Fire season continues to scorch the state and firefighters are definitely feeling it, making the need for new ones essential. The Pasco Fire Department celebrated the graduation of eight new firefighters on Friday. With fire officials expecting to take on wildland fires up into October, their graduation couldn't have come at better time.
- PUB DATE: 8/28/2017 6:05:24 AM - SOURCE: KEPR-TV CBS 19

Local FEMA groups are headed to Houston Monday morning, including Renton firefighters who are trained to dive for people in distress. Two years ago, 15 firefighters in Renton trained in a rescue swimmer program in addition to the department's regional dive team. Those firefighters with the skills and equipment needed to get to stranded Tropical Storm Harvey victims have been deployed as part of FEMA’s Pierce County-based Washington Task Force, WA-TF1.
- PUB DATE: 8/28/2017 5:43:19 AM - SOURCE: KIRO-TV CBS 7

A couple of days ago, San Antonio Fire Chief Charles Hood got a “Godspeed” text from Houston Fire Chief Samuel Peña. He also got a similar text from Corpus Christi Fire Chief Robert Rocha, Hood said during an afternoon briefing on Harvey. But, oh, how the tables have turned. “They are going through those challenges (now) and I had to reciprocate with texts and phone calls to them because of what they are going through,” Hood said.
- PUB DATE: 8/28/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: Corpus Christi Caller-Times

A veteran FDNY captain threw water on the notion that the job of New York’s Bravest is dangerous, insisting in a pitch to potential minority recruits that firefighters “do not run into burning buildings.” Capt. Paul Washington, who launched a landmark racial-discrimination lawsuit against the city, is now getting heat for his “ridiculous” and “insulting” comments last March to a group of young people at Borough of Manhattan Community College.
- PUB DATE: 8/28/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: New York Post

The state's plan to cutback on the number of firefighters that worked in the Atlantic City Fire Department hit a setback Friday. In a ruling released Friday, Judge Julio Mendez blocked the state's efforts to reduce the number of firefighters from 198 to 148. The state, who took over control of Atlantic City in November, has been trying to find ways to cut costs in the resort town.
- PUB DATE: 8/28/2017 12:00:00 AM - SOURCE: South Jersey Times