When a grass fire ignited near the Latigo subdivision in late February, a rapid response by firefighters from Falcon and other agencies held the wind-driven fire to 34 acres. About a dozen structures were threatened, including homes, but none were damaged or lost. Deputy Chief Jeff Petersma of the Falcon Fire Protection District credits part of that success to partnerships with other fire agencies established long before the fire ignited. ìIt required a lot of resources to address it,î he said.The FFPD has mutual and automatic aid agreements with other agencies to provide and receive assistance on large incidents such as the Latigo fire. Small departments have limited resources in terms of personnel and apparatus, so establishing aid agreements allows them access to additional manpower and equipment when needed.Under an automatic aid agreement, one or more partner agencies are automatically dispatched to certain types of incidents that inherently require additional resources, such as structure fires or wildland fires. As an example, Black Forest Fire/Rescue is automatically dispatched along with Falcon to fires in certain areas of the Falcon Fire Protection District. Likewise, FFPD is dispatched for fires in certain areas of Black Forestís response district. Petersma said automatic aid agreements can reduce dispatch and mobilization times, and specific resources can be pre-designated.Departments working under mutual aid agreements will provide resources when requested to do so by a partner agency. Firefighters from multiple agencies, including FFPD, were requested under mutual aid agreements for recent large grass fires in far eastern El Paso County and even neighboring Lincoln County because of the size and rapid spread of those fires.Automatic and mutual aid agreements are not limited to small fire departments, however. The Colorado Springs Fire Department also maintains aid agreements with other fire departments in the region. During the June 2012 Waldo Canyon fire, more than 15 El Paso County fire departments sent crews to assist with firefighting, as well as backfill empty city fire stations. In turn, CSFD was one of many fire agencies that provided assistance during the Black Forest fire a year later.Petersma said there are many benefits to automatic and mutual aid agreements for the departments involved. The availability of personnel and apparatus increases, as does firefighting-water in rural areas where water must be trucked in to a fire scene. Aid agreements further relations and interoperability of communications, and encourage departments to train together to become familiar with each otherís operations and districts. For the Falcon fire district, aid agreements with neighboring jurisdictions such as Black Forest, Cimarron Hills and Colorado Springs, can help provide a quicker delivery of services to the more distant ends of the fire district.
