Examining wildland fire fighter candidate pass rates over five years post-implementation on a newly-developed physical employment standard1

BACKGROUND: To assess the post-implementation impact of the Canadian Type 1 Wildland Fire Fighter (WFF) Fitness Test Circuit (WFX-FIT), a retrospective descriptive analysis of anonymized aggregate data collected between 2012-2016 was conducted. OBJECTIVES: The objectives were to examine the pass rates of Type 1 WFF in each fire jurisdiction and on the standard for exchanging Type 1 WFF between agencies, the interagency exchange standard, by age group and sex and to propose what other information could be of value in assessing the effectiveness of implementing a physical employment standard. METHODS: Frequencies and pass rate percentages were compared by sex and age groups (<40 years, ≥40 years). RESULTS: Between 2012-2016, pass rates for all participants on the jurisdictional and interagency exchange performance standards improved from 93.2% to 95.6% and 79.1% to 87.6%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: We conclude that since the WFX-FIT was implemented, there has been an increase in the number of exchange-eligible Type 1 WFF for suppression of wildfires in Canada.