The Roles of Agencies That Could Be Involved in a Fire Investigation

There are multiple agencies that can work with fire investigators. Each of these can either help with preservation of life, collection of evidence and finding the cause of the fire as well as helping fix any damage made and try to prevent it. Each of the agencies that will be mentioned help out with these. Police The police are usually the first people on the scene other than the fire services, depending on how long it will take for the fire trucks to arrive.

When they are on the scene to ensure nobody gets too close to the fire and interview any witnesses that could be there.

The police officer that arrives may be an arson investigator depending on the local police force. Crime Scene Investigators The crime scene investigators are involved with examining the scene of the fire. This is to collect, enhance and recover and evidence at the scene. While doing this the need to ensure that they keep a secure audit trial to ensure that the evidence can be used in a court of law.

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Each member of the CSI’s team can be asked by a court of law to appear as an expert witness to explain what the found at the scene.

Specialised dog units Each of the dogs that are in this unit are specially trained to do a particular job, such as locating people, find any useable evidence and smell any accelerants that are used. An arson dog can search a large area in half the time it would normally take the average person.

this is due to their sense of smell and their ability to cover a lot of ground quickly and easily. In area searches, the dogs are used to search large areas outside of the scene quickly, saving time as there could be evidence left behind by the arsonist.

In crowd searches, the dogs are used to sniff out arsonists in crowds because many arsonists like to return to the scene of their work to admire the fire. Another way that the dogs are used is by walking one of the dogs through a crowd. The dog might be able to sniff out the accelerants that could have been used on the arsonist’s clothes. This will not put someone in jail but the suspect can be placed in a line up and sniffed out by the dog. Clothing searches are completed once a suspect has been identified. The dog is used to search the suspect's clothing so that he can zoom in on a spot or two on the clothes.

Forensic Scientist The main area of there expertise is to analyse any evidence and determine which, if any, type of accelerant was used. It is similar to the examination of crime scenes as both must be preserved and evidence collected and analysed, but when examining a fire scene numerous additional difficulties and dangers are presented. The investigation normally includes surveying any damage to scene to establish the origin of the fire and establishing the cause. Pathologist The main job of this is to determine the cause of death to a person.

In the case of a fire, they can determine if a person died before, during or after a fire. Gas and Electricity Advisor These are needed to examine the scene of the fire to determine if it is safe to enter. This is by turning any gas off and that the electrics are safe. They also ensure that there are no live or hanging wires that can cause harm to the fire fighters in any form. Insurance Loss Adjuster Insurance companies deal with any claims that are made due to fire and smoke damage. Their main job is writing report on what damage has been made.

This could be for people who are insured as well as people who are not. Each report made is written by an insurance loss adjuster licensed by the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority. Health and safety executive Health and safety executives investigate fires. They are normally concerned with injury to person and in case of death they investigate any workplace related death to determine if it will affect the workplace and prevent another related death from happening.