The Big Corkscrew Island Fire prevention Bureau was organized in 1998. The Bureau is responsible for new and existing building fire code inspections, public education and the investigation of all fires within the fire district.
Currently we have two full time fire inspectors and one volunteer inspector. The Bureau operates out of the districts administrative offices and has three pieces of apparatus assigned to it for its use.
Our Bureau operates one "specialized" unit which is on a pickup truck chassis. This unit is assigned to Inspector Marfongella and the unit is used for daily inspections; however the rear of the unit is equipped and used for fire scene investigations. This unit carries all the hand tools need for a normal investigation, as well as a generator, portable lighting and an electric positive pressure fan.
All of the Bureaus inspections are conducted on hand held PDA computers. Our district uses "Code Pal" software for its inspections. This approach has saved time and made us much more efficient in our inspections. The software allows inspections to be transferred from inspector to inspector, seamlessly allowing for one inspector to start an inspection and another to complete it! The software also allows field access to the entire inspection database stored inspection history. Furthermore the software provides on site and immediate access to the currently adopted Fire Codes, which allows code research to take place on site.
