NFPA Journal - Spring 2024 - 25

Some experts
believe that AI
assistants may
someday help
safety professionals
perform
installations,
maintenance, and
inspections in
the field. Debate
continues over
whether AI could
ever master the
important subtle
nuances in the
code the way a
human can.
inputs, AI could one day aid incident commanders
at the scene of a fire by reading live building sensor
data and-based on the lessons from thousands of
pages of post-incident reports, meetings, trainings,
and fire science manuals-provide instant guidance
on the optimal next moves.
Although tantalizing, most of these concepts
remain aspirational, though several AI tools spanning
a range of life safety industries could launch as
early as this year. In the fire service, some larger and
more progressive fire departments are already on
the verge of incorporating AI into their daily tasks.
" Like many departments, we have a finite amount
of resources but an ever-expanding amount of work
we have to accomplish-I think by using these tools
we can gain a lot of efficiencies, " said David Povlitz,
the fire chief at the Arlington County (Virginia) Fire
Department, which for at least the past year has
been carefully assembling and testing the infrastructure
and data sources needed to run AI applications.
At first, AI programs in Arlington and elsewhere
will likely be used primarily to help fire departments
manage time-consuming administrative work, like writing
a new paid-time-off policy or completing the first
draft of a new standard operating procedure, Povlitz
said. Soon, programs could help departments with other
administrative functions including budgeting, staffing,
and scheduling. The hope is the tools will help free up
staff time to do more hands-on work such as training,
community outreach, and community risk reduction.
Eventually, departments may incorporate AI programs
into more complex tasks, such as fireground
operations and improving safety for firefighters by
tracking where they are inside a burning building.
Those types of applications are " still a little bit of a
dream at this point, but it feels like they could be
within our grasp in three to five years, " Povlitz said.
" Like many fire departments,
we have a finite amount of
resources but an everexpanding
amount of work.
AI tools can gain us a lot
of efficiencies. "
As bullish as some are on AI's potential to positively
impact the fire protection industry, others urge caution.
Even innovative AI programs, like the chatbot
ChatGPT 4, are known to sometimes " hallucinate "
facts and will occasionally present wildly inaccurate
information with conviction. When the stakes are
high, what assurances do we have that AI will be
sophisticated enough to accurately interpret subtle
nuances in the codes, or careful enough to provide
reliable input during a complex fire incident?
" We need to pay attention to AI and identify the
places where we can utilize it to help achieve better
outcomes, but we should also be careful not to get
too enamored too fast, " said Jim Pauley, president and
CEO of NFPA. " AI can help with many tasks, but in the
spaces that we serve as NFPA, the human element is
still very important. I'm not sure that will ever change. "
How quickly fire departments, code enforcers,
building designers, and other stakeholders actually
adopt these tools into their operations remains to
be seen. As with everything AI, however, progress
tends to move faster than anyone expects.
MACHINE EFFICIENCY,
HUMAN ELEMENT
The AI industry's ascent has been meteoric since
the viral launch of ChatGPT in November 2022-the
month it seems that the entire world collectively
NFPA .ORG/JOURNAL * NFPA JOURNAL | 25
GETTY IMAGES/ RECEP-BG
http://www.NFPA.ORG/JOURNAL
NFPA Journal - Spring 2024

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - Spring 2024
