TV 9 DC

Several of the FDNY’s busiest engine companies across all the boroughs are finally getting one more firefighter. As part of a contract agreement between City Hall and the Uniformed Firefighters Association last summer, the department has added a fifth firefighter to five of the most swamped engine companies throughout the city — something the union has been clamoring for since 2011.
- PUB DATE: 2/10/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: new york daily news

On Super Bowl Sunday morning, firefighter James J. Butler Jr. was in City Hall, pulling paperwork for a number of building inspections he hoped to start scheduling. “I got a text from him around 9 a.m.,” Derby Fire Marshal Phil Hawks said. “He responded (that) he was pulling some paperwork on the inspections .
- PUB DATE: 2/10/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: connecticut post

A Boston fire chief was convicted today of five counts of procurement fraud and five counts of larceny over $250 for swindling the city, Attorney General Maura Healey said. “This defendant abused his position as a public employee and stole tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars that should have gone back to the City of Boston,” Healey said in a statement.
- PUB DATE: 2/10/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: boston herald

An attorney will ask a DeWitt County jury this week to find his client not guilty of stabbing a volunteer firefighter because he was insane at the time. Kirk Ross Engle, 45, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to stabbing Brian Smolik in the stomach on Aug. 19. Smolik responded on Aug. 19 to the 400 block of West Sixth Street in Yorktown where brush, a couch and a trash can were ablaze.
- PUB DATE: 2/10/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: victoria advocate

On February 8, 3 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

In his first months as the new head of Detroit’s beleaguered Fire Department, Eric Jones is building bridges with union leaders, touting improved response times and a decline in arson fires. But aging infrastructure, worker safety and wages are among the issues that remain on his hefty to-do list. Jones, 47, was appointed to the Detroit Fire Department’s top post in October.
- PUB DATE: 2/9/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: detroit news

The city of Orlando is looking to change the way it does live fire training after firefighters said their health was put in danger from being exposed to asbestos. A dozen firefighters were exposed to the hazardous substance inside an abandoned apartment complex, but Channel 9 learned more may have been put in harm’s way.
- PUB DATE: 2/9/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WFTV-TV ABC 9 Orlando

As the community reacts to the fire at a Raytown apartment that claimed the life of a 5-year-old boy and hospitalized two other people, the details have emerged in the dramatic rescue mission that put firefighters in serious danger. "The hose line burst. I don't know if it was cut or it burned or what, but they had to shelter in another part of the building where there wasn't fire," Raytown deputy fire chief Mike Hunley said.
- PUB DATE: 2/9/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WDAF-TV FOX 4

A levy language error will put one Sandusky County township back on the ballot in November. Washington Township has long used a levy to pay for fire service, set in recent years at 1.5 mills. Township officials sought to raise the levy to 2.5 mills in November, and voters overwhelmingly approved that five-year levy.
- PUB DATE: 2/9/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: toledo blade

The two Pensacola Fire Department chiefs placed on administrative leave earlier this week are not the focus of an investigation into the fire department, though it remains unclear what that focus is or how long the investigation might last. Local attorney Russell VanSickle of the Beggs & Lane law firm has been hired to perform the investigation, and interim Fire Chief Matt Schmitt and Deputy Fire Chief Joseph Glover will remain on paid administrative leave until the investigation in concluded.
- PUB DATE: 2/9/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Pensacola News Journal

On February 6, 8 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

On February 4, 3 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

Former Derby Fire Chief James J. Butler, 50, has died, according to an email sent out Sunday by Town/City Clerk Mark Garofalo. The email, which doesn’t mention the cause of Butler’s death, details his accomplishments, including being an inspector with the Derby Fire Marshal’s Office, and a member of the Paugassett Hook and Ladder company for more than 30 years.
- PUB DATE: 2/8/2016 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: firehouse