Services

Specializing in:

• Improving Communities’ Public Protection Classification (PPC) Rating
• Fire Station Locations
• Alternative Water Supplies (Folda-Tank Water Shuttles)

Improving Communities’ Public Protection Classification (PPC) Rating

• Evaluate the Public Protection Classification (PPC) that ISO last developed for your community.
• Generate an updated PPC for your community based on the existing fire defense infrastructure and prepare a list of suggested improvements, which, if implemented, would improve your community’s PPC.
• Explain all 14 items (and the Texas Addendum) that comprise your PPC rating to two decimal places. Explain to your community (again to two decimal places) how improvements in your fire defenses, planned or implemented, will affect your PPC rating.
• Assist your fire jurisdiction throughout the ISO survey process -- from the letter to request a survey to the exit interview.
• Complete all the necessary forms allowing the various departments within your community to continue with their normal daily activities.
• Represent your community during the ISO survey, to free your city officials to concentrate on their normal daily activities.
• Explain the complexities of the Fire Suppression Rating Schedule (FSRS). For example:
• Paid, Volunteer and Combination Departments
• Automatic Aid vs. Mutual Aid
• Training – How to present your data
• Pump Testing – What is actually required
• Water Distribution System Testing (Flow Tests)
• Locating Fire Stations to Minimize Costs and Maximize ISO Credits
• Fire Service Communications
• Structural Calculations – A very important aspect of the grading process
• Texas Addendum
• Hauled Water
• Extended Hose Lays
• Large Diameter Hose (LDH) Credits

Fire Station Locations

• The strategic placement of existing and proposed fire stations is critical to the emergency response and PPC rating for all communities. Reports developed by our company address the immediate needs of communities along with all future needs based on the existing city limits and ETJ. Apparatus and manpower deployment for each existing and suggested station will be identified. The impact on the PPC rating based on the accurate location of existing and required fire stations for the community will be identified.
• Studies performed by our company utilize 1.5-mile response boundaries (approximate 3-to-4 minute response times) for engine companies and 2.5 mile response boundaries (approximate 5-to-6 minute response times) for ladder companies. Existing structures in areas requiring fire stations are analyzed to determine the apparatus required at all existing and proposed fire stations. This is the most accurate method of locating fire stations along with apparatus deployment that exists today. Computer programs cannot accurately perform these studies; it takes a human brain. These 1.5 mile engine company response boundaries and 2.5 mile ladder company response boundaries are the exact method utilized by Insurance Services Office (ISO) when a community is rated.

Alternative Water Supplies (Folda-Tank Water Shuttles)

• For developed areas within 5 road miles of a fire station housing an engine company, but outside 1000 feet of a creditable fire hydrant, an alternative method of providing water must be demonstrated to attain a PPC rating better than “8b”. To be credited, the alternative method of providing water must demonstrate that at least 250-gpm can be delivered within 5 minutes of arrival of the first fire apparatus and maintained without interruption to 85% of the built-upon area within 5 road miles of a fire station housing an engine company for the required fire duration (2 or 3 hours). The most common and economical method of providing this water supply is a hauled water/tanker shuttle.
• A hauled water/tanker shuttle survey takes significantly more time to complete than a survey based on a water system with creditable fire hydrants. The major items required are an accurate map (showing roads, fire stations, fill points, building locations and response differences within the graded area), timed tests (folda-tank set-up time, tanker filling and tanker dumping), accreditation of fill points, needed fire flow evaluation (targeted structures) and location of automatic and mutual aid tankers. Insurance Services Office (ISO) obtains this information via their pre-survey packet and analyzes the water shuttle effort via a computer program that models tankers filling, dumping and traveling for a duration of 2 or more hours. Based on this computer analysis, credit for the shuttle is justified or denied.