The recent wildfires in Los Angeles are a somber reminder of the ability of fire to destroy lives and property.
Closer to home, winter in Indiana is a prime season for house fires caused by blocked chimneys, sparks from fireplaces, or the use of inappropriate heating sources such as ovens. In 2024, 77 Hoosiers died in residential fires, including eight in counties surrounding Monroe County. In January, a well-known Monroe County business owner lost his life after his house caught fire.
The Bloomington Fire Department’s four-member Fire Prevention Division works year-round to reduce the risk of fires in the city. Along with the rest of the fire department, they promote fire safety efforts through education, engineering controls, and enforcement.
Those who ‘fight the fire without water’
Captain Garrett Greathouse | Photo by Nick Bauer
“The best fire prevention is early education,” says Captain Garrett Greathouse, at Bloomington’s Fire Station #1 on East 4th Street, assigned to Truck 1. As a “truckie,” Greathouse knows the dangerous consequences of structure fires firsthand.
“We are the ones that fight the fire without water,” Greathouse said, describing the Truck 1 crew’s duties. “We are breaching and breaking doors. We go in to search for people and pets.” The engine crews extinguish the fire.
“As a captain, my job is to make sure my crews go home the next morning,” Greathouse said. “Any kind of emergency can tilt the scales. Anything can happen. But when there’s prevention and that fire doesn’t happen in the first place, everybody’s safer. Everybody gets home then.”
Despite the dangers, firefighters are ready to go into action to save life and property if a fire does occur. “What I take pride in is the fact that somebody is dependent on us on their worst day. Anybody that’s calling 911, it can be one of the worst days of their life. And they depend on us. So I take a lot of pride in that,” Greathouse said.
‘Be attentive everywhere’
Fire Prevention Officer Tom Figolah | Photo by Nick Bauer
Fire Prevention Officer Tom Figolah focuses on education. He talks about fire prevention, fire safety, and evacuation plans with members of the Bloomington community by visiting places such as grade schools, Indiana University, businesses, and senior centers. Figolah knows he cannot reach every resident in person.
“It’s important to say, ‘Spread the word. What you guys learned, just don’t leave it here with you,’” he said. “The people I do talk to have family members, co-workers, and others they can talk to. There’s information out there that not everybody has that I’d like to get out there.”
Figolah encourages the residents he speaks with to be attentive everywhere, such as their workplace or a friend’s house. They can identify hazards and missing smoke alarms and then take steps to make the places they frequent safer for everyone.
“We’re a resource here. If there’s a business that wants to have someone talk to them about fire safety in the workplace or evacuation plans, I’m here to do that,” Figolah said. “I can help businesses do fire drills. I am glad to talk to neighborhood groups as well as businesses and schools.”
Bloomington’s fire marshal
The second aspect of fire prevention is engineering controls, involving building designs and mechanical systems that reduce the risk of fires. Engineering controls also make buildings safer for occupants and firefighters in the event of a fire. Tim Clapp performs new-construction plan reviews for all commercial projects in the city in his role as Bloomington’s fire marshal. Without Clapp’s signature, a new commercial building cannot obtain a certificate of occupancy. He works with the Monroe County Building Department to do a life safety-plan review and ensure the drawings and plans for each project meet or exceed state building codes.
Fire Marshal Tim Clapp | Photo by Nick Bauer
“We’re looking at the building as a whole, anything exterior or interior,” Clapp explained. “We’re looking at access and egress. We’re looking at devices such as sprinklers. We’re also looking at the stairways and approaches and all that.”
The building code is the minimum standard. Part of Clapp’s job is to use his more than four decades of experience in the fire service and almost twenty years as Bloomington’s fire marshal to guide projects toward a safer design. Simple changes in the planning stage can pay off in the event of an emergency.
Clapp cited a discussion he had with a civil engineer about the location of an exterior device the fire department would use to hook up to a building’s sprinkler system. The project drawings Clapp reviewed did not leave enough space for the fire apparatus, so the first crew on scene would block access to the hookup for the second crew. As Clapp said, “The fire department knows how our operations work for fighting a fire, and we make suggestions.”
Clapp has built relationships with local building professionals so they can collaborate to maximize safety and fire prevention.
“Our criteria we have to meet is the Indiana Code. What we try to explain to everybody — architects, engineers, and contractors — is the code is the minimum. So if you’re striving to meet the minimum, your goals aren’t very high,” Clapp said. He works with these individuals as he reviews building plans and discusses any required or suggested improvements.
Enforcing fire codes
“The best fire prevention is early education.” —Captain Garrett Greathouse | Photo by Nick Bauer
Enforcement of fire codes is the third component of fire prevention. Commercial buildings in the city are subject to routine inspections, which are the primary duties of the department’s deputy fire marshals, Jeff Yutmeyer and Chuck Cohenour. The inspectors visit buildings to check for any number of problems that could cause a fire, such as improper use of extension cords, and conditions that would make a fire more dangerous to the building’s occupants, like blocked or locked exit doors and fire systems that are not current or functioning.
The deputy fire marshals focus on safety and education more than on fines and penalties, which are rarely issued unless a business refuses to take corrective measures or has failed to correct the issue after multiple follow-up inspections. Yutmeyer and Cohenour consider telling property owners to fix hazardous conditions more as educational opportunities rather than demands for action to be taken.
Clapp said they tell property owners, “If you don’t do this now and a fire happens, it’s going to cost you a whole lot more money than it will to just fix it.” Inspections are an important way to keep property owners thinking about the importance of fire prevention.
In August 2024, Clapp visited IU Health Bloomington Hospital to inspect a space that had been remodeled. During his visit, he noticed that patients on cots or beds in hallways were blocking an exit. He alerted the hospital, which moved the patients.
Scouting the enemy
Routine inspections serve a second purpose for the fire department. The inspectors make notes about each building in a computer system the fire crews have available en route to and on scene at a fire. These notes help the fire crews understand the details and unique areas or characteristics of a building to inform the plan of attack against a fire. Bloomington is a mix of new and older buildings. Property owners repurpose older buildings by splitting them into different levels and modifying floor plans for commercial and residential use. This creates the potential for unexpected problems like staircases walled off at the top.
“On a crew level,” Greathouse said, “we all go out on pre-plans to visit hot spots, older buildings, and certain construction that doesn’t adapt well in a fire behavior. We highlight those first. It is a scouting trip — scouting our enemy, so we know what we are facing before a fire happens.”
The department uses each fire that occurs as a learning opportunity. All members of the fire prevention division are fire investigators. “We’re the guys that are left there trying to figure out what happened,” Clapp said. “What we do is not glorious. We’re there after the fact and it’s dark and cold and wet. We try to minimize the amount of afters that we have to be at. There’s nothing colder than a fire scene after the fire’s out, here in January and it’s three o’clock in the morning.”
The causes they find in fire investigations influence the inspections and educational efforts of the department in the future. “We can’t prove a negative,” Clapp said. “So if a fire doesn’t happen, we’re doing our job.”
