What type of material is involved? For example, is it a solid, liquid or gas? Have we planned for a response involving the material? What resources are currently assigned?.What type of environment are we responding to? For example, is this incident outdoors or indoors? What are the concerns for life safety in this area? What potential exposures are of concern?.There are several questions to consider in this process: We attempt to process the information and form an early idea of what has taken place, the current conditions, and the resources we may need to respond to the incident. Dispatch information allows us to form the initial impression of the incident. The incident size-up begins when the call is initially dispatched. With that in mind, let’s break down the overall process into three steps: 1) early impression, 2) research-driven information and 3) on-scene analysis. As all fire officers know, the size up of an incident becomes more effective with the level of knowledge and skill of the firefighter. NFPA 472 states that emergency responders trained to the hazardous materials operations level should be able to “survey the incident to identify the containers and materials involved, determine whether hazardous materials/WMD have been released and evaluate the surrounding conditions.” 3 steps to a complete hazmat size-upįirefighters trained to the operations level should be able to conduct a size-up and report the findings through an on-scene report. The majority of the time, the first-due unit will contain emergency responders trained to the awareness or operations level. Most fire-based hazmat teams will not be the first unit responding to a hazmat emergency. Hazmat response teams are structured differently throughout the country. But how adequate is our training on conducting size-ups of hazardous materials incidents? What information should be included in such training to ensure that our crews have an efficient and effective response to the incident? First-due size-up Firefighters spend countless hours each year conducting on-scene size-ups of fire-related incidents.

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