The Fire Service Council will soon introduce home fire certificates as a way of preventing domestic fire outbreaks in the country.

This was disclosed when Chief Fire Officer Dr. Albert Brown Gaisie visited the Ashanti Region following recent fire outbreaks that claimed 11 lives within a month and destroyed properties worth thousands of cedis.

Dr. Gaisie described the situation as “unfortunate” and “unacceptable” while addressing fire officers in the region. He advised the officers to liaise with the assemblies to inspect the fire safety requirements of every home.

“We are soon going to introduce the home fire certificate. The council will soon approve of the guidelines for the home fire service certificate. Each district will have to take and liaise with the assembly to ensure that there is data on premises...we inspect premises, evaluate and assess their fire safety requirements,” he stated.

“We need to advise on evacuation, exit drills in the homes, we look at first aid appliances and extinguishers. We need to look at early warning systems like fire detectors, we need to look at electrical systems, assembly points, sources of fire hydrants, sources of water and simulation exercises towards evacuation. These are the things that we would have to look at… at the end of the day ascertain the safety condition of homes… It will be so reasonable that every citizen of this country should be able to have some information regarding their personal safety.”

He also tasked fire officers to act to forestall the occurrence of fires.

“Let us be more proactive. We should move from reactiveness to pro-activeness. Don’t let us wait for the fires to occur only to sound the sirens, we should come out with early warning systems and prevent the fires from occurring,” he advised.

“We should leave the comfort of our fire stations…and ensure that we educate and improve upon fire safety management of the people… We should eschew the unnecessary rumour mongering, unnecessary unproductive attitudes, and then focus on how we can prevent the fires from occurring.”