Poor preparation by park crews and a massive failure of imagination allowed the November wildfire that began in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to grow, pick up speed and sweep through Gatlinburg and surrounding parts of Sevier County, leaving death and destruction in its wake, according to a federal review released Thursday.
- PUB DATE: 9/1/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Knoxville News Sentinel

Cuts in the Fire Department budget have resulted in layoffs for the town's 18 per-diem firefighters who will lose their jobs at the end of September. Town Manager Vic Hodgkins in an Aug. 30 letter to each per-diem firefighter, wrote that the layoffs were the result of voters' decision at the June 17 town meeting to cut the Fire Department budget by $145,629.
- PUB DATE: 9/1/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Sun Journal

The Marshfield Area Pet Shelter has partnered with Marshfield Police Department and Marshfield Fire and Rescue Department to create a calendar to raise money and awareness. The calendar features 12 kittens posed with firefighter/paramedics and police officers at their departments. MAPS is working with local company Premier Printing to design and develop a calendar, which will be sold at MAPS’ Adoption Center in Marshfield Mall beginning in October.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 9:20:51 AM - SOURCE: WSAW-TV CBS 7 Wausau

A power line lying across the roof of a burning garage, a faulty fire hydrant and a leaking propane cylinder inside the structure complicated Sheboygan firefighters’ efforts to control the Wednesday-evening blaze. Nobody was injured in the fire that caused an estimated $25,000 in damages to a detached garage on the 1800 block of North Seventh Street.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 8:35:41 AM - SOURCE: Sheboygan Press

Firefighters are asking the state's top law enforcement official to weigh in on a fire safety regulation the Walker administration says it can't enforce anymore. The Madison Fire Department has submitted a formal request to Attorney General Brad Schimel, asking him to support a regulation that required sprinklers in apartment buildings that have between three and 20 units.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 6:27:58 AM - SOURCE: Wisconsin Public Radio

Emergency responders in Chippewa and Eau Claire counties spent Wednesday searching for two people missing in separate incidents in the Chippewa River. By the end of the day, both searches came up empty. In Chippewa County, officials have been searching for 45-year-old Kyle Anderson, of Altoona, who is believed to have fallen out of a boat into the river near the Lake Wissota dam sometime after 3 p.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 2:14:30 AM - SOURCE: Eau Claire Leader-Telegram

Ten Harris County deputies were exposed to a 'non-toxic irritant' after a release of pressure from multiple small containers holding chemicals at the Arkema plant in Crosby. The incident was first reported by emergency officials as two explosions. Law enforcement later began referring to the situation as containers popping, spewing black smoke, and being on fire.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KHOU-TV CBS 11 Houston

A Baltimore Fire captain was suspended and transferred from his post on Wednesday after giving a television interview about his engine being directed away from the scene of a house fire on Friday, a department spokesman said. Capt. John Parker, of Engine 31, which is housed in the 3100 block of Greenmount Avenue in Waverly, was transferred to Engine 6 in Oldtown, according to an internal Fire Department document obtained by The Baltimore Sun.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Baltimore Sun

A recent, but long overdue, external audit has discovered $6.2 million in a county bank account that the financially strapped East Contra Costa Fire District should have received as savings from staff reductions and fire station closures over the past three years. The revelation, coming after years of station closures, deep budget cuts and failed ballot measures to raise revenue, drew a strong response from state Assemblyman Jim Frazier, D-Oakley, who had been seeking to pass a bill in the Legislature to help the district stay afloat.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: East Bay Times

This is an immediate request for unused fire/rescue/EMS department or company t-shirts of any and all sizes to be distributed to Texas Firefighters (and their families) who have suffered property losses. The shirts will provide them with something new to wear after losing so much, and it also allows them to wear the logo of those departments, locals, associations and fire companies that were able to help.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: FirefighterCloseCalls.com

There was never a doubt in Patti Valero's mind that she could overcome the loss of her leg and get back on the job. After all, the retiring Hillsborough County firefighter had grown accustomed to facing adversity throughout not only her career but her personal life as well. "I never cried," Valero said in a recent interview with Firehouse.
- PUB DATE: 8/31/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Firehouse

On August 30, 2 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

On August 29, 3 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

On August 25, 9 residential fire fatalities were reported by the Nation's news media.

VIDEO: A fire destroyed a home Wednesday morning near Stevens Point, but multiple people inside escaped unharmed. The fire was reported at about 8 a.m. near Sunset Drive in the town of Dewey, less than 10 miles north of Stevens Point. The home already had flames coming out of the walls when firefighters arrived, according to Dewey Fire Chief LeRoy Pukrop.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 9:51:13 AM - SOURCE: Stevens Point Journal

Racine police were working Tuesday night to sort out what led to a two-vehicle crash that occurred at 17th Street and Taylor Avenue that possibly sent up to four people to the hospital. Police and fire crews were dispatched just before 8:30 p.m. to a report of a crash with entrapment. Racine resident Vincent Cosey said he had just gotten off work and was driving down Taylor Avenue right behind a blue pickup truck.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 2:24:04 AM - SOURCE: Racine Journal Times

Last week, surgeons took skin from the leg of Becca Micus and grafted it onto her hands and arms. She suffered third-degree burns to her face, arms and hands Aug. 12 in a camper fire near Mauston, and every day since, James Micus has gone to visit her and his two children in the UW-Madison Burn Center.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 1:56:22 AM - SOURCE: Lake Geneva News

More than 20 people - including a veteran Houston police officer - have died or are feared dead in the Houston area in flooding triggered by Tropical Storm Harvey, according to local officials. Among those is a family of six reported missing after their van was overtaken by floodwaters in east Houston Sunday afternoon near Greens Bayou.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Houston Chronicle

The chiefs of Wicomico County’s volunteer fire companies said they cannot support a fire service agreement between the county and the city of Salisbury, citing disputes over funding and territory for the new Station 13. The Wicomico County Fire Chiefs Association voted unanimously to reject the contract that was signed in April by Mayor Jake Day and County Executive Bob Culver, according to a letter from Joe Morris, the group’s president.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Delmarva Now

The Chief of the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department (SDFD) called out the department's union leader for making false claims regarding disaster assistance in Texas. "It’s absolutely inappropriate to politicize and personalize this disaster when Texans are suffering and this disaster isn’t over yet," SDFD Chief Brian Fennessy said in a statement.
- PUB DATE: 8/30/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: KNSD-TV NBC San Diego