2. Tactical guidance for fire control rooms
Workshop

3. Welcome Welcome Introduction to me
This is you day it is about developing guidance for you in the form of tactics and foundation material
Fire alarm tests
None today
Fire assembly point
Rest rooms
Ladies
Gents
Refreshments
Tea
Lunch
Around the room ?

4. Business change officer
NOG Overview
Chris Caswell
Business change officer

5. National Operational Guidance Video
Click on the ticks above to access the video online

6. The Programme
To provide an online catalogue of fire service guidance which is:
Easy to search
Written in plain English
Replaces the thousands of pieces of previous guidance
So, what was the problem before?
8000 documents developed over 50 years – uncatalogued; duplicative and conflicting. Guidance about walkie talkies remained extant, whilst TB 1/97 took over a decade to replace.
A number of major incidents and rulings have shown the insufficiency of guidance. Firefighters have been accused of being too risk averse or showing a lack of discretion – standing at the water’s edge whilst passers-by wade in to perform an animal rescue; perhaps being led by insufficient policies and procedures. But don’t take my word for it…
In his ruling against Warwickshire County Council, The Honourable Mr Justice MacDuff said [paraphrased]:
“…It has taken a lot of explanation from Mr Matthews QC … to educate me upon the statutory and regulatory framework which lies behind the huge volume of directives, advisory notices, operational procedures, and the many thousands of pages of other documents which we have had to consider … Can a fire fighter, attending a fire in an emergency situation, remember what the picture on page 138 of the manual was intending to convey … and which of the elements of the flowchart he should move between before forming his decisions? … Many of the ever increasing numbers of directives and other papers are couched in language which borders on the impenetrable. We have found internal contradictions and entirely different flow charts purporting to show the same thing.”
In the face of this challenge, government was not complacent—
Field Fisher Waterhouse were commissioned by DCLG to review the back catalogue, finding it to be high risk
Greenstreet Burman, another law firm, were commissioned to develop a new model and scope for operational guidance
Sir Ken Knight established the Operational Guidance Programme Board, citing 20 pieces of risk-critical guidance that required urgent development … however, eight years later we have relatively few products from that process—with some products not without controversy.
Generic Risk Assessments were developed alongside that process—however these often strayed well beyond risk assessing, prescribing operational policies and procedures. Those products were not co-ordinated or reconciled with operational guidance being produced by the OGPB.
Initiatives to develop operational policies, primarily in the north west and south east, were pump primed by DCLG. Again, no co-ordination with national initiatives was in place.

7. The Programme Progress and the future
Guidance framework developing well
Supporting implementation
Resilience and legacy
So, what was the problem before?
8000 documents developed over 50 years – uncatalogued; duplicative and conflicting. Guidance about walkie talkies remained extant, whilst TB 1/97 took over a decade to replace.
A number of major incidents and rulings have shown the insufficiency of guidance. Firefighters have been accused of being too risk averse or showing a lack of discretion – standing at the water’s edge whilst passers-by wade in to perform an animal rescue; perhaps being led by insufficient policies and procedures. But don’t take my word for it…
In his ruling against Warwickshire County Council, The Honourable Mr Justice MacDuff said [paraphrased]:
“…It has taken a lot of explanation from Mr Matthews QC … to educate me upon the statutory and regulatory framework which lies behind the huge volume of directives, advisory notices, operational procedures, and the many thousands of pages of other documents which we have had to consider … Can a fire fighter, attending a fire in an emergency situation, remember what the picture on page 138 of the manual was intending to convey … and which of the elements of the flowchart he should move between before forming his decisions? … Many of the ever increasing numbers of directives and other papers are couched in language which borders on the impenetrable. We have found internal contradictions and entirely different flow charts purporting to show the same thing.”
In the face of this challenge, government was not complacent—
Field Fisher Waterhouse were commissioned by DCLG to review the back catalogue, finding it to be high risk
Greenstreet Burman, another law firm, were commissioned to develop a new model and scope for operational guidance
Sir Ken Knight established the Operational Guidance Programme Board, citing 20 pieces of risk-critical guidance that required urgent development … however, eight years later we have relatively few products from that process—with some products not without controversy.
Generic Risk Assessments were developed alongside that process—however these often strayed well beyond risk assessing, prescribing operational policies and procedures. Those products were not co-ordinated or reconciled with operational guidance being produced by the OGPB.
Initiatives to develop operational policies, primarily in the north west and south east, were pump primed by DCLG. Again, no co-ordination with national initiatives was in place.

8. NOG Hierarchy Operational Guidance Strategy Board
Operational Guidance Group
NOG Programme Team
Project Board Transport
Project Board Hazmat
Project Board Fires Construction
Project Board
Fires in Waste Sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Project Board Wild Fires

9. NOG framework Transport Utilities Industrial Major incidents
All Incident
Context
Scenarios
Transport
Sub-surface,
structural and access
Utilities
Industrial
Major incidents
Marauding Terrorist
Firearms Attack
Operations
Incident
command
Environmental protection
Fires in buildings under construction/demolition
Fires and firefighting
Wildfires
Fires in waste sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Hazardous materials
Explosives
Gases
Flammable liquids
Flammable solids
Oxidising substances
Radioactive materials
Corrosive substances
Toxic and infectious
substances
Performing
rescues
Water rescue and flooding
Rescue from confined space
Line rescue
Animal rescue
IOR CBRNe
SOR CBRNe
Miscellaneous
Fires in the built environment
Fires and firefighting
Transport
Sub-surface,
structural and access
Utilities
Industrial
Major incidents
Transport
Sub-surface,
structural and access
Utilities
Industrial
Major incidents
Marauding Terrorist
Firearms Attack
Fires in buildings under construction/demolition
Fires and firefighting
Wildfires
Fires in waste sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Fires in the built environment
Fires in buildings under construction/demolition
Fires and firefighting
Wildfires
Fires in waste sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Fires in the built environment
Operations
Incident
command
Environmental
protection
Fires in the built environment
Wildfires
Fires in buildings under construction
or demolition
Fires in waste sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Transport
Sub-surface,
structural and access
Utilities
Industrial
Major incidents
Fire scenario
Domestic
High rise
Basements
Agricultural
Industrial/commercial
Residential (institutions)
Public assembly
Wildfire
Derelict/construction/demo
Waste transfer/recycling
Rescue scenario
Water rescue
RTC
Bariatric rescue
Machinery
Confined space
Operations
Incident
command
Environmental protection
Operations
Incident
command
Environmental protection
Explosives
Gases
Flammable
liquids
solids
Oxidising
substances
Toxic and infectious substances
Radioactive
materials
Corrosive
Miscellaneous
Performing
rescues
Water rescue and flooding
Rescue from confined space
Line rescue
Animal rescue
Performing
rescues
Water rescue and flooding
Rescue from confined space
Line rescue
Animal rescue
Rescue from confined space
Water rescue and flooding
Line rescue
Animal rescue
Performing
rescues
Explosives
Hazardous materials
Gases
Flammable liquids
Flammable solids
Oxidising substances
Radioactive materials
Corrosive substances
Toxic and infectious
substances
IOR CBRNe
SOR CBRNe
Miscellaneous
Hazardous
materials
IOR
CBRNe
SOR
Master Slide
Marauding
terrorist
firearms attack
Marauding terrorist
firearms attack

10. Strategic and tactical guidance

11. Control measure actions
Previously
Operations
Hazards
Control measures
Incident
Command
Control measure actions

12. Moving forward Hazards Control measures Strategic actions
Operations
Hazards
Control measures
Strategic actions
Incident
Command
Tactical actions

13. What are NOG tactics? Strategic actions are:
“Actions that fire and rescue services should take at policy level”

14. What are NOG tactics? Tactical actions are:
“Actions that fire and rescue services should expect their staff to take at incidents”

15. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
Hazard: Emergency fire control operations - Equipment failure
Control Measure: Provide IT support
Tactical Actions
Fire control operators should be:
Ensure they consider maintenance and upgrades as part of the initial design stages when tendering for new fire control room software and hardware
Have arrangements in place for resolving failures of both software and hardware quickly, 24 hours a day
Communications and information systems and the hardware that supports them are complex.
It is likely that some or all of these systems may periodically fail.
These failures may have an impact on the control room operator’s ability to mobilise the most appropriate resource quickly.
Further support for resilience planning and control room equipment security may be considered good practice.
Maintaining the efficiency of systems should be an ongoing process, to ensure they are performing to the highest standard and that all mobilising data displayed is current.
As part of the specification, fire and rescue services may consider having system suppliers deliver professional training on all equipment.
This may include customised courses for essential users and first line maintenance courses for control room managers so they can work alongside system engineers when a problem occurs.
As part of any contractual agreement with suppliers, fire and rescue services may consider various maintenance agreements suited to their own organisational requirements.
(Page 13)

16. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
Hazard: Emergency fire control operations - Equipment failure
Control Measure: Provide IT support
Strategic Actions
Ensure they consider maintenance and upgrades as part of the initial design stages when tendering for new fire control room software and hardware
Have arrangements in place for resolving failures of both software and hardware quickly, 24 hours a day

17. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
Hazard: Emergency fire control operations - Equipment failure
Control Measure: Provide IT support
Strategic Actions
Tactical Actions
Fire control operators should be:
Familiar with the signs and symptoms of both software and hardware failure which may prevent a catastrophic failure at a later point in time.
Familiar with the resilience procedures for dealing with failures in Fire control equipment.

18. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
Page 15
Two existing documents currently provide National Emergency Call handling guidance to control staff:
(Fire Service Circular 10/93 appendix B – Fire survival Guidance)
(Fire Service Circular 54/04 – Emergency Call Management)
Control staff use this national guidance as a support to underpin their contact with callers.
Control room operators are the first point of contact for the entire emergency side of the organisation. It is common to deal with people who are excitable, upset, distressed or confused. To obtain the required information control room operators should always be professional, supportive and calm.

19. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
Page 17
Control measure actions
Fire and rescue services should:
Develop standard procedures for obtaining the most relevant information from callers. This will allow the nearest appropriate resource to be mobilised quickly.
Develop survival guidance prompts for control room operators
Control room operators should:
Be familiar with these procedures and should use them where appropriate

20. What does this mean to you?
NOG Operations
But does it stop there…......?
Could we go further to gather more information?
Could we build a better picture of the incident?

21. How it all fits together

22. NOG framework Fires and Firefighting Context Performing Rescues
Fires in the Built Environment
Fire in buildings under construction/demolition
Fire Scenario
Agricultural
Wild fires
Fire in waste sites
(including renewable energy facilities)
Fire Scenario
Basements
Fire Scenario
Derelict/Construction/Demo
Context
Performing Rescues
Water Rescue and Flooding
Site Specific Risk Information
Fire Scenario
Domestic
Transport
Rescue from confined space
Performing
Rescues
Fire Scenario
High Rise
Line rescue
All Incident
Sub-surface,
structural and access
Fire Scenario
Industrial/Commercial
Site Specific Risk Information
Animal rescue
Operations
Firewater Run-off
Fire Scenario
Public Assembly
Firewater Run-off
Utilities
Fire Scenario
Residential (Institutions)
Incident
Command
Explosives
Fire Scenario
Rural / Wild fire
Master build
Site Specific Risk Information
Industrial
Hazardous
Materials
Gases
Fire Scenario
Waste transfer/Recycling
Flammable liquids
IOR CBRNe
Rescue Scenario
Bariatric Rescue
Site Specific Risk Information
Hazardous Materials
Major incidents
Flammable solids
SOR CBRNe
Rescue Scenario
Confined Space
Oxidising substances
Rescue Scenario
Machinery
Environmental Protection
Radioactive materials
Rescue Scenario
RTC
Corrosive substances
Toxic and infectious
substances
Rescue Scenario
Water Rescue

23. Impact on guidance Hazard A fire and rescue service should: Strategic
actions
Incident
Scenario
Activity
Control
Measure
Tactical actions
Staff at incidents should:

24. NOG Database
Introduced to identify and consolidate Control Measure reparations across NOG publications.
Provided us with a tool to map Hazards, Control Measures, Strategic Actions and Tactical Actions across the NOG programme
Identify Strategic activity from that of Command or individual activities

25. Impact on guidance Hazard Hazard A fire and rescue service should:
Strategic
actions
Incident
Scenario
Activity
Control
Measure
Tactical actions
Staff at incidents should:
Hazard
Strategic
actions
Activity
Control
Measure
Tactical actions

26. What has been done in this area and where do we go next?
Jamie Orr
Fire Control Projects Support Team
CFOA National Resilience

27. Objectives Initial Scoping Exercise (what we need).
Establish what’s available (what we have).
Gap analysis.
Identify the guidance required to fill the gap.
Size the task.
Develop a project plan.

28. What do we need?

29. What do we have?
Existing guidance in relation to mobilising and control rooms are contained in a wide variety of outdated sources e.g.
2/1987 (Control Room Training)
FSC 10/1993
The Fire Service Manual Volume 1 (1998)
FSC 54/2004
NOG “Operations” Guidance
Part 1 - Emergency Fire Control Operations >> Strategic Guidance >> Policy Makers
A great deal of work has been undertaken recently by:
The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service
The Collaborative Partnership
Individual Fire and Rescue Services

30. Structure
Standalone?
Integrated into other aspects of tactical guidance?
Probably a blend of both
Foundation Document
Suite of guidance documents

31. JESIP
Doc Holliday
Programme Manager

32. Supporting Principles
Establish a dialogue between control room commanders  /supervisors at the earliest point
Control Rooms should use Plain English when liaising with other agencies
Proactively contribute to the shared situational awareness, including identification of risks and hazards, until the arrival of the first on-scene commander and throughout the incident
Coordinate the incident whilst control room commanders /supervisors remain in command and then coordinate the transfer of command to identified incident commanders

33. Fire control work packages

34. What do we need?

35. Emergency Call Management

36. Incident Support

37. Resource Management

38. People Matters

39. Technology, Systems and Data

40. Key Interdependencies

41. What else needs to be
included?

42. Scoping the work packages
What’s in and what’s out?

43. What are the priorities?

44. Project planning

45. Timelines