Emergency Calls

[Purple_Popple]

I had cause to call the Fire Brigade out earlier while i was out as I passed a litter bin blazing away at the side of a field, I called 999 for the Fire Service and immediately apologised to the operator for the call as it wasnt an emergency and felt guilty dialling it. The police have a 101 number to call in non-emergencies, but does anyone know if the Fire/Coastguard have an alternative 'non emergency' number ?

[IggyB]

the implication is that they are not as busy as the other emergency services and would thus attend an incident with more resources than actually required because they fancied the trip out (or as they would say "to ensure the incident was adequately resourced for any potential eventualities"). This is a situation that police and ambulance would love to find themselves in but instead must spread resource very thinly and adopt coping mechanisms such as non-emergency phone numbers.

[fbg40]

IggyB
Are you aware of rules laid down by the Home Office for minimum attendances to an "A" risk, "B" risk or even a "C" risk, and what the maximum times allowed for the first attendance to arrive at such incidents ? Or, do you know what an A,B or C risk is ? If the Fire Service arrived at an incident that you had called them to "under" attended what would your opinion be then ?
FBG40

[IggyB]

The fire cover model is slightly irrelevant but would at least act as a measure to demonstrate that fire jobs had been over resourced (if you used the risk cats as the baseline) as I am suggesting they are... though I accept that I offer no evidence of this other than an assertion that they would happily attend a half hearted bonfire in the middle of an empty field if requested.

We are straying wildly from the point of this thread but as an aside I feel following the approach used elsewhere in the world of combining fire and ambulance services in an attempt to reduce downtime would be the way to go. I have considered whether the introduction of HART teams within ambulance services isn't possibly a first step in this direction?

[fbg40]

IggyB
I think we are going to have to agree to disagree on this - I was always taught in my training days that " It's not what we do it's what we could be called upon to do". If Boris has his way and the LFB is reduced in numbers of personnel, appliances and stations (as I imagine you are in favour of), then one day I am sure it will come back and bite him in the bum !! As a parting shot, please don't believe that firemen sit around playing cards, darts etc while waiting for a call - nothing is further from the truth.
FBG40