A criminal charge was filed Tuesday against a driver in connection to the death of the Comstock Township fire chief, who was killed in the line of duty in June. Brandon Clevenger, 24, of Springfield faces a charge of reckless driving causing death, court records show. The Kalamazoo County Prosecutor’s Office confirmed the charge is connected to the death of Chief Ed Switalski.
- PUB DATE: 8/23/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WOOD-TV NBC 8 Grand Rapids

The Macungie Volunteer Fire Department will not lose state funding after it issued a nearly $25,000 repayment to the association that handles its state-allocated fire insurance funding. The Macungie Firemen’s Relief Association wrongly spent $24,939 on insurance payments for vehicle insurance from 2014 to 2016, according to a July email from a state auditor reviewed by The Morning Call.
- PUB DATE: 8/23/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Allentown Morning Call

VIDEO - Stunning video captured the moment an Indianapolis firefighter rescued a kitten from a house fire. IFD tweeted that its crews were called to the blaze in the 3300 block of Houston St. at about 4 p.m. Tuesday. Fire officials say the home was unoccupied except for the cat and no injuries were reported.
- PUB DATE: 8/23/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WXIN-TV Fox 59 Indianapolis

VIDEO- Around 4 p.m. on Tuesday, August 22nd, emergency crews responded to reports of a fire truck that had crashed into the river bank. Upon arrival, it was discovered that a man stole an East Moline fire truck, crashed it into the bank of the Mississippi River, and then jumped into the river "and tried to elude officers," said East Moline Police Captain Tom Reagan.
- PUB DATE: 8/23/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: WQAD-TV 8 (Davenport/Rock Island/Moline)

VIDEO: A Waukesha teen is behind bars after police say she lashed out at her mother's ex-boyfriend. Police say the girl confessed to making a molotov cocktail and hurling it onto the man's front porch. Black scorch marks darken the siding of a Waukesha home. Investigators say 17-year-old Natasha Garczynski spent more than a decade plotting her revenge against her mother's ex-boyfriend.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 8:40:32 PM - SOURCE: WITI Fox Channel 6

Three Door County Board committees spent several hours last week discussing adding a command level to the county's Emergency Services Department medical responders operation. The department serves two functions: It is tasked with providing medical response and developing plans for dealing with emergencies that are not necessarily medically related.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 3:25:23 PM - SOURCE: Green Bay Press-Gazette

The need for full time firefighters is high at the La Crosse Fire Department after a year of heavy turnover. The loss of several members of the department has left voids in certain shifts and the department is looking to recruits to step up and fill those holes. "Before we assign them to a shift and get them on some sort of 24 hour shift, we want to make sure they have the basic understanding of all the things they can run into on the street on a day to day basis," Division Chief Frank Devine, said.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 4:55:57 AM - SOURCE: WXOW-TV ABC 19 LaCrosse

A 4-year-old Racine boy drowned on Monday afternoon in Browns Lake, Racine County Sheriff Christopher Schmaling confirmed. The child went missing at about 5:10 p.m. according to emergency radio transmissions, and was located at about 5:40 p.m. The child was rushed by Burlington Rescue crews to Aurora Memorial Hospital of Burlington, dispatch reports indicated.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 2:16:07 AM - SOURCE: Racine Journal Times

PHOTO - Three Downey firefighters suffered injuries when their fire truck caught fire at the scene of a wildfire south of this Bannock County town. The fire was reported along South Marsh Valley Road around 11 a.m. Monday and initially threatened multiple houses that were about 100 yards from the flames.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Idaho State Journal

Houston voters will face $1.5 billion in city bonds and nine community college or school board races this November, but will not be asked whether to give firefighters a raise. Monday was the last day on which a candidate can file for the November ballot, and on which local governments can call an election.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Houston Chronicle

A dedicated wireless communications network for first responders answering the call on a large-scale incident is something most citizens might assume is already in place across the country. The unfortunate truth is that they would be wrong, but efforts are ongoing to present all 50 states with plans and options surrounding The First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), which was designed to help public safety agencies coordinate their efforts amid emergencies and major events such as earthquakes, hurricanes, floods or terror attacks, to name just a few scenarios.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Firehouse.com

An upper-management union for the Orange County Fire Authority planned to tell the agency’s board of directors that “current tensions” in the department were created by Chief Jeff Bowman, who resigned last week, according to a letter written by the union and sent to the board on Sunday, Aug. 20. The letter also said the union – the Chief Officers Association, which represents battalion and division chiefs – met with Bowman a day before he stepped down and recommended he resign before it submitted a position paper, out of respect for him and “to save the organization further embarrassment.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Orange County Register

A plea deal means a term of slightly less than six years for the driver of a Michigan firetruck that crashed last summer on Interstate 35W in Blaine, killing two fellow firefighters. Michael A. Johnson, 29, of the Upper Peninsula city of Baraga, pleaded guilty in Hennepin County District Court to two counts of criminal vehicular homicide and one count of criminal vehicular operation in connection with the crash on Aug.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Minneapolis Star Tribune

The Salem Fire Department followed suit with its fellow first responders Monday, requesting the Board of Selectmen consider increasing the previously set staffing plans and potentially renegotiate the Tuscan Village development agreement. Both the police and fire departments have experienced decades of stagnant staffing, which department leaders say have caused longer emergency response times in Salem and more cases in which the fire department has to ask for assistance from neighboring towns.
- PUB DATE: 8/22/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Eagle-Tribune

Homeowners who were evacuated after a gas leak in the 4300 block of Crawford Drive in Madison were allowed back into their homes about five hours after the leak was detected. The Madison Fire Department says Madison Gas and Electric (MGE) found high readings outside of 4353 Crawford Drive around 8:30 a.
- PUB DATE: 8/21/2017 9:22:19 AM - SOURCE: WKOW-TV 27 ABC

On August 19, 1 residential fire fatality was reported by the Nation's news media.

VIDEO: There are no injuries but the second floor of a home in the Town of Dewey is a total loss after a fire Sunday, according to the Town of Dewey Fire Chief LeRoy Pukrop. It happened around 3:30 Sunday evening, and it took crews about two hours to fight the flames. The assistant fire chief was first on scene and saw smoke, and made the box alarms to call in aid.
- PUB DATE: 8/21/2017 5:25:55 AM - SOURCE: WSAW-TV CBS 7 Wausau

VIDEO: An historic building in Door County is likely destroyed after a fire that firefighters spent all of Sunday battling at a brew pub. Fire crews were called to Shipwrecked Brew Pub in Egg Harbor around 11 a.m. Sunday. The general manager of the restaurant says the fire started after an air conditioner on the second floor caught fire.
- PUB DATE: 8/21/2017 5:16:10 AM - SOURCE: WKOW-TV 27 ABC

A Menlo Park Fire Captain sustained moderate burns in a house fire after the roof he was standing on gave out as the attic burned beneath him, late Friday. The Fire Captain, a seasoned veteran with the Fire District, had just guided a Probationary Firefighter as he cut a square ventilation hole in the roof of the residence, located on Nassau Drive near the Menlo Park-Atherton border.
- PUB DATE: 8/21/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KTVU-TV Oakland, San Francisco, Bay Area

The number of years was 63 that father and son, Louis “Butch” Chagnon and Michael Chagnon served on the Somerset Fire Department. It included a decade they served together answering the call on fires and medical emergencies, it was announced during a brief recognition by the Board of Selectmen for the retiring son.
- PUB DATE: 8/21/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: The Herald News