Sonoma County Fire agencies ready for peak of fire season. They ask: are you?

Graton Fire

September represents our 2-year anniversary since we added two full-time firefighters every day in the station! The benefits have been amazing. We are arriving 4-5 minutes earlier to fires, putting them out faster and with less damage. For medical calls, we can start CPR, provide oxygen, stop bleeding, etc. that much sooner. We are also able to help homeowners with defensible space, tour local businesses and create maps, and provide more education to our community and local school children. It’s been such a positive benefit to our community, thank you for supporting us! Looking for a defensible space check? Like your business to have a pre-plan completed to improve our knowledge of your building? Give us a call, 823-8400.

Joint Agency Strike Teams

Wildland fire season is here, and Sonoma County Strike Teams have been fighting fires from the Klamath River to Yosemite. These communities appreciate our support during their fires; most importantly, they return the favor when we need help. Our firefighters also gain invaluable experience on these large campaign fires which helps us all here at home.

Sonoma County Fire District

SCFD is getting ready to launch a new EMS/Firefighting helicopter program in October. In preparation for that, our command staff has been participating in a lot of helicopter training. Check out our social media pages to see the video of Fire Chief Mark Heine in water survival training where he was taught how to exit the helicopter in the event of a water landing emergency. Our crew members were strapped into the simulated helicopter seat while wearing a flight vest then dropped into the water. They were all successful in completing the training and making it out of the water! Stay tuned… More to follow on our new flight program next month.

We have a new Community Outreach Specialist, Karen Hancock! Please be sure to say hi or hola when you see her out and about throughout our district, she’s bilingual! We are looking forward to participating in more events and engaging with our community. Please contact Karen at 707-892-2445 for any community outreach needs.

Our Prevention Division would like to remind everyone to please continue to work on defensible space around your home and property. Defensible space, coupled with home hardening, is essential to improve your home’s chance of surviving a wildfire. Defensible space is the buffer you create between a building on your property and the grass, trees, shrubs, or any wildland area that surround it. This space is needed to slow or stop the spread of wildfire and it helps protect your home from catching fire—either from embers, direct flame contact or radiant heat. Proper defensible space also provides firefighters a safe area to work in, to defend your home. To learn more visit, readyforwildfire.org

Help our firefighters and paramedics find your house. If we can’t find you, we can’t help you. Sonoma County Fire District produces green reflective address signs that make it easier for first responders to locate its residents during emergencies.

Reflective address sign features:

• Highly visible day or night
• Reflective materials on both sides
• Fade resistant, last for years
• Pre-drilled holes for easy installation
• Easily installed on mailboxes or wooded posts
• Signs can be vertical or horizontal
• Signs are 18" x 6" or 24" x 6"

Signs are $25 each and can be customized with mounting holes and numbering on one side or both. Signs can be up to 5 digits long and can be made horizontal or vertical. If you wish to purchase a sign you can do so by going to our website, sonomacountyfd.org.

Thank you for doing your part in helping make us a safer Sonoma County!

Check out our website, www.sonomacountyfd.org.

Follow us on social media! Sonoma County Fire District on Facebook & Instagram and Twitter-@SoCoFireDist

Emergency Notifications

As we move into the height of fire season, it is a good time to share all the different ways to be notified during an emergency. Remember that many of these alerts will reach beyond the immediate area of the emergency based on technology limitations. Better too many than too few.

• Nixle: text 888-777 with your zip code for text alerts and visit nixle.com to customize your alert settings
• SoCoAlert: call 707-565-1369 or visit www.SoCoAlert.com for phone and email alerts
• Weather/Emergency Alert Radio: These started as tornado warning devices and can now be activated for any emergency, including fire evacuations. They are not too expensive (roughly $30), do not require phone or internet as they use radio waves, and even have battery backup. If you can get AM/FM radio channels, this should work where you live.
• Sirens: police and fire vehicles throughout the County have installed a “hi/low” siren that will be used if an evacuation is needed. Some fire departments with station-mounted sirens (e.g., Graton, Occidental), will activate them for 5 minutes continuously to alert you of a major event and to find out more information.
• Facebook/Instagram/Twitter: to stay informed, follow your local public safety agencies like, Sonoma County Sheriff's Office, Graton Fire, County of Sonoma Department of Emergency Management
• Media: Local radio and Bay Area news media are also excellent local sources of information such as KSRO radio (103.5FM/1350AM).
• 2-1-1: Did you know the County has a number that you can call at any time for information on anything? Shelters, evacuations, road closures, etc. Save 9-1-1 for life threatening emergencies!
• Pulsepoint: This smartphone app shows every call in Sonoma County. See smoke? Use the map feature to see if there’s a reported fire in that area (or a control burn when backyard burning reopens). You can even see what engines are assigned and their status. It is possible to set alerts for any type of call, such as a wildland fire, but be aware it is countywide and will provide alerts from Cloverdale to Schell Vista.

Watch Duty App

Okay… so all the notifications above alert us to an emergency, but don’t “de-alert” us when the danger has passed. Step forward a dedicated group of volunteers that created the Facebook page and Twitter feed, Sonoma County Scanner Updates, to post real-time updates as they scan fire and police radio frequencies. They recently moved to the next level and built an app called “Watch Duty.” Now, it is possible to see real-time updates on whether an incident is growing, shrinking, unfounded, etc. directly on your smartphone. The app now not only covers the counties of Sonoma, Lake, and Napa but all of California – you can pick which counties you want to receive notifications. We want to give a huge shout-out to Graton Volunteer Firefighter Evan Jacobs for supporting the Facebook page, Twitter feed, and the new app.