“Don’t invite fire into your home”, the new campaign by the Barcelona Fire Service

The Barcelona Fire Service has launched the campaign “A casa, no convidis el foc” (Don’t invite fire into your home) as a prevention tool for raising public awareness about the importance of anticipating risks which may cause fire in the home. Prevention is fundamental and particularly necessary in the winter months, when the number of fires in homes reaches its highest.

02/12/2022 12:55 h

Ajuntament de Barcelona

The campaign is particularly directed at elderly people living alone and people with functional diversity. To this end, the Barcelona Fire Service has established direct coordination with the Councillor’s Office for Childhood, Youth, Elderly People and People with Disabilities to increase safety among these groups, which are more vulnerable when it comes to fire.

The campaign also seeks to raise awareness on the importance of installing smoke detectors at home. These affordable devices require no building work and can save lives by emitting an alarm sound when they detect smoke, meaning the fire service can quickly be called out.

To help promote all these messages, the Barcelona Fire Service will be promoting prevention advice on social media and through talks, as well as facilitating materials with basic information to reduce fire risks at home as much as possible.

The Barcelona Fire Service has acted on 19,115 occasions since the start of the year, taking part in rescues, fighting fires and explosions, providing technical assistance and carrying out operational prevention tasks. The service intervened in house fires on 1,094 occasions.

Guide to energy poverty indicators

The Barcelona Fire Service has been working since March 2017 with a guide to indicators to detect cases of energy poverty once they access the home: these indicators are included in reports compiled by all services. For instance, they include the presence of gas stoves in buildings with a central gas supply, the accumulation of water collected from street springs and stored in large bottles, the presence of candles or lamps without light bulbs, or signs of leaks or damp. As of 21 November this year, the Barcelona Fire Service had referred 440 cases of energy poverty to Social Services.

New articulated fire truck

The Barcelona Fire Service has added a new rescue vehicle to its fleet: an articulated fire truck with a 32-metre ladder to carry out rescues at height. The lorry comes in addition to the 16 new vehicles purchased since 2019 with the aim of providing good service to the public.

A further five vehicles are due to be added next year: a bariatric ambulance (to provide assistance for obese people), a four-wheel-drive ambulance and three plug-in hybrid command vehicles.

 

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