- Commercial and industrial property insurer FM GLOBAL and WORCESTER POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE (WPI) have announced a new memorandum of agreement (MOA) under which FM Global will provide more than $570,000 in financial and equipment contributions to WPI. Funding will support a WPI fire protection engineering professor to be designated as the FM Global Scholar as well as the work of graduate students. FM Global also is donating two state-of-the-art fire propagation apparatus for use in WPI’s Fire Science Laboratory.
At the same time, FM Global is nearing completion of its $70-million-plus research campus in West Glocester, Rhode Island, which will be the largest fire research and testing facility of its kind in the world.
- SPARTAN CHASSIS has selected RAYDAN MANUFACTURING INC.‘s Air Link air ride suspension system as the standard air suspension for tandem axle chassis. Spartan first used the Air Link on one model and, after a successful nine-month testing period, decided to include it as its standard tandem air suspension.
Spartan is the fourth fire apparatus manufacturer to include the Air Link as standard equipment. Other manufacturers include Emergency One, Inc., Smeal Fire Apparatus Co., and Sutphen Corp. The Air Link suspension is also offered as an option by KME Fire Apparatus, Aerialscope Inc., Seagrave Fire Apparatus, American LaFrance Corp., Ferrara Fire Apparatus Inc., and Saulsbury Fire Rescue.
- ZELLWEGER ANALYTICS, a gas detection systems manufacturer, announces the opening of a new $2 million state-of-the-art business center in South Florida, Zenter Americas. It provides customer care and technical support to customers of all the Zellweger Analytics brands including Lumidor, MDA, Neotronics, and Sieger 24 hours a day, seven days a week. When it is fully operational by the end of the year, it will have a team of multilingual experts in gas detection using leading-edge communications and business systems for fast response sales and technical services to customers throughout Canada, Mexico, the United States, and South America.
- M/A-COM, INC., a unit of Tyco Electronics and a manufacturer of critical radio systems used around the world, recently linked six different Kentucky public safety agencies via the same communications system. The statewide interoperability demonstration was achieved using M/A-COM’s NetworkFirst, a system based on Internet technology to enable public safety agencies to communicate with each other. With more than 200 Kentucky first responders viewing the demonstration, members of the Kentucky National Guard, the State Police, and the Frankfort Fire Department spoke to each other using disparate brands of two-way radios and communicated over multiple frequency bands. Currently, each of these agencies can only communicate with other officials within their own organizations. To communicate outside of their organizations, these agencies are forced to use multiple radios or communicate through the same frequency band.
The live demonstration involved public safety and federal agencies located across Kentucky. With a communications ring that stretched more than 360 miles from Pike County in the east to Muhlenberg County in the west, M/A-COM’s NetworkFirst highlighted the inherent advantages of implementing an interoperable communications system based on Internet Protocols (IP).
For the demonstration, M/A-COM connected its NetworkFirst system into the Intranet operated by Kentucky’s State Police and National Guard units. M/A-COM and emergency officials from the Frankfort Fire Department, Frankfort’s EOC (Emergency Operations Center), and Greenville, Kentucky’s Range Control, a National Guard facility, were then able to communicate in groups and separately using different channels and frequencies.
- PROAIR LLC named Jerry Mishler president of the manufacturer of automotive heating and cooling systems. Mishler joined ProAir 16 years ago and most recently served as executive vice president and general manager, a position he held for 21/2 years. Prior to that, he served for four years as vice president of sales and marketing. As president, Mishler will oversee all operations at the company’s corporate facility in Elkhart, Indiana, as well as its western division located in Ontario, California.
- OTTO J. HUBER was named chief of the Loveland-Symmes (OH) Fire Department. Huber replaces James D. Hunter, who retired after serving as chief of the department for 23 years. Huber joined the department in 1976 and rose through the ranks to assistant chief in 1985, serving in that rank until 2003. He will be responsible for leading the department’s four fire-EMS stations, 80 career personnel, specialized Tactical Rescue Team-Task Force One, and regional fire/rescue/EMS and police communications center. The Loveland-Symmes Fire Department provides fire, rescue, EMS, and related emergency and community services to the city of Loveland, Symmes Township, and surrounding areas.
- RACHEL SMITH, a senior at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, has been awarded a Thomas J. Watson post-graduate fellowship for the 2003-2004 academic year. She will study the effects of wildland fire on ecosystems in South Africa, Ghana, Australia, New Zealand, Costa Rica, France, and the United Kingdom. She will search for a fire management plan that is integrated into the ecosystem it protects and has long-term viability and will investigate wildfire policies in first world and developing nations, observing how wildland fire impacts societies.
NAMESINTHENEWS
Smith, a graduate of the U.S. Forest Service’s Smokejumper Basic Training program, became a volunteer firefighter at 18 in a fire station near her Everett, Washington, home. She became a paid structure firefighter and an emergency medical technician and completed training as a Forest Service Hotshot in La Grande, Oregon.
- DANIEL W. BIRO of the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, PATRICK P. DUNN of Oklahoma State University, and CHEUK-WAI LEUNG of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University were awarded $5,000 scholarships from the Fire Safety Educational Memorial Fund of the nonprofit National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). A committee appointed by the NFPA board of directors chose the students based on their academic achievement, leadership qualities, commitment to volunteerism, and intention to pursue a career in fire safety.
Biro, studying for a master’s degree in fire protection engineering at WPI, is a firefighter in Roslyn, New York, and an assistant fire inspector with the Nassau County Fire Marshal’s Office.
Dunn, pursuing a master’s degree in fire and emergency management at Oklahoma State University, has completed summer professional internships with fire departments in Alabama, Arizona, and Virginia and serves in the Air National Guard.
Leung, studying at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, is a full-time doctoral student focusing on flame spread. Her research project on sprinkler systems is credited with helping develop new fire codes in Hong Kong.
