Northern Territory Fire and Rescue Service

Northern Territory Fire & Rescue Service
	Logo of the NTFRS
Established	1941
Headquarters	St Stuart Park, Northern Territory
Membership	11 Permanent stations; 16 Volunteer stations;
Director	Steve Rothwell
Ministry	Police, Fire and Emergency Services
Website	Official website

Northern Territory Fire and Rescue Service, or NTFRS, (in conjunction with Bushfires NT^[1]) is the primary provider of fire and rescue services throughout the 1.35 million square km Northern Territory of Australia. It is made up of 27 fire stations, 16 being staffed by volunteer brigade units, 5 being staffed 24 hours a day by career fire fighters, and the remainder by a mix of career and auxiliary fire fighters.

The NTFRS is made up approximately 180 permanent staff working in the regional centres of Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine, Nhulunbuy, Yulara and Jabiru, as well as 54 part-time auxiliaries and approximately 250 volunteers.^[2]

The NTFRS is part of the NT Government "Tri-Service", Northern Territory Police, Fire and Emergency Services, or NTPFES. The CEO of the NTPFES and Commissioner of Northern Territory Police in 2022 was Jamie Chalker, APM. The NTPFES falls under the portfolio of the Minister for Police, Fire and Emergency Services.^[3]

History

Unlike many other Australian brigades the NTFRS is relatively young. The first permanent Chief Fire Officer took command of a newly formed Darwin civil brigade on 31 October 1941, however following the Bombing of Darwin by Japanese forces during World War II, fire fighting duties were assumed by the military after general evacuation of the civilian population. This made The Northern Territory Fire Service the only capital city Australian Fire Service to serve under enemy fire. It was not until 1946 that the Darwin civil brigade was reformed, with another small brigade formed in the large regional centre of Alice Springs in 1949.

The original Darwin fire station and fire service headquarters was located in Darwin city on Daly street, this station was closed and the Iliffe street station was opened in Oct 1988. Serving outer Darwin was the Winnellie Fire station opened in 1970–71, which was closed with the opening of the Palmerston Fire station in the newly formed satellite city of Palmerston in 1984. Serving the rural area of Darwin is the Humpty Doo station that was opened in 2005. To better serve the Northern suburbs of Darwin the old Casuarina station was closed and the new Marrara fire station was opened on 14 June 2007.

The history of the NTFRS was researched and written by former Assistant Commissioner of the NT Police Bill Wilson.^[4]

Organisational structure

Director/Chief Fire Officer – Mark Spain
Deputy Chief Fire Officer Territory Operations – Stephen Sewell
Assistant Chief Fire Officer Strategy and Capability – Joshua Fischer
District Officer Fire Safety Command
District Officer Training and Development Command – Ian Lockley
District Officer Darwin Command
District Officer Southern Command – David Letheby
District Officer Northern Command – Gerry Seville
District Officer Special Operations

Chief Fire Officers

Jul 2016 – current Mark Spain
Sep 2011 – Mar 2016 Steve Rothwell
Jan 2005 – Jan 2011 Greg Nettleton
Jan 2004 – Jan 2005 Thomas Konieczny
Jan 2002 – Jan 2004 Daryl Pepper
Jul 1992 – Jan 2002 Ian Rae
Jul 1990 – Jul 1992 Kenneth Copeland
Oct 1986 – Jul 1990 Geoffrey Skerritt
Oct 1984 – Oct 1986 Jeffrey Godfredson
Jul 1983 – Oct 1984 Alan Ferris
Jul 1981 – Jul 1983 William Henderson
Aug 1967 – Jul 1981 Peter Holtham
Jun 1956 – Jul 1967 George Robbins

Fire Stations

Full Time Stations

Volunteer stations

Alice Springs Rural (VFB), Bathurst Island (VFB), Virginia Bees Creek (VFB), Howard Springs (VFB), Humpty Doo (VFB), Koolpinyah (VFB), Larrimah (VFB), Yirrkala (VFB), Adelaide River (FERG), Bachelor (FERG), Borroloola (FERG), Elliott (FERG), Mataranka (FERG), Pine Creek (FERG), Timber Creek (FERG)

VFB – Volunteer Fire Brigade

FERG – Fire Emergency Response Group

Fleet and resources

NTFRS Vehicles include a new fleet of Scania medium and heavy pumpers, and older medium and heavy Freightliner pumps, an aerial appliance, numerous tankers and grass fire units, plus rescue, command and utility vehicles. The NTFRS also has trailers for Fire Investigation, Rapid Decontamination and a BA trailer for refilling SCBA Cylinders in the field.

Due to the relatively small size of the NTFRS, rather than having dedicated specialised sections, general firefighters are trained in various disciplines, including: HAZMAT, USAR, Road Crash Rescue, Paramedic, School Based Education, and Wildfire.

Callsign Structure

The NTFRS uses a callsign system for appliances, designed to identify a vehicles class and which brigade it belongs to over the radio. The callsign features the brigades name, followed by a numerical sequence, with the first number in that sequence identifying the vehicles class, and the numbers following identify that vehicles own number within that class. For example, the callsign "Alice Springs 915" tells us the vehicles is an Isuzu Tanker, belonging to the Alice Springs Fire Station, and is the 15th vehicle within the Isuzu Tanker class. All vehicles within the NTFRS are required to have the numerical sequence printed on the roof of the vehicle, allowing for easier identification from waterbombing aircraft deployed at bushfires.

This table shows how the NTFRS has allocated numerical callsigns. The NTFRS doesn't use the number "5" for any callsigns.


Number	Vehicle Class	Example Callsign
1	Command / Utility Vehicle	Darwin 107
2	Light Composite Pumper	Yulara 27
3	Grassfire Unit	Emily Hills 340
4	Foam Pumper	Alice Springs 47
6	Aerial Appliance	Darwin 64
7	Specialist Appliance	Palmerston 72
8	Rescue Tender	Tennant Creek 84
9	Isuzu Tanker	Jabiru 97

References

^ Bushfires NT
^ NTFRS Staff
^ Chief Minister Archived 18 February 2010 at the Wayback Machine
^ NTFRS History

External links

[1] Bushfires NT

[2] NTFRS Staff

[3] Chief Minister Archived 18 February 2010 at the Wayback Machine

[4] NTFRS History

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

v t e Fire services in Australia
National organisations	Australasian Fire Authorities Council
New South Wales	Fire & Rescue New South Wales New South Wales Rural Fire Service Section 44 powers Community Fire Units List of fire stations
Victoria	Metropolitan Fire Brigade (former) Fire Rescue Victoria Country Fire Authority Forest Fire Management Victoria List of fire stations
Queensland	Queensland Fire and Emergency Services List of fire stations
Western Australia	Department of Fire & Emergency Services
South Australia	Metropolitan Fire Service Country Fire Service Emergency Fire Service (former) List of fire stations
Tasmania	Tasmania Fire Service
Australian Capital Territory	ACT Fire and Rescue ACT Rural Fire Service Community Fire Units
Northern Territory	Northern Territory Fire and Rescue Service

v t e Northern Territory
Topics	Crime Energy Fire and Rescue Service Flag Geography History Local Government Police Sport Symbols Territory Government Territory Parliament
Regions	Alice Springs Region Arnhem Land Barkly Tableland Darwin Region Katherine Region
Major settlements	Alice Springs Darwin Katherine Nhulunbuy Palmerston Tennant Creek List of places in the Northern Territory by population