The alarm sounds, the giant bay doors open and Huntsville Fire & Rescue (HFR) is off on another run. From day to day or even year to year, that part of the job doesn’t change much.
Whether it’s 3 o’clock in the afternoon or 3 o’clock in the morning, the HFR crews are ready and responding to calls by the thousands each year.
It’s generally summed up in one small word with one big meaning: Training. From chiefs to captains to firefighters, training is constant.
“If you think about it, HFR has to be prepared to deal with multiple hazards,” Chief Howard McFarlen said. “House fires, car fires, tornadoes, mass shooting, a 15-car pileup. We have to be prepared.”
In 2025, a point of training emphasis was on mid-rise fires in buildings four to seven stories in height. More of those types of buildings – whether multi-family or office – are being constructed in Huntsville. HFR brought in experts from across the country to provide insight.
“We learned a lot from them,” McFarlen said. “We also opened it up to neighboring (fire) departments.”
The benefit is that not only all HFR stations but nearby departments will be operating from the same playbook and implementing the same tactics to create a wholly efficient response.
“You don’t want to have two different strategies,” McFarlen said.
The training is critical because the environments in which they are fighting fires and the materials involved in the fires are changing. McFarlen said these changes cause fires to burn hotter and faster due to the abundance of synthetic materials. Additionally, the change in structure types and construction practices require additional time to gain access to and get water on the fire. It gets more complicated if you’re on, say, the sixth floor instead of a one or two family dwelling which has been the primary residential construction type until recent years.
“We’ve had to increase the size of our hoses and nozzles to facilitate getting the water flow that we need at the higher elevations involved in this new type of construction. Additionally, we need to be able to apply more water per minute to overcome the heat produced by newer construction materials and synthetic material in order to put the fire out,” McFarlen said. “With that comes different tactics of how we’re going to stretch those lines to where they need to go.”
“And then you find a balance of search and rescue versus putting water on the fire. Search and rescue is always the top priority. However, extinguishing the fire stops other lives from being endangered and stops further property damage. Fire hose deployment can often be accomplished while conducting the initial search which often includes locating the seat of the fire. Due to the increase in mid-rise style construction, fire crews have to begin searches without the safety of a charged fire hose nearby due to the extended time it takes to deploy, stretch and charge a fire hose to upper floors.”
HFR also went through an organizational change in 2025. The department expanded from four districts to five – which translates to having more districts chiefs available to respond and supervise scenes that HFR is working. While the district chief will respond to incidents within their district and act as the commander, a second district chief is also needed to respond and act as a safety officer on working structure fires and other complex incidents.
“His job is to make sure that crews are working as safely as possible and that hazards are identified and mitigated to the extent possible,” McFarlen said. “He is looking at not only the tactics of putting the fire out, but is also providing a second set of eyes for the district chief in command to make sure everyone is safe.”
In 2026, the training will continue with Greene County, Ga., Fire Chief Rodney Wiggins holding classes for three days in January on vehicle mounted refrigerated awareness. It’s a personal project for Wiggins, whose battalion chief died in 2024 when a refrigerated truck exploded.
“He has a program where he dove deep into refrigerated trucks and their hazards and this is what we found,” McFarlen said. “So we wanted to bring him in and take advantage of that research and the lessons learned from real world response.”
