The goals of firefighting are (in order of priority):
Save life
Save property
Save the environment
As such, the skills required for safe operations are regularly practiced during training evaluations throughout a firefighter's career. In the United States, the preeminent fire training and standards organization is the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). Often initial firefighting skills are taught during a local, regional, or state approved fire academy.[1] Depending on the requirements of a department, additional skills and certifications such as technical rescue and pre-hospital medicine may also be taught at this time.
Firefighters work closely with other emergency response agencies, most particularly the police and emergency medical service, and their role may overlap with both. Fire investigators or fire marshals usually work for a fire department to investigate the cause of a fire. If the fire was caused by arson or negligence, this means that their work will overlap with law enforcement. In fact, some fire marshals in the United States have powers of arrest. Firefighters also frequently provide some degree of emergency medical service, in addition to working with full-time paramedics.
The basic tasks of firefighters include: firefighting, fire prevention, rescue, basic first aid and investigations. Firefighting is further broken down into skills which include size-up, extinguishing, ventilation, salvage and overhaul. Wildland firefighting includes size-up, containment, extinguishment, and mop up. Search and Rescue, which has already been mentioned, is performed early in any fire scenario and many times is in unison with extinguishing and ventilation.