Fire companies across the Bronx find themselves in an increasingly dangerous situation. The demands of the job are at an all-time high, while staffing is at an all-time low. The average engine company in the Bronx responds to 5,298 calls per year, and several engines have eclipsed 7,000 runs across the borough.
Between augmenting EMS, increased call volume, and the spate of high-risk fires stemming from a combination of aging buildings, increasingly extreme weather, and the proliferation of lithium-ion battery-operated devices in the home, these numbers are steadily increasing, year over year.
Conversely, there are fewer companies in the Bronx than ever before and staffing of many of those engine companies has gradually reduced. This paradox of rapidly increasing volume and lower availability can and, heartbreakingly, sometimes does, lead to unnecessary death and destruction.
In January 2026 alone, there have been 45 residential and business fires in the Bronx, killing two people and leaving hundreds unsheltered or displaced, including two residents dead and 300 left without a home just this past weekend during our largest snow storm in years.
The Uniformed Firefighters Association, the union for New York’s rank-and-file firefighters, for years has called for the reinstatement of a fifth firefighter to every engine citywide. Given the data and the recent tragedies that have unfolded, the Bronx must be prioritized.
The FDNY should launch a pilot program that makes these necessary and easy changes in the Bronx. Right now, the Department primarily equips engines with four firefighters. Justifiably, you may wonder, “how much of a difference does one extra person actually make?” The sobering answer is a critical difference.
The time it takes to get a hose deployed and water on fire is nearly halved, from approximately 11 minutes to 6 minutes, when engines are staffed with five firefighters. When every second counts, these five minutes are a matter of life and death.
Most fires only require the equipment from two engines and manpower of ten firefighters. With the current staffing system, the FDNY sends three four-firefighter engines via its response protocols. Deploying three four-person teams not only takes longer than sending two five-person engines, it occupies a third company who would otherwise be free to respond to other fires within their response areas.
Freeing up engine company resources enables these companies to respond to medical emergencies within their response area more rapidly as well. The American Heart Association states that the effectiveness of intervention on cardiac emergencies decreases as time passes, especially after 10 minutes.
With engine companies in the Bronx stretched so thinly, the average response time to medical incidents is just under 9 minutes, approaching that critical zone. Eliminating the need for a third engine dispatched would go a long way towards lowering that response time.
Perhaps the most compelling argument for the reinstatement of the five-person engine is the relative ease with which it could be instituted. Five-person engine staffing is an international standard for high-risk fires already in place across the United States. In fact, during severe weather or citywide emergencies, like the winter storm we experienced this weekend, the FDNY switches to five-person engine staffing for precisely these reasons, demonstrating that they, too, see the benefit of the extra firefighter.
Therefore, the FDNY already has the personnel to implement these staffing changes, quite literally overnight, if they so choose. No committee hearings, no drawn-out studies, and no law required – simply a change in response protocol by the Department.
Fully optimizing our emergency resources is a longer-term structural and budgetary issue. In the meantime, The Bronx is ready to pilot a solution that can start and save lives as soon as tomorrow, if given the okay from Headquarters.
Let’s take the UFA’s recommendations to add a fifth firefighter to each engine in the Bronx and track the results: including response times, number of medical runs the FDNY can absorb, and the time it takes for engines to put water on the fires they respond to.
If the numbers support that it works, let’s roll this out to the rest of New York.
New York City can do better, and the Bronx deserves better. Let’s flip this switch today and start saving lives tomorrow.
