State Fire Marshal - 801-284-6350
Utah Fire Incident Reporting System
NFIRS 5.0 (New NFIRS)
Why New NFIRS?
The United States Fire Administration (USFA) is mandated by law to collect information on fires and it relies on the nation=s fire service to meet that requirement through the National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS). The current NFIRS does not adequately meet fire service information needs. The USFA is responding to the request of the fire service for a better system.The current NFIRS (NFIRS 4.1) is designed to collect fire information. This is only a fraction of what the fire service does.
NFIRS 5.0 addresses the fire service=s need for a system that accounts for the full range of fire department activities. NFIRS 4.1 is 20 years old and long overdue for a major overhaul. Many lessons about fire reporting have been learned in those 20 years and are being applied in NFIRS 5.0. New technology is available to make a new system that is easier to use and less expensive for states to operate. States need a flexible system that will easily allow them to collect their own information yet still participate as part of the national standard for fire reporting. There is a great deal of interest from states, national fire organizations, public educators, fire data analysts, the media, and others about information that simply is not available in the current system, NFIRS 5.0 will fill the information gap.
Features of NFIRS 5.0
NFIRS 5.0 collects information on a full range of fire department activity. The current NFIRS 4.1 is fire based;
The new system is modular in design. Data is collected for all incident types in a basic module. Additional modules for structure fires, firefighter casualties, civilian casualties, hazardous materials, wildland fires, apparatus and personnel are completed as necessary. The apparatus, personnel, hazmat, and wildland fire modules are optional;
The address field is now formatted to allow computerized queries and street based address matching for GIS purposes;
Carbon Monoxide incidents are now captured;
Abbreviated paths through the system for nuisance fires with no losses or casualties are now available;Fire losses are now broken into property and contents to better define structure losses. Pre-incident value is also now captured as an optional data element;
The ability to capture one-time information for special studies purposes is a feature of the design;
Fire service resources for apparatus and personnel are now grouped by use at the incident. Specific, detailed information about the use of fire service personnel and apparatus will be collected in a standard way for the first time in optional modules. This will permit manning studies on several levels of use;
Factors that impact fireground suppression for future prevention are captured. Burglar bars, high rack storage, balloon construction, and unprotected vertical openings are some examples of these types of information;
Information on detectors and automatic suppression systems have been greatly expanded for the current NFIRS. Included is information on the system=s presence, range, power supply, effectiveness, operation, and reason for failure;Information on casualties has been expanded to provide a better understanding of the relationship of the casualty to factors contributing to injury as well as the nature and cause of the injuries.
These are just a few of the features of NFIRS 5.0 The USFA and NFIC have web sites if you would like more information. Those sites are: www.usfa.fema.gov (USFA) and www.nfic.org (NFIC).
To get the UFIRS software, contact Janet at (801) 284-6353 or eMail: jherron@utah.gov