What is a “First Alarm” fire?

Often times you will hear the term “first alarm fire” describing a type of fire, technically, it’s not a fire at all. A “First Alarm” is actually an apparatus assignment sent to a fire or a report of a fire. This assignment can vary in different parts of the country, as well as specific locations e.g. Spirit of St. Louis Airport, a nursing home, a commercial building, or a building dealing with hazardous substances.

A Typical “First Alarm” assignment in West St. Louis County consists of: 3 pumpers, 1 ladder truck, 1 heavy rescue truck, 1 adavnced life support(ALS) ambulance, and 1 battalion chief. At a minimum this response gives you a total of 16 fire suppression personnel and 1 chief officer. The total number of personnel can change quite a bit depending on the level of staffing for the day.

All additional alarms, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th, etc… are basically the same response with the heavy rescue truck alternated with an ALS ambulance. So, the 2^nd alarm would give you one additional ALS ambulance, and no rescue truck. The 3^rd alarm would give you a second rescue truck.

Any piece of equipment can be added or replaced at the discretion of the officer in charge.

So, what’s a “general alarm” fire?

A “general alarm” also refers to a response to a fire. A “general alarm” fire is any fire that goes to a 5^th alarm or greater. However, you won’t hear us call for a “general alarm”, as we would for a 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th, 5th, etc. We would continue to call for individual alarms until we have enough personnel and equipment to handle an incident.