Formartine area sees an increase in deliberate fires
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Station commander for the Formatine and Garioch area Paul Berrisford from Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) has highlighted an increase in deliberate fire incidents in the Formartine area as he presented the quarterly report to councillors at the area committee on Tuesday.
He said: "During the period from April to the end of June, Scottish Fire and Rescue attended at total of 106 incidents within the Formartine area.
"Of these 29 were deliberate fires, 18 were accidental fires, there were 17 special service incidents and 42 false alarms.
"As a result these incidents there were no fire fatalities, four non-fatal fire casualties, six accidental dwelling fire, four non-domestic fire and one RTC casualty."
He stressed: "We have seen an increase in deliberate fires in this quarter compared to previous years.
"45 per cent of these incidents relate to one location in the Formartine area and we are working with partnership agencies trying to reduce the number of calls related to this.
"We have also had a number of fires in the Turriff area with which we are also working with Police Scotland, to reduce these types of calls.
"Local officers have been out engaging with youths to reduce these deliberate incidents."
He continued: "On the accidental dwelling fires, half of these were out on arrival and advice given at the time of the incident.
"Three were the result of cooking being left attended and we are putting a focus on this during home fire reduction visits.
"We have still managed to deliver 30 of these during restrictions and we will continue to deliver high and medium risk occupancy visits.
"The casualty noted was for someone injured tacking a small home fire, our advice is still to get out and contact us and not to tackle them.
"For the non-domestics fires, two of these were within derelict buildings.
"SFRS and police continue to work to secure these buildings.
"For the non-fire emergencies - we attend many incidents that are non fire related and we continue to see an increase in these, and 10 of these were for assistance from other agencies where we were required."
On road incidents he said: "I am pleased to report no fatalities in this quarter, and only one non-fatal who was treated by the ambulance service at the scene.
"Reducing the number of unwanted fire alarm signals is still a priority and we have currently completed a public consultation on reducing these and look forward to moving forward on reducing these."
On the issue of establishment, for Formartine, stations are currently two over at Oldmeldrum, six under at Ellon with four trainees in system, and Turriff is six under with one in training.
To book at home safety visit, go online to https://www.firescotland.gov.uk/your-safety/for-householders/home-fire-safety-visit.aspx call call 0800 0731 999 or text "FIRE" to 80800 from your mobile phone.
