Firefighter Rescue and the RIT Officer
James Crawford
Saturday June 14, 2025
10:00 AM – 11:30 AM
This program is designed to further educate fire departments that are trained in the basic concept of rapid intervention. The program will cover RIT advanced search techniques including search goals, pre-search procedures, MAYDAY procedures, conducting the search, utilizing search ropes, specialized equipment, and thermal imaging for RIT. The role of the RIT officer will be discussed and best practices for this position will be identified and elaborated on. The speaker will also discuss his on-scene experience with two LODD incidents and several near-miss incidents while serving on the Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire. This class will assist rapid intervention teams in reaching the next level in search and RIT officer procedures while dealing with a downed firefighter.
James Crawford
James K. Crawford is the Assistant Fire Chief for Midway Fire Rescue in Pawleys Island, SC. He retired as the Assistant Fire Chief of the Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire in 2010 after 20 years of service. Jim is also a retired Deputy Fire Chief of Operations for the 171st Air Refueling Wing Fire Department, Pennsylvania Air National Guard after 23 years of military service and is a graduate of the Air Force Fire Academy spending four years as an active-duty firefighter. Jim is the past Deputy Chief of Training for the Pennsylvania USAR Strike Team where he also served as a Rescue Manager. He is a life member and past Fire Chief of the Ben Avon Volunteer Fire Company, PA. in the suburbs of Pittsburgh and has over 50 years’ experience in the career and volunteer fire service. Jim was the ISFSI Fire Instructor of the Year recipient in 2002 for his aggressive national efforts in firefighter rescue training. In 2003, he assisted the Department of Homeland Security and the US Fire Administration in developing their in-depth technical report titled, “Rapid Intervention Teams and How to Avoid Needing them”. Chief Crawford instructs nationally on the subject of firefighter rescue operations and holds several national fire service certifications. He has been the lead instructor of hands-on training at numerous conferences including Firehouse Expo and FDIC teaching firefighter rescue programs. Jim has an associate degree in Fire Science from Columbia Southern University. He is the owner of the training group Rapid Intervention Training Associates and an instructor with the training group On Scene Training Associates (OSTA).
