Like NFPA 1970 that brought separate requirements for turnout gear, work apparel, SCBA and personal alert safety systems (PASS) into a single standard, the new NFPA 1950 consolidates multiple PPE standards from different technical committees into a new single standard. However, unlike NFPA 1970, NFPA 1950 combines standards from three entirely different sets of fire service missions and, in some cases, non-fire service missions: technical rescue for structural collapses, high-angle rescue, vehicle extrication, and responses to various natural disasters; EMS operations mainly involving emergency patient care and transport; and wildland firefighting, which is increasingly expanding to wildland/urban interface (WUI) firefighting.
These different missions can be part of any fire department responsibilities but also have collectively different constituent groups of end-users.
- Technical rescue: Technical rescue or special operations groups are often separate teams within a larger fire department, but for some departments, these capabilities can more broadly exist for at least some members of many departments. On the other hand, there are highly specialized groups, such as FEMA’s Urban Search and Rescue Teams, which exclusively engage in technical rescue activities.
- EMS: Depending on how municipal services are divided in a given locality, many fire departments offer BLS services, while some offer ALS services that are integrated into department response capabilities. However, there are also separate ambulance and other emergency services that exclusively provide an EMS function. Sometimes, these services further expand into other specialized prehospital teams, particularly for large-scale events, that operate under different circumstances.
- Wildland/WUI: While wildland firefighting has become a more prolific activity involving a greater number of firefighters year-round, there are also multiple areas throughout the United States that operate wildland firefighting groups that specialize only in wildland firefighting and often also in WUI firefighting. Some of the larger, best known of these groups are the U.S. Forest Service and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE).
Each of these mission areas, while sometimes overlapping, has a wide variety of PPE items (see table below) that were covered in the three individual standards:
- NFPA 1951: Standard on Protective Ensembles for Technical Rescue Incidents (2020 edition)
- NFPA 1999: Standard on Protective Clothing and Ensembles for Emergency Medical Operations (2018 edition)
- NFPA 1977: Standard on Protective Clothing and Equipment for Wildland Fire Fighting and Urban Interface Fire Fighting (2022 edition)
In this column, we detail the new NFPA 1950 standard that was issued in December 2024 and its possible impact on the fire service.
Changes to technical rescue PPE
When NFPA 1951 was first created in 2001, the prevailing hazards guiding protection needs were the impact of a rugged physical environment combined with potential for exposures during a flash fire (ignition of a combustible environment within ensuing short duration fire exposure), bloodborne pathogens from engaging with disaster victims, contact with chemicals from broken containers, and the need to be visible in a relatively complex response setting. Consequently, many requirements from structural firefighting protective clothing and equipment were borrowed for the purpose of defining technical rescue products. Over the years, the requirements that applied to this ensemble – garments, helmets, gloves, footwear and goggles – have become increasingly pragmatic. The standard now focuses mainly on the physical protection requirements with lighter levels of thermal protection. The need for barrier protection against either liquid chemicals or infectious fluids is optional.
For the consolidation of the older NFPA 1951 requirements into the newer NFPA 1950, key changes include:
- Further qualification of garment fabric insulation using an instrumented manikin test simulates a flash fire exposure.
- More detailed requirements for barrier garments that entail additional criteria for bloodborne pathogen and liquid chemical exposures while making allowances for different test approaches based on new material technologies.
- The use of an evaporative resistance requirement for composites providing optional liquid barrier garments.
- The re-addition of optional visibility requirements using fluorescent and retroreflective high-visibility materials on garments, per a separate national standard on high-visibility safety apparel.
- Simplification of the helmet requirements that result in a universal helmet that will also apply to both EMS and wildland firefighting. This included the creation of a new helmet roll-off test for evaluating how well the retention system stays in place for the helmet.
- Some downward adjustment of the exposure temperatures used for footwear that permit synthetic leather alternative upper materials.
- The ability to use machine-readable tags to supplement existing labels for most elements with tracking information or other required label information.
Revisions to EMS clothing requirements
The 1999 standard for EMS operations protective clothing and equipment is more of a “menu” standard that sets individual requirements for different clothing configurations. Originally, this standard has focused solely on bloodborne pathogens and infectious liquids, but its new version also addresses exposure to airborne transmissible diseases. Typically, first responders rely on examination gloves, then some eye/face protection, and lastly some form of garments based on their perception of like exposure risks. For this reason, the standard establishes multiple categories for types of garments, gloves, eye and face protective devices, footwear, and specialized respirators. The standard further defines the integration of all these items into different full-body ensembles for more extreme exposures as may occur in a serious disease outbreak like Ebola or the release of a biological agent. Further, distinctions are made between what are considered single-use (disposable) and multiple-use (reusable) products. Many of the changes occurred due to lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Principal changes to the NFPA 1999 standard as part of the new NFPA 1950 will include:
- A new evaporative resistance requirement for garments now supplements total heat loss testing for minimizing the physiological burden for long-term wearing of garments.
- Referencing existing ASTM standards for different types of examination gloves in lieu of the previous very specific NFPA requirements.
- An optional provision for making permeation resistance protection claims against fentanyl and other opioid drugs for both examination and cleaning gloves.
- Direct referencing of ASTM requirements for both medical masks in the new category of limited protection barrier face coverings that were updated in response to pandemic concerns.
- The recognition of a new classification of eye and face protection specifically designed for blood/body fluid sprays and spurts according to a recently introduced American National Standard for these types of products.
- Removal of the existing helmet criteria, plus a directive to use the new universal NFPA 1951 technical rescue helmet instead.
- The identification of new powered air-purifying respirators as one form of suitable respiratory protection called PAPR 100s, which are lighter and quieter than industrial devices of the same type now available through NIOSH approval.
- The ability to use machine-readable tags on certain multi-use clothing items as a way of supplementing or replicating existing printed physical product labels.
Many of the above changes were made to identify specific equipment that is likely to be already commercially available based on more conventional healthcare product specifications. These changes are intended to make NFPA 1999-compliant clothing items more accessible to the fire service and other EMS providers.
New wildland requirements
While the standard on wildland protective clothing and equipment was updated just two years ago, the technical committee responsible for the standard had an opportunity based on the consolidation to address some topics that had not been completely resolved during the earlier revision.
Some of the key changes in this product group include:
- Revamping the detailed sizing requirements for garments. For example, the standard now includes women’s upper-torso garment dimensions by size. The NFPA 1977 requirements are relatively unique for protective garments in that they specify exact dimensions for standardized garments in terms of permitted measurement ranges. These requirements are applied to both shirt/pant combinations and coveralls.
- The specification of a minimum 3-inch collar height for upper torso garments.
- Adjustments to the new optional performance requirements for particulate-blocking garments mainly intended for WUI protection.
- Gloves must now be available in five sizes.
- Shelter requirements added in the prior edition were removed because the testing capabilities were no longer in place. Requirements for shelters will now default to the specifications for these products as provided by the USFS.
- Like both the technical rescue and EMS requirements, any electrical circuitry incorporated into a protective clothing item is now subject to intrinsic safety requirements.
New category: Multifunctional ensembles
One of the benefits of consolidating the three standards is the ability to create an entirely new category of protective products called multifunctional ensembles. Some fire departments already define utility for having a second set of garments that can address multiple missions as an alternative to using traditional, heavier structural turnout clothing for non-structural operations.
To date, several manufacturers have offered products that are certified to different combinations of standards, such as applying the NFPA 1951 technical rescue standard with optional blood-borne pathogen protection and the NFPA 1999 EMS standard to garments that have barriers, or applying the baseline NFPA 1951 technical rescue standard and NFPA 1977 wildland firefighting standard to garments that do not have barriers.
While garments with these multiple certifications provide a way of addressing combined hazards in one product, they are often expensive to certify because even when the same tests are called out, there are slight differences in the test parameters or criteria that require duplicate tests of prospective products and unnecessary costs.
In the new NFPA 1950 standard, this new category has its own certification and labeling requirements spanning garments, helmets, gloves, footwear and goggles. As noted above, this consolidation has already resulted in uniform helmet design and performance requirements separately applied to technical rescue, EMS and wildland firefighting.
In the new product category, references are made to other parts of the standards that are considered to be the most appropriate set of criteria for a multifunctional item, be it a garment, glove or footwear.
While the new multifunctional items are not a replacement for a given mission category of specific clothing or equipment, they will bear a label and certification listing that defines their use in multiple types of missions. It is expected that this new clothing category could become of interest to some departments that are weighing how frequently they use their turnout clothing.
Implementation of NFPA 1950
NFPA 1950 specifies an 18-month grace period for which products meeting current editions of the NFPA 1951, NFPA 1999 and NFPA 1977 standards can be carried forward. Any new products produced after late December 2024 now have to meet the new 1950 standard.
Still, it is expected that new products created to meet the new NFPA 1950 standard may be delayed because the capacity for new product certification will be exceeded as structural firefighting protective clothing products are making their way through the certification process for complying with the new NFPA 1970 standard. This logjam in testing and certification will likely push the availability of products certified against the new standard toward the end of 2025.
Note: The views of the author do not necessarily reflect those of the sponsor.
