An Unalaska man was killed in an avalanche Tuesday evening while he was snowmachining in the Unalaska Valley. Trey Henning, 21, was buried in the avalanche and later recovered from the site near the quarry on Overland Drive. In a statement, the Department of Public Safety said life-saving measures were unsuccessful. "CPR was initiated and other life-saving measures were taken both on the scene and throughout his extrication from the mountain," said the statement. "Henning was taken to the Unalaska clinic for continued care. After exhausting all efforts to revive him, he was pronounced deceased at 1858 hours." Public Safety officials said they were notified of the avalanche around 5:30 p.m. The Department of Fire and Emergency Medical Services led the response, with help from police and several Good Samaritan snowmachiners.  

A man was pulled out of his smoke-filled downtown apartment last week by two neighbors who heard an explosion and came to the rescue. His brother is accused of setting the fire. Freddie Lee Fox, 66, is in custody facing charges of arson, assault and attempted murder in the early morning Feb. 19 fire at an apartment on Eagle Street. According to charging documents, he is the older brother of Odell Fox, who lived inside the apartment. Odell Fox was taken to a local hospital in critical condition and placed in the intensive care unit. He suffered severe smoke inhalation, but is expected to survive. "I hear an explosion, a big bang,' said Joseph Schultz, a commercial fisherman who also lives at the apartment complex. "I was talking to my friend on the phone and all of a sudden, I open up my door and I'm talking to him and I go, 'Hey, holy smokes there's' — I cussed, I didn't say 'smokes' — and I go, 'there's a fire! There's a fire!' I said, 'Oh, this looks bad, I gotta go.' I hung up on my friend. I ran over here."  

San Francisco's women firefighters are exposed to higher levels of certain toxic PFAS chemicals than women working in downtown San Francisco offices, shows a new study led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, the University of California, San Francisco, and Silent Spring Institute. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are used in grease- and water-resistant coatings and can be found in fabrics, furniture and food packaging, but also notably in firefighting foam and turnout gear. These "forever chemicals," which don't easily break down in the environment, have been linked to a variety of cancers and are known to interfere with immune function, endocrine function and breast development. The study, which appears online today (Wednesday, Feb. 26) in the journal Environmental Science and Technology, is one of the first published results from the Women Firefighter Biomonitoring Collaborative, a long-term investigation into the chemical exposures faced by women firefighters.  

The Georgia Senate passed legislation Tuesday aimed at loosening training requirements for volunteer fire departments in the state. Senate Bill 342 would create a council tasked with establishing training and certification rules for volunteer fire departments in Georgia that are separate from those required for full-time professional fire departments. The bill passed the Senate unanimously and heads to the Georgia House for consideration. Its sponsor, Sen. Burt Jones, said the measure's intent is to loosen training requirements for volunteer firefighters. Currently, volunteers receive the same kind of stringent training that professional firefighters are required to take. Jones, R-Jackson, said tougher training may scare off qualified people interested in volunteering particularly in rural areas where volunteer firehouses are often critical to a community's public safety readiness.  

Ambulances with flashing sirens trying to weave their way through congested city streets. Traffic poses challenges to EMTs rushing to treat patients. To improve response times, some EMTs in San Diego use scooters get around faster. City Councilman Joe Borelli wants the FDNY to test the scooter idea here in New York. "We know that minutes and seconds do matter and it's not always safe to wait for an ambulance who might be stuck in some traffic in gridlocked streets," Borelli said. Borelli says scooters would be especially useful in Manhattan where security bollards and barricades create additional obstacles for first responders. "Having these vehicles that can navigate those is just something that can make the FDNY response time to medical emergencies much quicker," Borelli noted.  

Not only is somebody going to respond, but they are going to respond quickly. That's how Deputy Chief of Quakertown Fire Company Brad Patkochis described the North Hunterdon Fire Alliance's Squad 51 program, through which the communities of Quakertown (Franklin Township) as well as High Bridge, Lebanon, Clinton and Annandale are each serviced by the fire companies of all five towns. Through the program, between four and six firefighters from one of the five departments volunteer from 6 p.m. on Saturday through to 6 a.m. on Sunday on a rotational basis. If there is an emergency that occurs within that timeframe in any one of the five municipalities, firefighters from that town are dispatched to the scene in addition to the Squad 51 volunteers housed at a department in one of the four other neighboring municipalities.  

VIDEO: It's easy to see and hear a firetruck when it's driving past but unless you are up close you might have missed a special marking. Small stickers line the doors of Davenport Fire Department trucks symbolizing an accomplishment achieved by the crew on board. "Those calls they go on, the saves they have or bringing a child into the world it's kinda a pride thing to recognize that they did something like that," Lt. Zach Soliz with Davenport Fire said. "It was very unique at the time and it's just a tradition that carried on since then." They have been handing out these stickers for over thirty years. A lightning bolt represents a crew saving someone using a defibrillator and a stork represents when a baby is delivered in the field.