The Baltimore City Fire Department has dismissed two more commanders for being "negligent" and "incompetent" in their roles at a live-burn training exercise in which instructors violated dozens of safety rules and a 29-year-old recruit died.
This brings to three the number of fire officers fired in the wake of the Feb. 9 fatal exercise, a significant development for leaders at fire departments around the country who are monitoring what's happening with training in Baltimore as they decide how -- and even if -- they will conduct live burns.
Lt. Joseph L. Crest, the lead instructor at the fatal exercise, and Lt. Barry P. Broyles, the instructor in charge of an ill-prepared rescue team, will lose their jobs effective Aug. 2 and Aug. 4. The head of the fire academy, Battalion Chief Kenneth B. Hyde Sr., was fired two weeks after the burn that led to the death of Racheal M. Wilson.
"The message here is that this kind of incompetence is not going to be tolerated at the Fire Department," said Rick Binetti, a Fire Department spokesman. "They are asked to do a job, they are asked to follow safety regulations. When that is not done, people's lives are in danger."
The developments in Baltimore are being disseminated to a network of national fire leaders via blast e-mails, online forums and trade journals.
Jay Lowry, the editor of a popular industry blog Firefighter Hourly, said he regularly receives comments about Baltimore from leaders at midsize and large fire departments.
"Baltimore is important," he said. "When it comes to training, Baltimore is going to stick out in the debate about whether or not the fire service continues to conduct live burns."
He said that readers often ask: "Will [Baltimore] spur any change?"
Lowry noted that there is considerable speculation about the fate of Fire Chief William J. Goodwin Jr. "He's a respected fire chief," said Lowry, who used to be the fire marshal for the Charleston, S.C., Fire Department. "Obviously there is interest in whether or not the fire chief gets dismissed. Certainly based on that, [other chiefs] will make decisions in the future about live burns."
Phil Welsh, the director of the Regional Emergency Services Training Center in North Carolina, said that when instructors talk about Baltimore, they express sympathy for the fire commanders but also use the fire as a reminder about following regulations.
