Supplementary memorandum from Staffordshire
Fire and Rescue Service (RS 82)
Comparing Incidents, fatalities, casualties
and rescues between Road Traffic Collisions (RTC) and Fire Damage
Report (FDR1) Fire Calls for a sample of Fire & Rescue Services
A review of a sample of Fire & Rescue Services
(FRS) was undertaken to assess the impact upon the services of
responding to Road Traffic Collisions and attending Fires where
there may be a life risk.
Ten non Metropolitan FRSs responded to our request
for information in the time available (23% of the total non Metropolitan)
Avon
Cambridgeshire
Humberside
Leicestershire
Mid & West Wales
Northumberland
South Wales
Staffordshire
Tyne & Wear
West Yorkshire
(There are 40 non Metropolitan FRS in England,
3 in Wales and 1 in Northern Ireland; there are 7 Metropolitan
FRSs)
Please be aware there may be subtle differences
between the way some of the statistics are assessed by individual
services, eg in defining a casualty, but it is felt that the figures
are broadly comparable.
The figures reported cover the financial reporting
periods 01-Apr-05 to 31-Mar-06, 01-Apr-06 to 31-Mar-07 and 01-Apr-07
to 31-Mar-08. (Note that any National figures available cover
01-Jan—31-Dec)
1. INCIDENTS
The following chart shows the total number of
incidents attended by the ten FRSs over the three year period.
Overall number of RTC and FDR1 Fire call incidents.
(01-Apr-05 to 31-Mar-08)
As can be seen the number of FDR1 Fire calls
is about 2.5 times the number of calls to RTCs.
RTC incidents decreased from 8,975 to 8,873
between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 1.1% decrease.
FDR1 Fire incidents decreased from 23,545 to
20,292 between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 13.8% decrease.
The next charts show the individual figures
for each FRS
Graph 1.2: The individual number of RTC Incidents
for each FRS respondent.
Graph 1.3: The individual FDR1 Incidents for
each FRS respondent.
As can be seen, whilst FDR1 incidents are showing
a decline, the data for RTCs shows a more variable situation,
with some services showing a slight increase and some a decrease.
Overall the numbers of RTCs seems fairly constant over the last
three years for these ten FRSs.
2. FATALITIES
Looking now at fatalities, here are the overall
figures. Please note that some fatalities that resulted some time
after the incident may not have been fed back to the FRS concerned,
or some fatalities may appear only on Police figures where the
use of FRS facilities was not required.
Graph 2.1 Overall fatalities from RTC and FDR1
Fire incidents (01-Apr-05 to 31-Mar-08)
As can be seen the number of fatalities resulting
from RTCs is about three times the number of fatalities from FDR1
fire calls.
Fatalities at RTC incidents decreased from 265
to 238 between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 10.2% decrease.
Fatalities at FDR1s Fire incidents increased
from 80 to 97 between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 21.25% increase.
Although the graphs seem to suggest a fall in
RTC fatalities and an increase in FDR1 fatalities, the individual
figures show some marked variation, but the overall picture is
consistent:
Graph 2.2 Fatalities from RTC incidents for
each FRS respondent.
Graph 2.3 Fatalities from FDR1 Fire incidents
for each FRS respondent.
3. CASUALTIES
Here are the overall casualty figures, again
it is to be noted that different services may define a casualty
in subtly different ways.
(Note: Humberside also include rescues in their RTC
casualty figures.)
Graph 3.1 Overall casualties from RTC and FDR1
Fire incidents (01-Apr-05 to 31-Mar-08)
This time the number of casualties resulting
from RTC incidents is five to six times higher than those resulting
from Fire calls.
Casualties at RTC incidents decreased from 6740
to 6243 between 05/06 and 07/08.
This is a 7.4% decrease.
Casualties at FDR1s Fire incidents decreased
from 1322 to 1035 between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 21.7% decrease.
The individual FRS data also show a varied picture:
Graph 3.2 Casualties from RTC incidents for
each FRS respondent.
Graph 3.3 Casualties from FDR1 Fire incidents
for each FRS respondent.
4. RESCUES
The overall figures for rescues (those that
are not injured, but need extricating from a vehicle) are as follows:
Note: Humberside does not account for separate RTC rescues and
casualties.
Graph 4.1 Overall rescues from RTC and FDR1
Fire incidents (01-Apr-05 to 31-Mar-08)
This shows that rescues for RTCs are about twice
the number for FDR1 fire calls.
Rescues at RTC incidents increased from 1,747
to 1,766 between 05/06 and 07/08.
This is a 1.1% increase.
Rescues at FDR1s Fire incidents decreased from
881 to 722 between 05/06 and 07/08. This is a 18.0% decrease.
The individual figures are
Graph 4.2 Casualties from RTS incidents for
each FRS respondent.
Graph 4.3 Casualties from FDR1 Fire incidents
for each FRS respondent.
5. CONCLUDING
REMARKS
Although the number of incidents the FRSs attend
for fire calls is far greater than the number of incidents attended
for RTCs, the impact on death and injury is far greater for RTCs.
If we create a fatalities per incident figure
for RTCs and Fire calls we get a figure of about 29 fatalities
per thousand incidents for RTCs and 3 to 4 fatalities per thousand
Fire calls. About ten times higher.
Similarly for casualties we get 730 casualties
per thousand RTC calls and just 52 casualties per thousand fire
calls.
The figures for rescues are 194 per thousand
for RTC and 37 per thousand for fire calls.
The following graph perhaps shows the scale
of the problem:
Looking at trends we note that:
Fatalities for RTCs are decreasing at a rate
of 10.2% whilst injuries are decreasing at a rate of 7.4%.
For FDR1 Fire incidents fatalities increased
at a rate of 21.25% but casualties showed a 21.7% decrease. The
perhaps unexpected increase in deaths can be explained by the
low number of fatalities at FDR1 fire incidents. Though it is
tragic it only takes an additional few deaths to change the figures
dramatically. (The actual total deaths among the 10 FRS were:
80 in 05/06, 73 in 06/07 and 97 in 07/08).
In terms of the time spent on incidents we note
that for Staffordshire:
The average median time spent on an RTC incident
was 29m 49s, resulting in an average amount of time spent on RTC
incidents of 484 hours per year. (Average "median time"
times number of incidents).
The average median time spent on an FDR1 fire
incident is 40m 26s, resulting in an average amount of time spent
on FDR1 fire incidents of 1647 hours per year.
Unfortunately given data limitations of some
FRS systems and due to the time constraints we were not able to
carry out a comprehensive review of times spent on incidents.
Staffordshire figures should only be taken as
indicative as a comprehensive and detailed analysis was not carried
out.
July 2008
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