- Author
-
U.S. Department of Agriculture
- Title
- Findings From the Wildland Firefighters Human Factors Workshop. Improving Wildland Firefighter Performance Under Stressful, Risky Conditions: Toward Better Decisions on the Fireline and More Resilient Organizations. June 12-16, 1995. Missoula, Montana.
- Coporate
- Department of Agriculture, Washington, DC
- Report
-
5100-F&AM; 9551-2855-MTDC,
November 1995,
53 p.
- Keywords
-
fire fighters
|
wildland fires
|
human factors engineering
|
human behavior
|
management systems
|
stress (psychology)
|
fire risk
|
decision making
|
fire seasons
- Identifiers
- high reliability organizations: a vision for fire reorganization; using the crew resource management model in fire; assessment and feedback; fire organization and culture; fire management, incident management teams, and fire crews in a crew resource management context; addressing the common behavioral element in accidents and incidents; naturalistic decision making and wildland firefighting; cultural attitudes and change in high-stress, high-speed teams; South Canyon revisited: lessons from high reliability organizations
- Abstract
- It has become increasingly clear that wildland firefighters are experiencing collapses in decision making and organizational structure when conditions on the fireline become life-threatening. Since 1990 wildland fire agencies have lost 23 people who might have survived had they simply dropped their tools and equipment for greater speed escaping fires. We are averaging more than 30 entrapments each year now. And during the 1994 fire season, 34 people died, 14 on the South Canyon fire alone. These facts tell us that firefighting organizations, crews, and individuals need to be much more proficient at decision making under stressful, risky conditions. Improving proficiency will require new training and attitude changes. And this in turn requires a thorough examination of the human dimensions of wildland firefighting. This examination is not limited to firefighting crews and teams (i.e., smokechasers, engines, helitack, incident management, type 1 and type 2) but extends to fire management officers, dispatchers, fire support, managers with fire and resource responsibilities, up to Agency heads. These people encompass a fire community. Fire community implies an awareness that we are interconnected and interdependent and should approach firefighitng from the point of view that we are all in this together. This paper outlines the workshop's findings and recommendations. The workshop represents a first step in what will be a long journey toward a better understanding of the human side of wildland firefighting.