The Blackshear Fire Department recently passed its yearly inspection by the Georgia Firefighter Standards and Training Council (GFSTC) in Forsyth.
Wayne Feller, Compliance and Evaluation Manager for GFSTC, came to Blackshear to conduct the inspection. Various things checked for compliance include fire engines having all required equipment and proof of workers compensation insurance, cancer insurance, firefighting training and pump tests.
“The state audit comes once a year to verify we have everything in order,” said Blackshear Fire Chief Bucky Goble. “All the required insurance, equipment and mandatory training hours have to be up to date.”
In a follow up letter to Chief Goble, Feller thanked Goble for his cooperation and noted everything was found to be correct and up to date. Feller’s letter concluded with “keep up the good work.”
One other thing Feller checked for was compliance with proof of National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS), which helped fire departments track fire-related incidents and identify trends in fire response. As of this edition of The Times, NFIRS is no longer required by the United States Firefighters Association. The old reporting system was decommissioned January 31, just three days after the inspection, a change that has been coming since June of last year.
NFIRS has been replaced by the National Emergency Response Incident System (NERIS), a cloud based platform designed to work faster and improve firefighter response by analyzing post-incident information. According to the NERIS website, this new system “helps local, state, tribal and territorial agencies improve prevention, response and firefighter safety.”
