Introduction
Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service (NFRS) asked Operational Research in Health Ltd (ORH) to undertake a Community Risk Review and Assessment of Risk to support the planning of resourcing across Nottinghamshire.
The NFRS Community Risk Management Plan (CRMP) sets out the appropriate level of resources relative to risk. Prior to the development of their next CRMP, NFRS require a Fire Cover Review that will identify the appropriate level of resources to meet the risk across the service area.
ORH has significant experience of working with fire and rescue services and other emergency services to deliver an evidence base for options for change.
Scope
The scope items for this project are summarised below and on the following slide:
Operational Analysis
- Data Collection - Liaising with NFRS to collect necessary data for all items of the review for the period, including: historical incidents, status change, station/crewing information and GIS data.
- Analysis of Current Profile - Undertaking a comprehensive analytical review of historical incidents and crewing to understand demand trends, vehicle availability and response performance.
- Review of Response Standards - Review the current response standard of attending all incidents within an average of 8 minutes not including call handling times.
Results to be broken down as follows:
- All incidents
- All incidents with data of AFA attendances at hospitals and prisons removed
- Breakdown of performance against each incident type, P1, P2, AFA etc. (all incidents)
- Breakdown of performance against each incident type, P1, P2, AFA etc. With data of AFA attendances at hospitals and prisons removed (data removed)
Model Setup
- Model Validation - Building optimisation and simulation models for NFRS to assess potential options for change.
Optimisation Modelling
- NFRS-wide Optimisation Modelling using existing locations - To determine the optimal deployment of NFRS appliances at existing fire station locations.
Viability and location optimisation for Stockhill and Arnold fire stations, both stations are earmarked for capital work during the next CRMP life cycle
- NFRS-wide Greenfield Modelling - Optimise stations on a ‘blank canvas’ basis to understand the ideal configuration of stations, independent of current locations.
Identify theoretically optimal locations of stations to achieve response standards based on current and future demand and risk:
- Scenario 1 – NFRS only, no consideration to over border mobilisations
- Scenario 2 – NFRS only, taking account of OB response times with Derbyshire FRS (DFRS) - Make some sensible assumptions about DFRS Pumps
Specials
- Review of Specialist Appliances - Specialist Rescue Units:
- Scenario 1 – Maintain current provision of 2 Specialist Rescue Units (1 SRU primary capability working at height / line rescue, 1 SRU primary capability water rescue / power boat rescue. Both SRU can support each other at line or water rescue, both appliances have animal rescue and heavy rescue (HGV RTC) capability)
- Scenario 2 – Removal of 1 SRU, with the remaining SRU capable of responding to working at height / line rescue, water rescue / power boat rescue, animal rescue and heavy rescue (HGV RTC)
- Scenario 3 – Removal of both SRU, replacing them with individual vehicles, therefore, one vehicle for working at height / line rescue, one vehicle for water rescue / power boat rescue, one vehicle for animal rescues, one vehicle for heavy rescue (HGV RTC), identify optimal locations for each vehicle type based on capability / incident type
- Identify optimal location
- Are 2 ALPs required based on risk & demand
- Identify optimal location
- Identify optimal location
Prevention
- Risk modelling - Targeting high risk people - Undertake a county wide assessment of risk to inform a targeted approach to prevention activities over the lifecycle of CRMP 2025-28
- Risk modelling - Road safety - Analysis of RTCs across the county to inform road safety activities
Protection
- Risk modelling - Targeted high-risk buildings - Understand and use NFRS categorisation of high-risk and commercial buildings.
Data Collection
To fulfil the objectives of this project, ORH collected two key data items from NFRS:
- 5 years (January 2019 to December 2023) of CAD workload data to enable a detailed analysis of the service, in terms of demand, response and performance. All analysis of demand presented are based on full 5 years, unless stated otherwise. The analysis on Response and Performance is based on 2 years only (January 2022 to December 2023), to reflect recent operations.
- 2 years (January 2022 to December 2023) of vehicle availability data to allow for a complete understanding of availability by callsign and time of day. All slides on availability are based on this sample period.
These two data items feed directly into ORH’s model validation process described on the next page.
Model Validation
The purpose of the model validation process was to ensure that ORH’s simulation model reflects the real-life behaviour of NFRS appliances.
There are a number of stages involved in preparing a validated model. A detailed understanding of the manner in which the service functions is required (gained through data analysis and consultation), and this is combined with a sophisticated travel time calibration process.
ORH’s simulation model takes into account temporal variations in demand and operational parameters, and the model validation process includes the calibration of travel times by time of day to ensure that any effects of varying travel conditions are replicated.
For the model validation, most analysed operational parameters used the sample January 2021 to December 2023. A five-year sample (January 2019 to December 2023) of historical incident locations was used to ensure a robust sample.
There was a close correspondence between the model and the actual analysed position. The model could therefore be used with confidence to explore the effects of changes in operational parameters, such as crewing and station deployments.