The International Association of Fire Fighters (lAFF) is requesting $1,058,078 in direct costs and $84,646 in F&A during the initial budget period, and $5,617,477 in direct costs and $449,398 in F&A for the total project period of the Worker Health and Safety Training Cooperative Agreement. The lAFF application includes two of the four program areas: Hazardous Waste Worker Training Program (HWWTP) and Hazardous Materials Disaster Preparedness Training Program (HDPTP). The lAFF proposes to continue to train fire fighters to the hazardous materials technician level through direct delivery programs nationwide. In addition, the lAFF will train fire fighters in other specialized course curricula already developed by the lAFF. The lAFF will use existing curricula, already proven to be effective, to train fire fighters, conducting curricula revisions as necessary to meet and exceed updated national consensus standards, federal standards and regulations. Aside from hazardous materials, the focus of the training will revolve around health and safety, with the intent that students will perform their duties in a safe and effective manner after training. In order to operate effectively in this new environment, emergency responders require incident command, safety management training at large scale incidents and advanced training, especially at the technician level. Each year of the cooperative agreement, the lAFF will train an average of 1,000 students in the technician and train-the-trainer curricula. In addition, the lAFF will reach an average of 750 students with an adapted incident management course which emphasizes safety management during disaster response. Hazardous Waste Worker Training Program (HWWTP)
Less than 10% of fire department calls involve fire. DOT reports 170,527 hazmat incidents with 2,857 injuries and 137 fatalities from 1999 to 2008. In 2008,114 fire fighters were killed in the line of duty. An estimated 36% of fire departments involved in hazmat response do not provided training. These statistics underscore the risk, and need for funding to train responders in hazmats, with a focus on health &safety.
