Sense of Air-gency – PPE and Ventilation Equipment for SAR

Zion National Park’s Visitor and Resource Protection division responds to approximately 75 fire-related calls annually in Zion and the local community. The Structural Fire Program responds both in-park and as mutual aid to several agencies, including the Hurricane Valley Fire Department, East Zion Fire Department, and New Harmony Fire Department.   

Many of the calls the Zion Engine Company responds to are classified as “hazardous materials” reports. Hazardous materials are known to pose unreasonable risk to health, safety, or the environment. These materials include common substances such as propane used to heat buildings, chlorine used to treat water, anhydrous ammonia used to treat crops, and fuel used to power engines. Hazardous materials most often come in liquid and gas form. While the liquid hazardous materials are often easy to recognize and divert or dam, gaseous hazardous materials are often invisible, odorless, and move quickly with air currents.   

Despite the lengths the NPS has taken to limit the use of hazardous materials on NPS lands to protect parks from the risks of hazardous materials, some hazardous materials are required to continue operations. Currently, the Zion Engine Company possesses one multi-gas detector, which allows us to only be minimally set up to recognize and respond to hazardous materials incidents. Additional equipment would allow us to respond to more than one incident or area at a time, or cut the time needed to search in larger buildings, such as Zion Headquarters, many of the Zion Lodge buildings, and the Maintenance Yard.    

Supporting the Sense of Air-gency – PPE and Ventilation Equipment for SAR project allows us to serve as a model for sustaining and improving an essential function across the National Park Service. In recent years, the number of structural fire programs in the National Park Service has been falling because many parks lack the ability to support their fire brigades. When managers are forced to do less with less, too often, structural firefighting has been a casualty. The result is that National Park Service staff with an interest in structural firefighting have had to find other professional opportunities. Providing the resources to sustain structural firefighting at Zion allows us to continue to attract highly trained emergency response staff who have an interest in remaining in the park service but lack opportunities in the agency for this kind of development.