Policy - Emergency Operations Safety

Format options. Adopt as a council- or chief-approved policy, with the operational detail in the department’s operating guidelines, or adopt as a standard operating guideline with sections 5.1 to 5.3 lifted into a one-page policy signed by the fire chief. Keep the numbering; the program, the procedures and the audit checklist refer to it.

Drafting conventions. Shall means mandatory. Should means expected unless there is a documented reason. May means permitted. Placeholders in double curly braces, such as {{Department}}, are completed by the department. Drafting notes in callouts are removed before adoption.

Keep intact: the risk principles (5.1), the one-commander rule (5.2), the accountability, two-in/two-out and rapid intervention commitments (5.4, 5.5), the mayday commitment (5.6), the stop-work and speak-up protection (5.10), and the learning firewall (5.11). Adapt: triggers, intervals, hardware, titles and the staffing method for each station type.

1.1 This policy states what {{Department}} commits to so that members are protected at emergency incidents and training evolutions, and names who is accountable for each commitment. It sets the department’s position on risk at incidents, incident management, personnel accountability, two-in/two-out and rapid intervention, mayday, air management, rehabilitation, building and fire behaviour knowledge, and learning from every working incident.

1.2 The detail of how each commitment is met is in Emergency Operations Safety Program and the safe work procedures it owns.

2.1 This policy applies to every member of {{Department}}, career, volunteer and paid-on-call, at every emergency incident and every training evolution, and to every mutual aid company and other agency working within the department’s incident management system.

2.2 It applies in full where any member enters an atmosphere that is or may be immediately dangerous to life or health. The incident management, accountability, incident safety officer and rehabilitation commitments apply at every incident type.

2.3 It does not replace the hazardous materials, technical rescue, water rescue, wildland or roadway policies; those policies add to this one for their incidents.

• Accountability system: the means by which the incident commander knows at all times who is at the incident, where each crew is and what it is doing (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 21.5).
• Emergency traffic: a radio announcement that clears the channel for an urgent safety message that is not a mayday.
• IDLH: immediately dangerous to life or health.
• Incident commander: the one person with overall authority for the incident (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 18.3).
• Incident safety officer (ISO): the member assigned to monitor conditions and operations at an incident, with authority to stop, alter or suspend an imminently dangerous activity (NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 5).
• Initial rapid intervention crew (IRIC): two members of the initial attack crew, outside the IDLH, trained and equipped and assigned to rescue the entry crew; the “two out” (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 3.3.140.1).
• Learning firewall: the commitment that information gathered for learning is not used for discipline (The Human Factor, 2026a).
• Mayday: the radio call a member makes when in danger inside a hazard zone.
• Personnel accountability report (PAR): a roll call confirming every member is accounted for.
• Psychological safety: the shared belief that it is safe to speak up, ask, admit error and challenge a decision (Edmondson, 1999)DOI.
• Rapid intervention crew (RIT): at least one officer and three members outside the IDLH, dedicated to the rescue of members (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 3.3.140).
• Working fire: a confirmed fire with crews operating inside a structure or within a collapse zone.

1. People are the solution we build around, not the problem to fix. Members adapt to conditions every day to make the work go right; this policy exists to give those adaptations margin, not to replace judgment with rules (Hollnagel, 2014).

2. Procedures describe work as done, written with the people who do it. Every procedure under this policy is drafted and revised with the crews who perform it (Conklin, 2012).

3. Learning comes before blame, and learning information is never used for discipline. Conduct concerns go to a separate process run by different people (Dekker, 2016; The Human Factor, 2026a).

4. Psychological safety is a condition of safety, so speaking up is expected and protected. A member who stops a task, challenges a decision or reports a near miss in good faith is doing what this policy asks (Edmondson, 1999)DOI.

5. Members are the most important asset at any incident. No property is worth a member’s life, and the department accepts significant risk only where a savable life depends on it (IAFC, 2010; NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 10).

6. One person commands every incident, and every member works within that command.

7. The controls in this policy are measured on routine incidents, not only examined after harm.

5.1.1 The department shall risk a lot, in a calculated and controlled way, to save a life that can be saved; shall risk a little to save property that can be saved, and only with the controls in this policy in place; and shall risk nothing to save lives or property that are already lost. Accountable: incident commander.

5.1.2 No interior offensive operation shall be conducted in an abandoned or derelict building, or in a building where the fire is well advanced, without credible, specific information that a savable life is inside. Accountable: incident commander.

5.1.3 Where the resources on scene cannot support and protect the members inside, the strategy shall be defensive until they can. Accountable: incident commander.

5.1.4 Before committing crews to an interior position, the incident commander shall complete or receive a 360-degree size-up and shall declare the strategy on the radio. Accountable: incident commander.

5.2.1 An incident management system compatible with ICS Canada shall be used at every incident, and command shall be held by one identified person at all times (NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 10). Accountable: incident commander; deputy chief, operations, for the system.

5.2.2 Command transfer shall follow the written procedure and be announced to all units. Accountable: incident commander.

5.2.3 Mutual aid companies and other agencies shall work within the host incident management system and accountability system, and the department’s agreements shall say so. Accountable: fire chief.

5.3.1 A qualified incident safety officer shall be assigned at every incident and training evolution that meets a trigger in the program, and shall have the authority to stop, alter or suspend any activity that presents an imminent hazard (NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 5). Until the ISO arrives, the incident commander holds the safety function. Accountable: incident commander for assignment; deputy chief, operations, for the qualified pool.

5.4.1 The department shall operate a personnel accountability system at every incident that records every member’s location and assignment, with entry control at every IDLH boundary, and shall conduct personnel accountability reports at the triggers and intervals the program sets (NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 10 and s. 21.5). Accountable: incident commander.

5.4.2 Members shall work in crews, enter, work and leave together, and never work alone in a hazard zone. Accountable: company officer.

5.5.1 No crew shall enter an IDLH atmosphere at a structure fire until at least two trained and equipped members are outside, in contact with the entry crew and ready to rescue them, except where a member sees a savable person who will die without immediate action, in which case the entry shall be reported before it is made and reviewed afterwards (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 3.3.140.1 and ch. 10). Accountable: company officer for the entry; incident commander for the outside team.

5.5.2 A member wearing SCBA in a hazard zone shall be accompanied by another member similarly equipped with the same air capacity; some jurisdictions’ fire-service regulations require exactly that (J12 Fire Service OHS Rules and Fireground Operations). Accountable: company officer.

5.5.3 At every working fire, a dedicated rapid intervention crew of at least one officer and three trained members shall be in place with no other duty, with the target of being in place within 10 minutes of the first interior entry (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 3.3.140); some jurisdictions’ fire-service regulations also set a rescue-crew rule (J12 Fire Service OHS Rules and Fireground Operations). Where this is not achieved, the incident commander shall report it in writing to the fire chief within 24 hours as a learning record. Accountable: incident commander.

5.6.1 Every member shall call a mayday as soon as they believe they are in danger, and no member shall be criticized for calling one early. The department shall maintain a mayday procedure, drill every operational member in it annually, and respond to every mayday as the procedure sets out (NFPA 1400, 2026; NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 18.3.1). Accountable: deputy chief, operations.

5.7.1 Every member shall know their air supply, manage it as a working resource and begin exit from the IDLH area before the low-air alarm activates (NFPA 1400, 2026; NFPA 1550, 2024, ch. 10). Accountable: company officer.

5.8.1 Rehabilitation with medical monitoring shall be established at every working fire and at every incident or training evolution meeting the program’s triggers, and no member shall return to work from rehabilitation until the release criteria are met (NFPA 1580, 2025). Accountable: incident commander.

5.9.1 The department shall base its fire attack and ventilation procedures on the current research on fire dynamics, shall teach every member to recognize lightweight construction, basement fires and collapse indicators, shall maintain building intelligence including registers of lightweight-construction and vacant buildings, and shall drill the evacuation signal (NFPA 1700, 2021; NFPA 1660, 2024). Accountable: deputy chief, operations.

5.10.1 Every member has the authority and the duty to stop an activity at an incident they believe presents an imminent danger, by naming the hazard and the action, and the officer or incident commander shall acknowledge, act or explain, and review the call afterwards for learning. A stop-work call, a challenge or a near-miss report made in good faith shall never be the subject of reprisal. This is in addition to the statutory right to refuse unsafe work in Policy - Right to Refuse Unsafe Work and Stop-Work Authority. Accountable: fire chief.

5.10.2 A member’s safety concern about emergency operations shall be logged within two working days and answered to the member within 15 days with the decision and the reason. Accountable: program manager, Fire Suppression and Emergency Operations team.

5.11.1 Every working fire shall end with a hot debrief; every mayday, rapid intervention deployment, collapse or flashover close call, lost-time injury and “RIT not in place” event shall be reviewed under Incident Investigation and Learning Program; and information gathered for learning shall not be used for discipline (NFPA 1550, 2024, cl. 5.7; The Human Factor, 2026a). Accountable: senior officer responsible for health and safety.

Only the differences from 01 Roles and Responsibilities are stated.

6.1 Fire chief: approves this policy; receives every “RIT not in place” report; ensures the ISO pool, the RIT staffing method for each station type and the mutual aid agreements are resourced.

6.2 Deputy chief, operations: owns the program; receives the quarterly update; ensures officers are qualified to command.

6.3 Program manager, Fire Suppression and Emergency Operations team: maintains the program and procedures with the team; logs and answers members’ concerns; reports indicators quarterly.

6.4 Incident commander: accountable for every commitment in section 5 at the incident.

6.5 Incident safety officer: monitors, advises, and stops imminently dangerous activity; files the ISO report.

6.6 Company officer: crew integrity, air management, entry only with the two outside, PAR responses, the hot debrief.

6.7 Member: works within the system, calls a mayday early, speaks up, reports near misses.

6.8 JOHSC: consulted on this policy and every procedure under it; receives the quarterly update and every “RIT not in place” report.

6.9 Dispatch: elapsed-time notifications, mayday monitoring, additional alarms as the procedures set.

• Emergency Operations Safety Program
• SWP - Accountability and Personnel Accountability Reports
• SWP - Two-In Two-Out and Rapid Intervention
• SWP - Mayday
• SWP - SCBA Donning, Use and Air Management (under Respiratory Protection Program)
• SWP - Rehabilitation at Incidents and Training (under Firefighter Rehabilitation Program)
• SWP - Roadway Incident Scene Blocking (under Apparatus, Driving and Roadway Operations Program)

8.1 Records under this policy: CAD and radio records, tactical worksheets, accountability and PAR logs, ISO reports, “RIT not in place” reports, debrief cards, learning review reports, training and drill records, the concern log and the indicator worksheets. Retention follows 05 Document Control and Records.

8.2 Records are written expecting disclosure under freedom-of-information law. They identify people by role, not name, wherever the purpose allows. Learning review records are held by the senior officer responsible for health and safety and are not placed in personnel files.

8.3 Peer support activity after a mayday is reported in aggregate only.

9.1 To the fire chief: every “RIT not in place” report within 24 hours; every mayday, RIT deployment and fireground injury the same day; the quarterly indicator worksheet.

9.2 To the JOHSC: the quarterly indicator worksheet, every “RIT not in place” report, and every learning review summary at the next meeting.

9.3 To council: the emergency operations indicators in the annual health and safety report (03 Accountability and Reporting).

11.1 Under the applicable occupational health and safety statute: the employer’s duty to take every reasonable precaution, the supervisor’s duties and the worker’s duties (J02 Duties of Employers, Supervisors, Workers and Contractors); the right to refuse unsafe work (J07 Right to Refuse and Reprisal Protection); the written OHS program (J03 OHS Policy and Program) and the joint committee (J05 Joint Committee and Health and Safety Representative); reporting to the regulator (J08 Incident Reporting and Investigation); and any fire-service rules on crew integrity, SCBA, PASS and fit testing (J12 Fire Service OHS Rules and Fireground Operations; J13 Firefighter PPE and Protective Equipment; J14 Respiratory Protection, Fit Testing and Breathing Air).

11.2 The duty of everyone who directs work to take reasonable steps to prevent bodily harm (Criminal Code [CA], 1985, s. 217.1).

11.3 NFPA 1550 (2024): emergency operations, risk management, accountability, two-in/two-out and rapid intervention, hazard control zones, the incident safety officer, incident management and command safety. NFPA 1407 (2020) and NFPA 1404 (2018), now within NFPA 1400 (2026). NFPA 1700 (2021). NFPA 1580 (2025). NFPA 1660 (2024). IAFC (2010).

11.4 Accreditation: a standardized incident command system supported by policy and training; risk management in emergency operations; qualified ISO deployment; accountability at all risk events (CPSE, 2019, criteria 5E.2, 11A.8, 11A.11, 11A.12).

12.1 Reviewed 12 months after adoption, then every three years; and after any mayday with injury, any line-of-duty death, any legislative or standards change, or on the request of the JOHSC.

12.2 Approved by the fire chief after consultation with the JOHSC, the bargaining agents and the volunteer association, with the consultation recorded.

Consult early and record it. What they will ask, and honest answers:

Put the agreement in writing. Volunteers and non-union members need a voice through the volunteer association. Where there is disagreement, record it, adopt what can be agreed, and review at 12 months.

Closing disclaimer. This model policy is general information prepared by The Human Factor. It is not legal advice. Adapt it to the department, confirm every citation, and review it with counsel and the bargaining agents before adoption.

This chapter relies on the following legal requirements, which differ by province and territory. Check your jurisdiction’s section on each topic page before adopting it.