Here’s the latest news from San Francisco Firefighters Local 798…
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Tiny smoke particles could make wildfires particularly harmful to human health
When the San Francisco Bay Area experienced a record 30 consecutive days of worrisome air quality alerts in August and September, Mary Prunicki began taking blood samples from firefighters. The sky had turned orange from nearby wildfires. Thousands of firefighters would spend months battling the blazes, which would eventually scorch more than 4 million acres and kill 31 people. And the damage isn't likely to have stopped there. Prunicki, director of air pollution and health research at Stanford University's Sean N. Parker Center for Allergy and Asthma Research, is studying the blood samples to understand what wildfire smoke does to human health.
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Chief Simon Pang on how San Francisco is transforming policing
Calls for reworking the way law enforcement operates and how it's funded have been heard across our country over the last year in response to numerous acts of police brutality. San Francisco was one of the first cities to actually change its policing model by removing officers from behavioral crisis calls and using unarmed specialists instead. Chief Simon Pang is the section chief of community para-medicine for the San Francisco Fire Department who has been leading its effort to build the “Street Crisis Response Teams” in the Bay area. “It increases our credibility.” Pang tells Ali Velshi that members of these teams are “the gold standard for trauma informed care. It's truly someone who has walked in their shoes before.”
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Paramedic says fire department discriminated against her when she got pregnant
A San Francisco Fire Department paramedic filed a lawsuit this week against The City for gender, pregnancy and lactation discrimination and harassment in the workplace, according to her attorney. The lawsuit alleges that Sarah Perata, an Emergency Medical Services captain, was subjected to derogatory comments and threats of losing her job during and after her 2019 pregnancy. It also alleges the fire department violated labor laws including the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act and others. Perata alleges a superior told her it was a “bad idea” to take maternity leave after she announced her pregnancy. She was told she might not have the same position if she left, according to the lawsuit.
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Video shows vehicle fire, massive traffic jam on Bay Bridge
A vehicle fire was causing delays on the Bay Bridge Saturday night. San Francisco Fire Department has released little information, but video shows the fire being extinguished around 7 p.m. It is unclear if anyone was injured, or what type of vehicle caught fire. It happened on the westbound Interstate 80, the San Francisco-bound, side of the bridge.
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Fire burning near Highway 101 in SF causes delays
A brush fire burning near Highway 101 in San Francisco is causing traffic delays Saturday afternoon. Officials first reported the fire around 5:41 p.m. near hospital curve. They later said the fire spread to Vermont Street and 22nd Street. Video from the Citizen App shows the fire burning near the shoulder off Highway 101.
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Woman, Dog Rescued from Cliff At Fort Funston In San Francisco
A woman and a dog were rescued from a cliff in San Francisco, police the fire department said Tuesday. The cliff rescue happened at Fort Funston on the southwestern edge of the city. The San Francisco Fire Department tweeted at 10:37 a.m. that a dog was being rescued from a location a quarter of the way down a cliff. Minutes later, the department tweeted that an adult was also being rescued. It appeared the dog was off-leash and went over and got stuck about 50 or 60 feet down the ledge. The woman tried to rescue the dog but then got stuck herself and couldn’t make it up or down.
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Invest In Your Safety Now
As City leaders deliberate the budget for Fiscal Years 2020-21 and 2021-22, it is critical to continue providing first-class service and unparalleled patient care. Please take a minute to visit our website and find out how you can Take Action.
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Revival of earthquake commemoration a sign of The City’s emergence from pandemic
A San Francisco tradition resumed Sunday morning, when a small crowd of politicians, firefighters, police and the public gathered before dawn to mark the 115th anniversary of the 1906 earthquake that brought The City to its knees. Those gathered noted that the phoenix that emerged then is alive now, bringing a post-COVID renewal. “We are coming out of this pandemic, and we are coming out stronger than ever,” said Mayor London Breed as she stood in front of Lotta’s Fountain to address the gathering of about 75 people.
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It's time for San Franciscans to think about the next big earthquake
Sunday is the anniversary of one of the great watersheds in Bay Area history — the great earthquake and fire that nearly destroyed San Francisco on April 18, 1906. There is always a ceremony at 5:12 in the morning, the moment when the earthquake struck, at Lotta’s Fountain at Geary, Kearny and Market streets. A small one was scheduled this year because of the pandemic. But why celebrate a disaster 115 years after it happened, especially when all the people who had living memory of the event have passed away? Mostly because the annual event marks not the destruction of San Francisco but its rebirth, a special place that rose from the ashes, like the phoenix, a mythical bird that is one of the symbols of the city.
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When San Francisco burned down - six times in a year and a half
Everyone knows that San Francisco was consumed by flames after the 1906 earthquake. But it’s less widely known that the city was also devastated by a succession of fires during the Gold Rush. No fewer than six destructive conflagrations ravaged the infant city in just 18 months — the greatest number of major fires ever to strike any American city in such a short time. Gold Rush San Francisco was a tinderbox. Most of its flimsy structures were made of canvas, oilcloth or wood, heated and lit by wood stoves and oil-burning lamps, vented by primitive chimneys or flues protruding from canvas walls. Piles of combustible items were everywhere, heavy drinking and cigar smoking were common, and bad actors had ample motivation for arson.
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California COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker
California will adopt an age-based system to vaccinate residents and turn over its distribution to the health insurance company Blue Shield in an effort to speed up what has been among the slowest vaccination rollouts in the country. Meanwhile, the discovery of new variants that may spread more easily, including a mutation that took hold in the Bay Area in December, makes the rollout even more urgent to fix. San Francisco has said it wants to vaccinate all eligible residents by June; at the same time, questions have arisen over why people from out of town can get vaccinated there. Here's the latest on when and where you will be able to get a vaccine across the Bay Area. If you are scheduled for an appointment, here's what to do before and after getting the shot.
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Burn it first. That deprives wildfires of the fuel they need to grow big and dangerous
Dripping small flames from handheld fuel canisters, two dozen trained volunteers began setting fire to 35 acres of dense brush near homes atop a ridgeline rising out of Dry Creek Valley in Sonoma County the other day. They were part of a major push in California’s forested communities to burn overgrown thickets around homes and roads before the state runs headlong into another fire season — one with the potential to surpass last year’s record devastation. Even with the rain that fell Sunday, a dry winter season and worsening drought conditions are narrowing the window to safely light prescribed fires, one of the most efficient methods of creating defensible space in forested areas.
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This massive network of wildfire cameras helps California save lives
As California gears up for what could be another destructive fire season, the state’s firefighting agencies have a powerful tool at their disposal that has gone somewhat unheralded: the largest wildfire camera network in the world. The network consists of more than 700 state-of-the-art cameras that survey fire-prone areas, and provide crucial intel to firefighting agencies and first responders throughout a fire’s life cycle. A public website shows photos snapped every 10 seconds, allowing community members to report smoke and wildfires, and prepare for possible evacuation.
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London Breed reacts to guilty verdict in George Floyd murder, addresses policy changes in SF
San Francisco Mayor London Breed couldn't hold back her emotion when reacting to the three guilty charges for former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the murder of George Floyd. "It felt like a weight had been lifted and also it's very emotional," Breed paused to gather herself. "(It's) almost unbelievable that I was hearing what I was hearing. (This was) one of the first times I felt there was accountability and there was justice. I'm still trying to process it all."
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NBC Bay Area Kicks Off Olympics In S.F. Japantown
With the Tokyo Olympics 100 days away, NBC Bay Area and the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Northern California marked the occasion on April 14 with a celebratory event in San Francisco Japantown’s Peace Plaza. NBC Bay Area’s Raj Mathai, who will be covering the Olympics for the seventh time this year, served as host. Representatives of the Japanese American Religious Federation began the program with a prayer. Participating Olympians were figure skater Kristi Yamaguchi, who won the gold medal in 1992; foil fencer Alexander Massialas, silver medalist in the 2016 Olympics, accompanied by his father and coach, Greg; and breaststroke swimmer Anne Warner Cribbs, gold medalist at the 1959 Pan American Games, who placed in the event at the 1960 Olympics. The athletes presented medallions for courage and dedication in community service to: Capt. Paul Yep, Northern Station, SFPD; Matthew Dea, San Francisco Fire Department; Dr. Mary Mercer, COVID Command Center; Shauna Bogetz, San Francisco Department of Recreation and Parks; and San Francisco Supervisor Dean Preston, whose district includes Japantown.
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Local 798 Hosts Station Stewards Event
On March 27th, Local 798 hosted our annual Station Stewards luncheon at a socially distant outdoor gathering at our Newhall office. Dozens of current and prospective stewards attended the event led by Director Adam Wood. Our program is recognized throughout the IAFF as the model Station Steward program, so much so that a Board Member from Orange County Professional Firefighters Association Local 3631 flew up to learn best practices as they are attempting to establish their own program this year. Due to COVID-19 we had to cancel last year’s event, so it was great to get the group back together to discuss goals for 2021. Special thanks to Adam Wood, Adrienne Sims, Floyd Rollins, Danny Gracia, Sam Gebler, Huck Ramsay, former Director Dan Casey, President Shon Buford, and all participants for helping to make the event a tremendous success.
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Remembering Our Fallen Brothers & Sisters |
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John Blake (Ret.)
Deceased: 4-4-21
Rank: H-2
Robert Banchero (Ret.)
Deceased: 3-19-21
Rank: H-20
John Neil (Ret.)
Deceased: 3-9-21
Rank: H-20
Phil Leanio (Ret.)
Deceased: 3-7-21
Rank: H-40
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Joseph Scannell (Ret.)
Deceased: 2-20-21
Rank: H-50
Robert Gregg (Ret.)
Deceased: 2-6-21
Rank: H-6
David Frisella (Ret.)
Deceased: 2-3-21
Rank: H-50
Michael Vandervort (Ret.)
Deceased: 1-16-21
Rank: H-2
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John Linney (Ret.)
Deceased: 1-15-21
Rank: H-4
Maurice Murray (Ret.)
Deceased: 1-15-21
Rank: H-10
Stanley Rokes (Ret.)
Deceased: 1-12-21
Rank: H-2
Peter Roybal (Ret.)
Deceased: 1-3-21
Rank: H-40
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About Local 798
Local 798 is the labor organization of the proud men and women that serve as Firefighters and emergency medical responders protecting San Francisco. The members of the San Francisco Fire Department rely on Local 798 to focus on the wellbeing and safety of those that protect the lives of others. For more information, visit www.sffdlocal798.org.
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