Fire marshal training is not a “one-stop product”, industry body the Fire Prevention Association Southern Africa (FPASA) says, emphasising that the suite of training tools and programmes available reflects real-world risk profiles and requirements, rather than rigid adherence to generic compliance checklists.

“The role of the fire marshal is to manage or mitigate the fire risk in the workplace, understand the installed fire-related safety equipment and ensure people-preparedness,” FPASA head of technical Kyle Jordaan states.

However, these aspects can differ significantly across workplaces, hence the association’s promoting that fire marshals should attend competency-based training and continuous professional development as opposed to once-off certification.

The core competencies that modern fire marshals should have, notes Jordaan, pertain to the understanding that fire places people, productivity, facilities and equipment at risk.

With this understanding as a starting point, the safeguarding of employees’ safety is enhanced using fire risk identification and assessment; an understanding of the basics of detection and suppression system functionality; and foregrounding emergency coordination and evacuation plans.

“In higher-risk environments, this responsibility extends to understanding hazardous materials, battery systems, machinery hazards and how these could affect a fire, which, in turn, necessitates site-specific emergency response procedures,” he explains.

Consequently, training should move beyond “what to do when the alarm sounds” towards understanding how systems behave and why they activate, especially in higher-risk environments.

Moreover, the increased exposure to intelligent detection principles, system feedback and fault reporting, as well as the interactions among detection, suppression, building management and access control systems, have further enabled fire marshals to make faster and more informed decisions during incidents and in assisting with early fault identification before systems fail.

However, the most basic focus of a fire marshal, Jordaan says, is rooted in identifying and then limiting the risk of fires.

As such, the association is advocating for risk-informed, scenario-based, practical training that reflects the actual environments in which the marshals operate, with a primary focus on human behaviour in emergencies, decision-making under stress and site- specific risks.

Best practices include yearly refresher training; regular evacuation and incident drills; post-drill reviews with lessons learned, resulting in updated training content; and new reviews and updates when risks change, says the FPASA.

“The fire marshal of the future will increasingly function as a risk-aware coordinator; however, the basic role should never be forgotten.

“While technology will continue to advance, the need for trained, competent individuals on site will remain central to effective fire safety,” Jordaan concludes.