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New Water Rescue Teams for Seven Fire Stations 221209

Seven fire stations across Herefordshire and Worcestershire will now have ‘first responder’ water rescue teams to provide additional rescue support during floods.

Following the 2007 flooding event, Hereford & Worcester Fire and Rescue Service (HWFRS) carried out a significant piece of work which determined that improvements were necessary to strengthen its response to floods and ensure the safety of its responders.

All fire fighters across Herefordshire and Worcestershire are trained in water / flood awareness and have basic equipment to undertake rescues from the bank side. We also have highly trained specialist water / flood rescue teams at Worcester, Hereford and Evesham who are trained and equipped to enter the water if necessary to carry out rescues, either swimming or in specialist rescue boats.

However, taking account of local flood/water risks and our experience in 2007, this year’s risk management plan identified a need for a number of trained ‘first responder’ teams equipped with dry suits and other equipment to enable them to work safely in flood water.

At its meeting on Friday, December 18, the Fire and Rescue Authority approved the establishment of seven new flood rescue ‘first responder’ teams at Kidderminster, Tenbury Wells, Upton-on-Severn, Ross-on-Wye, Pershore, Bromyard and Leintwardine. These teams will be formed by providing additional training and equipment for existing personnel, and together with the three existing specialist teams and the capabilities on each front line fire engine, will provide extra flexibility and resilience across the two counties.

Water and flood incidents are already supported by a number of personnel who have been trained to supervise these specialist operations. With additional response teams, these arrangements will be strengthened through the creation and maintenance of a formal cadre of staff with specialist knowledge in this area to reduce risk to responders and the public.

Chief Fire Officer Paul Hayden said: “It is disappointing to note that despite the recommendations made by Sir Michael Pitt in his review of the 2007 floods, there has been no government money made available for flood rescue. As fire services still do not have a statutory duty to rescue people from flood water, the costs fall entirely on our local service and local communities.

We know all too well that we have a significant need for flood rescue capability in our two counties and we typically rescue between 30 and 60 people from the water each year.

Less frequent major floods, as were last seen in 2007, resulted in the rescue of more than 1100 people across Herefordshire and Worcestershire alone.

Whilst we could undoubtedly do even more given government funding support, we have to take into account the costs involved to ensure that we continue to offer both an effective service and value for money. The cost of providing this specialist service across our two counties, including equipment such as boats and dry suits, amounts to 30 pence per year for a Band D council tax payer."

Firefighters to get new hi-tech breathing apparatus 291109

FIREFIGHTERS in the region are to be issued with new hi-tech breathing apparatus and electronic entry control boards under a regional procurement contract.

Firefighters in Hereford and Worcester, Warwickshire, West Midlands and Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Services will all receive the Drager PSS 7000 breathing apparatus set with Drager Bodyguard and Merlin Breathing Apparatus Entry Control Board.

The four fire and rescue services will also bring their operational procedures into alignment, meaning that fire crews working across authority borders will be able to work together.

The new equipment incorporates "Telemetry" which is a wireless link between the wearer's equipment and the Entry Control Officer (ECO) outside that transmits data about the wearer. The ECO can also send an electronic emergency signal at the press of a button to the wearer's equipment to evacuate in the event of danger. If a firefighter working in a fire gets into difficulty, they will be able to press a distress button, which will alert the ECO outside.

This new equipment is designed to improve firefighter safety and will give the entry control officer outside more accurate and up-to-date information about the firefighters working in a fire situation.

Crews are to be trained early in 2010, and the anticipated "Go Live" date for Tenbury is 14th April 2010.

A full article can be found in HWFR's "Grapevine" publication, which can be found on their official website.

Congratulations as Graham Receives 35 Year Award 291009

CONGRATULATIONS go out to Tenbury firefighter Graham James, who has just received the outstanding service medal awarded for 35 years service to the people of Tenbury Wells.

Graham was presented with the medal by Tenbury Watch Manager David James at Tenbury fire station last Monday (26th October)

Graham is the first firefighter at Tenbury Wells to receive this award.

Tenbury Advertiser Story

Tenbury Supports National Fire Safety Campaign 291009

TENBURY FIRE STATION is supporting the governments national fire safety campaign urging people to ensure that they have a working smoke alarm in their home by testing it once a week.

A large banner is on display at the fire station, and fire safety messages have been added to the website.

New survey results from the Fire Kills campaign show that people vastly underestimate the impact of toxic smoke: Of those surveyed:

• 39% believe they could survive for more than two minutes in a smoke filled room;

• 49% think they would be alerted to a fire by the smell of the smoke.

• 19% believe a pet (e.g. their dog barking), or someone else would alert them to a house fire.

The only way to buy vital time to escape from a house fire is by having a working smoke alarm. Although 93% of those surveyed in a fire kills survey own smoke alarms, 75% admit to not testing them every week. This is despite the fact that you are more than twice as likely to die in an accidental house fire if you do not have a working smoke alarm.

To see the national TV advert click here.  This is an external website.

Tenbury Wells Fire Station Annual Barbecue 220809

Tenbury Firefighters have held their annual barbecue in aid of the Fire Fighters Charity.  As ever the event was well supported by the local community, who we must thank very much. (Letters are about to be delivered to supporters, and a full list will appear here shortly).

The total profit for the event is £876.50. Why not check out the photos taken on the night?

This year we had to scale down the number of stands due to a shortage of personnel, however, all of the stalls were extremely busy.

The barbecue was busy, with the majority of customers choosing burgers over hot-dogs.  Food was flying off the barbecue and burgers sold out quickly so we had to go down town to purchase more!  Later on, hotdogs started to be sold and by the end of the night, most of the food was sold, with just two small packs of sausages left over. The BBQ took £227 on the night, with £95.18 expenditure, leaving a profit of £131.82.

The tombola was a success again, with a large amount of prizes to be won.  The tombola made a total profit of £314.80.

The bar was manned by Ash, who was busy serving up until closing time.  Again, the bar was busy, with a good selection of drinks to choose from, including two local breweries - Hobsons and Robinsons.  The bar took £365.60 with expenses of £272.05, leaving £93.55 profit.

Muriel was again in charge of the main draw, and managed to catch most people making a profit of £136. Again, we need to thank Muriel for her support.

Fire engine rides made a sum of £75 and a new stand - shoe flinging - on a mini golf course, complete with rough and bunkers made £12.50.

We also received donations of £100, miscellaneous income of £13.46 and expenses of £6.48

We would like to thank everyone who attended for their support, and look forward to seeing you again next year.  We would also like to thank all of the supporting businesses for their help.  Without them, we could not hold such an event.

Check out the photos taken on the night.

Website reaches 50,000 visitors 180809

The Tenbury Wells Fire Station website has now received 50,000 hits on the web-counter since the site was created in 2001.  We would like to send out a big thankyou to all our visitors.

FIRE CREWS from Tenbury Wells and Kingsland fire stations joined forces at a Guideline Laying and Search and Rescue exercise at Kerry Foods in Burford, Tenbury Wells yesterday (Mon 20th July 09).

Firefighters filled the disused warehouse unit with cosmetic smoke and laid guidelines through the building to allow other firefighters to search for five casualties and find their way out of the building.

More pictures are available in our picture gallery.

Integrated Risk Management Plan Released - Have Your Say!! - 040709

THE 2010 / 11 Integrated Risk Management Plan (IRMP) has been released to the public setting out the plans for the Fire and Rescue Service for the coming years.

Included is a public questionnaire inviting you to have your say on the way the fire service is run.

Tenbury Wells Fire Station features in the proposals, whereby crews from the town would be trained to a higher standard for water rescue duties following the flooding of Tenbury during the summer of 2007 and the flooding of 2008.  To pay for this, savings will have to be made in back-office efficiencies.

Incident Log Update 110609

We have now changed the way we record incidents on the incidents page.  We have removed abbreviations and removed callsigns, replacing them with the name of the station and type of vehicle attending.

Hopefully this will make the page simpler to understand and removes any confusion around the two sets of callsigns currently in use by H&W and Shropshire.

New navigation for website 090609

Our regular visitors may notice that we now have a complete new navigation system for the website.

The new menus look much better than the previous ones that were always a temporary fix until we could find something that suited the site.

The change-over has taken a few days, with each section of the site being updated one-by-one.  We hope that you like the update, and that it makes browsing the site easier.

New Uniform A Step Nearer 100509

THE NEW uniform for Hereford and Worcester Fire and Rescue Service is a step nearer as the order is made to the supplier this month.

The new uniform, to be delivered in November follows the new "colours" of the Fire and Rescue Service, giving the service a recognisable uniform in the same way as the ambulance service wear green and the police black.

The uniform consists of light grey shirt, dark grey trousers and a red t-shirt.

The new uniform will replace the existing navy blue working-rig trousers and t-shirt.

BOTH of Tenbury's fire engines have now been kitted out with the very latest in digital communications technology.

The new radio system is now live using the "Airwave" communications network.  It offers much improved speech clarity over the previous analogue system, and will eventually be used alongside a "mobile data" system to be brought in under the national "FireLink" project.

The project will see the introduction of a single communications system for England, Scotland and Wales replacing the existing radio systems.

New Radio System 040409

THE first of Tenbury's fire engines has now been kitted out with the very latest in digital communications technology.

The new radio system, installed last Tuesday is now live on the Rescue Pump, using the "Airwave" communications network.  It offers much improved speech clarity over the previous analogue system, and will eventually be used alongside a "mobile data" system to be brought in under the national "FireLink" project.

The project will see the introduction of a single communications system for England, Scotland and Wales replacing the existing radio systems.

Tenbury Firefighters to go digital 200209

FIREFIGHTERS in Tenbury Wells will soon be taking advantage of the latest digital radio system to communicate with fire control and other fire engines.

The rollout of the new "Airwave" system is underway across Hereford and Worcester, with Tenbury scheduled to have the new radio system installed at the end of March in 532 and during April for 531.  The system is being installed as part of a national project called "FireLink" which aims to fit every fire service vehicle in the country with a digital radio (and eventually a data system), as the existing analogue system is to be switched off.

The fire engines are to be fitted with a Motorola MTM800E radio.

TENBURY firefighters will soon be taking delivery of a replacement fire appliance for the current L registration Dennis Rapier.

The appliance allocated to Tenbury is an X-reg Dennis Sabre currently based at Bromsgrove.

The changes come as H&WFRS bring online a new batch of 58 plate M.A.N. appliances around the county; freeing up appliances for distribution around other stations and removing the Dennis Rapiers from the fleet.

Our neighbouring stations are also to receive replacement appliances for their Rapiers; Bromyard is to get a  Dennis Sabre on a '53 plate' and Leominster is to receive one of the new M.A.N.s.

We don't currently have a timescale; but will update the site as we get more information.