NFPA Journal - September/October 2012 - (Page 6)

>> FIRSTWORD BY NFPA PRESIDENT JAMES M. SHANNON BOARD OF DIRECTORS OFFICERS Chief Philip C. Stittleburg Chair La Farge Fire Department La Farge, Wisconsin Ernest J. Grant First Vice-Chair North Carolina Jaycee Burn Center Chapel Hill, North Carolina Philip J. DiNenno Second Vice-Chair Hughes Associates, Inc. Baltimore, Maryland Randolph W. Tucker Secretary ccrd partners Houston, Texas H. Wayne Boyd Treasurer U.S. Safety & Engineering Corporation Sacramento, California James M. Shannon President President and CEO, NFPA *Bruce H. Mullen Staff Officer Sr. Vice-President and CFO, NFPA *Dennis J. Berry Assistant Secretary Secretary of the Corporation, Director of Licensing, NFPA dIRECTORS Thomas W. Jaeger Past Chair Jaeger and Associates, LLC Great Falls, Virginia Terms Expire in 2013 Donald R. Cook Shelby County Department of Development Services Pelham, Alabama John C. Dean Office of Maine State Fire Marshal Augusta, Maine Chief Rebecca F. Denlinger Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General Victoria, British Columbia, Canada Chief Ned Pettus, Jr. Columbus Division of Fire Columbus, Ohio Dean L. Seavers Pinecrest, Florida Keith E. Williams Underwriters Laboratories Inc. Northbrook, Illinois Terms Expire in 2014 Amy Acton The Phoenix Society Grand Rapids, Michigan James M. Clark Management Consultant Germantown, Tennessee Kwame Cooper Los Angeles Fire Department Los Angeles, California Julie A. Rochman IBHS Tampa, Florida Terms Expire in 2015 Peter Holland Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service Lancashire, United Kingdom Brian Hurley Palm Beach, Florida William McCammon East Bay Regional Communications System Authority Dublin, California Harold A. Schaitberger International Assoc. of Fire Fighters Washington, D.C. William A. Stewart Toronto Fire Services (retired) Toronto, Ontario, Canada Peter J. Gore Willse XL GAPS Hartford, Connecticut *Not a member of the Board of Directors The Wildfire Imperative By its nature, NFPA is a reactive organization—we depend on participants in the codes and standards development process to bring forward proposals that address practical problems in the field. As the most influential advocate for fire safety, though, we must also be proactive. Waiting for the world to come to us for answers is not good enough, and defeats the purpose of our safety mission. That’s why we try to stay ahead of events that we believe will eventually have a major effect on fire, life safety, and electrical safety. A case in point is how NFPA is dealing with the burgeoning wildfire problem. look ahead, take notice of the clear scientific evidence, and recognize that the entire fire protection community is not committing anywhere near enough time, effort, and knowledge to exploring the implications of this colossal problem. Wildfires will drain our resources and threaten more communities in the coming decades if we do not act with a greater sense of urgency and commitment, starting now. At NFPA we do not intend to wait. We are going to play a bigger role in focusing the attention of the fire service and policymakers on the social, economic, and public safety implications of the accelerating wildfire problem. This issue will require an all-out effort, WIldFIRES WIll dRAIN our resources and including greater collaboration threaten more communities in the coming among the fire service organizadecades if we do not act with a greater sense of tions, the federal government, urgency and commitment, starting now. state and local governments, and the building industry. Much Some might say we’re already behind the valuable work has already been done, and curve, considering the huge wildfires occurthe Fire Adapted Communities coalition—a ring in the West this year and last. In fact, new initiative with participation from NFPA, NFPA has been pushing hard for years the USDA Forest Service, the International through our Firewise® program for a much Association of Fire Chiefs, and other leading more active approach to reducing risk in organizations—is providing a clear path of the wildland/urban interface, and we have leadership. NFPA has also re-organized its recently expanded the scope of our work Wildland Fire Division and located it in Colowith a grant from the U. S. Forest Service rado to be closer to the center of activity. to launch the Fire Adapted Communities™ We have set a goal of having more than 800 program. This issue’s story on the recent Firewise communities by the end of the year, Colorado wildfires illustrates both the grow- and with the support of the Forest Service we ing prevalence of wildfire as well as the expect the Fire Adapted Communities proimportance of communities taking steps to gram to get off to a fast start. minimize its threat. A proactive approach is But that is not enough. The whole comessential; as devastating and costly as some munity concerned with fire safety should recent wildfires have been, they may only be understand that this is no longer a regional harbingers of what we’ll face in the future. or seasonal problem that can be solved by a Wildfire could be the major fire protection single agency, but an issue of urgent challenge of the next generation. national concern with implications for all of We have a choice. We can continue to us. At NFPA we are not waiting for this respond to this phenomenon as if it were problem to get further out of control. We no different than it has ever been, or we can are acting now. 6 NFPA JOURNAL SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2012 Photograph: dave Yount/NFPA

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - September/October 2012

NFPA Journal - September/October 2012
Contents
First Word
Mail Call
In a Flash
Perspectives
Firewatch
Research
Heads Up
Structural Ops
In Compliance
Buzzwords
Outreach
Electrical Safety
Wildfire Watch
Lessons of Comayagua
After Waldo Canyon
Catastrophic Multiple-Death Fires in 2011
Fire Loss in the United States in 2011
Section Spotlight
Research + Analysis
What’s Hot
Looking Back

NFPA Journal - September/October 2012