The importance of the time factor in fire and rescue service operations in Sweden

doi:10.1016/S0001-4575(97)00054-7

Accident Analysis & Prevention

Volume 29, Issue 6, November 1997, Pages 849-857

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0001-4575(97)00054-7 Get rights and content

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to measure the benefits and costs for the society if the fire and rescue service is delayed by 5 and 10 min respectively. A 5 min longer turn-out time is often the difference between a full-time and a voluntary crew. A 10 min difference may represent what happens if a voluntary crew on the outskirts of the municipality is closed down and their services are taken over by the centrally located full-time staff. In Sweden a full-time staff costs USD 180,000 more per year and man on duty. When it comes to the costs of a longer turn-out time three items dominates: fires in buildings; road transport accidents; and drowning cases. These three account for 38% of the alarms but 97% of the damage increase if the rescue operation is delayed, whether it is for 5 or 10 min. For all these three items we have carried out calculations based on our own empirical material. To be allowed to fight fires using breathing apparatus Swedish legislation requires a minimum crew of five. For a municipality in Sweden with the average number and distribution of alarms a full time crew of five is not economically justifiable until it reaches a population of 30,000.

References (5)

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Health Status Index in Cost-Effectiveness Analysis of PKU-program
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There are more references available in the full text version of this article.

Cited by (28)

Is the perceived risk of fire-related injury and trust in local authorities affected by rescue services’ actual ability?
2022, Preventive Medicine Reports
Citation Excerpt :
Although part-time organisations are less costly than full-time, the ability to respond will also be affected. Given that response times are one of the most important factors in terms of saving lives (Jaldell, 2015; Kobes and Van Den Dikkenberg, 2016; Runefors, 2020), the fact that part-time organisations (in Sweden) are on average five minutes slower (Mattsson and Juås, 1997) is noteworthy. Apart from objectively longer response times, thereby objectively increasing the risk of fire-related deaths (Jaldell, 2015), there have been fears that part-time rescue services would affect the population’s general trust and confidence in local authorities, given that the service levels are poorer – something local Swedish policymakers also believe (Frantzich et al., 2019).
Rescue services are one of the most crucial actors in providing fire-related societal protection, particularly in terms of response times. To achieve this, considerable funding and/or full-time organisations are required – something that is not always feasible and leads to differences in rescue service related protection in different municipalities. In turn, the question is how such variations affect the perceived risk of being injured in a residential fire and levels of general institutional trust in the municipality. By utilising a dataset on risk perception and trust, combined with data on the ability and structure of municipal rescue services, this study can show that a municipal’s average perception of the risk of attaining a fire-related injury closely follows response times – indicating that individuals living in areas with less societal protection are aware of this fact. However, the results also indicate that general institutional trust and perception of risk on a municipal level seems to relate to each other in such a way that municipal types (with similar sociodemographic characteristics and rescue service ability) congregate around similar levels of perceived risk and trust. In turn, this study therefore indicates that perceived risk and trust differs in different municipalities and that efficiency measurements not necessarily encompass all these differences.
Security officers responding to residential fire alarms: Estimating the effect on survival and property damage
2018, Fire Safety Journal
Citation Excerpt :
The time factor is the most important for drowning accidents, fires in buildings and traffic accidents. Jaldell's [21] paper updated the study by Mattsson and Juås [23]. Jaldell [22] estimated the importance of the time factor for FRSs for saving lives in residential homes.
Decreasing the response time to residential fires leads to more people being saved, fewer injuries, less property damage and a lesser environmental impact. One way of reducing the response time to fires is to allow the municipal fire and rescue services to cooperate with other actors. This study evaluates a potential agreement between the fire and rescue service of a Swedish municipality (Helsingborg) and a private security officers' firm. A geographic information system (GIS) simulation is used to estimate the reduced response times. The result is combined with a statistically estimated measure of the risk of fatality for marginal changes in the response time to find the effect on survival rates and property damage. The results show that the response time is 52 s on average faster using security officers for residential fires. Combining this gain in response time with the relation to fatalities and adjusting for the fact that security officers are less effective imply a decreased death rate by 0.0105 or 1.3% per year. The project has positive economic effects with the benefits estimated to be 1.4 (saved lives) and respectively 2.3 (saved lives and property damage) times higher than the costs.
Time Is Money, but How Much? the Monetary Value of Response Time for Thai Ambulance Emergency Services
2014, Value in Health
Citation Excerpt :
Gonzales et al. [5] found increased emergency medical service prehospital time to be associated with higher mortality rates, as did Wilde [6] and McCoy et al. [7] recently. Fire and rescue services have been found to increase the survival rate when having shorter response times than traditional ambulances for health care responses [8–10]. Newgard et al. [11], however, recently concluded that there is no relationship between the response time and outcome of the patient, as other studies have also done before [12–14].
To calculate the monetary value of the time factor per minute and per year for emergency services.
The monetary values for ambulance emergency services were calculated for two different time factors, response time, which is the time from when a call is received by the emergency medical service call-taking center until the response team arrives at the emergency scene, and operational time, which includes the time to the hospital. The study was performed in two steps. First, marginal effects of reduced fatalities and injuries for a 1-minute change in the time factors were calculated. Second, the marginal effects and the monetary values were put together to find a value per minute.
The values were found to be 5.5 million Thai bath/min for fatality and 326,000 baht/min for severe injury. The total monetary value for a 1-minute improvement for each dispatch, summarized over 1 year, was 1.6 billion Thai baht using response time.
The calculated values could be used in a cost-benefit analysis of an investment reducing the response time. The results from similar studies could for example be compared to the cost of moving an ambulance station or investing in a new alarm system.
The application of geometric network models and building information models in geospatial environments for fire-fighting simulations
2014, Computers, Environment and Urban Systems
Citation Excerpt :
A public fire department provides vital assistance to victims of fire in protecting their lives and property (Deng, Hsieh, Yang, & Sheu, 2001). After a fire starts, it usually spreads rapidly, and often causes a great deal of damage in a very short period of time (Mattsson & Juås, 1997). Unfamiliarity with the interior of a building may affect a firefighter’s ability to fight a fire.
This study was motivated by the need to develop a micro-geographic information system (GIS) to represent and analyze 3D spatial data for fire-fighting simulations. The proposed method involved exploration of a 3D geometric network model (GNM)-based, building information model (BIM)-supported framework for fire-fighting simulation. The operations of ladder trucks were simulated in a virtual 3D environment. Using the method described in this paper, the best position for the deployment of the ladder trucks can be determined even before the arrival of firefighters at the scene. A real fire-fighting drill was also conducted as part of this study. The proposed method can assist firefighters quickly locate their ladder trucks, thereby reducing response time after an incident.
Characteristics of lifesaving from drowning as reported by the Swedish Fire and Rescue Services 1996-2010
2012, Resuscitation
Citation Excerpt :
Mattsson et al. described the relationship between time, cost and survival in Sweden and showed that, during a three-year period, another 50 lives could have been saved if the fire and rescue services had arrived 10 min earlier. Drownings accounted for the third highest cost after fire in buildings and transport accidents.5 The Swedish Fire and Rescue Services (SFARS) are part of the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (SCCA) and report data on the basis of the Civil Protection Act.6
We aimed to describe characteristics associated with rescue from drowning as reported by the Swedish Fire and Rescue Services (SFARS) and their association with survival from the Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA) registry.
This retrospective study is based on the OHCA registry and the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (SCCA) registry. All emergency calls (1996–2010) where the SFARS were dispatched were included (n = 7175). For analysis of survival, OHCAs that matched events from the SCCA registry were included (n = 250).
Calls to lakes and ponds were predominant (35% of all calls reported). Rescues were more likely in cold water, <10 °C (45%), in open water (80%) and in April–September (68%). Median delay from a call to arrival of rescue services was 8 min, while it was 9 min for rescue diving units.
Of all OHCA cases, the victim was found at the surface in 47% and underwater in 38%. In events where rescue divers were used, victims were significantly younger than in non-diving cardiac arrests and the mean diving depth was 6.3 ± 5.8 m. Overall survival to one month was 5.6% (13% in diving and 4.7% in non-diving cases; p = 0.07).
In half of more than 7000 drowning-related calls to the SFARS during 15 years of practice, water rescue was needed. In all treated OHCA cases, the majority were found at the surface. Only in a small percentage did rescue diving take place. In these cases, survival did not appear to be poorer than in non-diving cases.
3D spatial information for fire-fighting search and rescue route analysis within buildings
2012, Fire Safety Journal
Citation Excerpt :
Fires tend to spread rapidly once they start and can cause major damage in short periods of time. A delay in the arrival of fire and rescue services of even 5 or 10 min can significantly increase the amount of fire damage or make the difference between life and death [2]. Recently, geographic information systems (GIS) have been used to site fire stations optimally to shorten the response times to fire scenes [3].
This study is motivated by the need for a micro-geographic information system (GIS) to represent and analyze 3D spatial data for the plotting of fire-fighting search and rescue routes within buildings. The GIS uses a 3D geometric network model (GNM) and the Dijkstra algorithm to consider smoke movement during different times of a building fire. Therefore, the route calculation algorithm can avoid routes through heavy smoke within buildings. In addition, when firefighters must search an area to find victims, the GNM and Ant Colony Optimization are applied to find the shortest path that passes through each room of the area. Finally, the GNM is implemented to perform a search and rescue route analysis from an actual underground station. The proposed method can not only provide the shortest safe route within a building but can also minimize the time required to search for potential victims.

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PaperThe importance of the time factor in fire and rescue service operations in Sweden

Abstract

Health Status Index in Cost-Effectiveness Analysis of PKU-program

Optimal Fire Safety

Swedish Rescue Service Agency; Research Report P21-098

Paper
The importance of the time factor in fire and rescue service operations in Sweden