The International Association of Arson Investigators Expands Online and App Program

Feb. 23, 2023

Partnership with University of Miami has created an expanded data collection tool for fire investigators.

WASHINGTON, Feb., 2023—The International Association of Arson Investigators’ Health & Safety Committee worked over past years with the University of Miami’s Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center in adapting their Personal Exposure Reporter data collection tool for fire investigators. The tool was initially developed as part of Florida’s Firefighter Cancer Initiative. Over the last year, this cooperative effort has been expanded to include accident and near-miss information. Most fire scenes examined by fire investigators expose them to potentially cancer-causing toxins. Now those exposures can also be tracked across accidents and near-misses through data entry in the Personal Exposure Reporter.

“The risks associated with fire investigation work have typically drawn less attention than risks for peers who fight fires directly, making fire investigators an underserved population,” said IAAI President Randy Watson. “In the 2000s, we began to notice that many in our industry were developing cancer and dying. It took a while for us to wake up and see the connection to our occupation.”

Accidents and near-misses are among the great unknowns in fire investigations because there has not been a way to capture this information as an industry until now. The program aims to encourage voluntary reporting of these occurrences to provide information that can then be used to increase fire investigators’ health and safety.

“To the best of our knowledge, there’s no other tool that captures this accident and near-miss information for the fire investigator population,” said Jeff Pauley, chairman of the IAAI’s Health & Safety Committee. “If we don’t mitigate workplace risks, there’s a real cost from insurance rates going up and legal expenses to lost wages that can adversely affect the investigator’s family and employer.”

It doesn’t matter when the accident or near-miss occurred, reporting past incidents will help build the database. All data are held in the University of Miami’s secure database. No user or employer identifiable information is stored with the reports or shared with the IAAI.

The IAAI encourages all fire investigators to use the Personal Exposure Reporter to record all fire scene exposures and to report any accident and near-miss situations. Reports can be completed in as little as three to four minutes.

Questions concerning the Personal Exposure Reporter program may be directed to [email protected].

For more information on IAAI, visit www.firearson.com.

About the International Association of Arson Investigators

The International Association of Arson Investigators is an international professional association of more than 10,000 fire investigation professionals, united by a strong commitment to suppress the crime of arson through professional fire investigation. Learn more at www.firearson.com.