Bridgend Fire and Station is located on Angel Street, Bridgend directly opposite the Ogwr river. It was opened in 1964 and despite some changes still retains its original form.The station is operated via two types of duty systems providing 24/7 service 365 days of the year. The primary duty system is Wholetime whereby the station is operated by Fire-fighters working on one of four ‘Watches’ coloured Blue, Red, White or Green. And the Retained Duty System whereby Fire-fighters, living within five minutes of the Station, provide an ‘on-call’ service.
All personnel who serve at the Bridgend Station support the key values of Prevention, Protection and Response.
Prevention:This key value supports the education of local residents in the dangers of fire and road traffic hazards. As well as general fire safety messages for the adult population, more than 50 Key stage 1 & 2 school groups received educational awareness on the dangers of fire. Crews also currently complete 48 visits a year to high risk premises, ensuring operational readiness should an emergency situation arise.
Protection:The Staff at the Station are continually striving to identify the more vulnerable in the Community in order to provide free Home Fire Safety Risk Assessments whereby advice and guidance is given to ensure homes are assessed for the dangers of fire.
Response:Bridgend Fire Station responded to over 800 emergency calls in 2010/11. These calls included property fires, road traffic collisions, grass & refuse fires to incidents involving hazardous materials. The station also responds to special service calls such as rescues from water, cliffs, flooding of properties and animal rescues.
Community Engagement:Being a part of the community is one to the key roles of the SWF&RS. The Bridgend Station is always open to the public, and we encourage you to drop by to discuss any fire related concerns you may have. Along with being an operational focal point, there are many outreach programs and services the Bridgend Station provides to the community.
Station Commander Phil Pinches is a member of various teams within BCB working to reduce instances of deliberate fire setting within the different Wards in Bridgend.
The Bridgend Fire-fighters provide many presentations to the various groups & organisations within BCB which are aimed at reducing the instances of fires in the home and road traffic collisions.
The Bridgend fire crews support the Pass Plus road safety scheme, a program aimed at 17 -25 year olds and designed to give greater educational awareness of the risk and hazards associated with becoming a young driver. Firefighters attend and deliver a Fire Service perspective on dealing with the consequences of a road traffic collision. Our dedicated crews also work to support the delivery of the road safety message through partnership with the Bridgend Road Safety officers.
Participating in youth education is a primary focus for the Fire Service, and we offer numerous school programs. All Key Stage 1 & 2 year groups will receive Fire Safety Education designed to match the national school curriculum. An additional program, Fire Watch, is an initiative aimed at reducing arson and deliberate fire setting, in and around school buildings. The Fire Watch programme is being supported in:
Furthermore, all schools within the Bridgend area will receive an annual Arson Vulnerability Assessment, designed to provide guidance to the manager responsible for fire safety at each site.
A regular update is provided every two weeks on Bridge FM by the Station Commander to discuss local and topical fire related issues.
In conjunction with the local ambulance service, the station currently operates as a holding area for an ambulance resource to readily respond to incidents from a location close to the centre of town.
Vision: The operational fire crews will continue in their development of the prevention and protection role within the community. Through this positive engagement we will assist in reducing the response needs of the Fire and Rescue Service to emergency situations.
“The most effective Fire and Rescue Service is one that never needs to be mobilised”