This research determined, under New Zealand operational conditions, the physiological workload of some rural firefighting tasks. At the same time, the research measured fire suppression productivity under real operational conditions. The project necessitated the development of a novel suite of data collection equipment worn by the firefighter to record visual, physiological and geographical information relevant to firefighting.
Results from the research indicate that rural fire suppression (and ignition) tasks are indeed
physically demanding. Average heart rates in excess of 120 beats per minute were recorded in most tasks (water and hand tool mop up). Periods of extremely heavy workload with heart rates above 150 beats per minute were experienced in all tasks.
An unanticipated benefit of intensive data collection from wearable devices at fires was that it provides excellent training material. In addition, a method was developed using Google Earth, to present the path of the firefighter in a 3D terrain model. This allows for a much greater understanding of physical environment in which fire are fought in New Zealand.
Now that the data collection ensemble is mature the emphasis will be on enlarging the data set with data collection at training and more real fires.