Schärding Fire Department takes stock: Record year with 2,678 missions!

Schärding Fire Department takes stock: Record year with 2,678 missions!

On March 27, 2025, the first district meeting of the Schärding fire department district took place in the fresco hall of the educational center at Zell an der Pram Castle. District fire brigade commander, state fire brigade councilor Johannes Veroner, looked back on a busy year for the 66 fire brigades in the district. A total of 2,678 missions were carried out by 6,932 active fire brigade members and reservists. What is particularly noteworthy is that 44 people were rescued from difficult situations.

The fire brigades in the Schärding district worked 546,962 hours in the areas of operational preparation, exercises, training, administration and youth work. Particularly notable missions include an F-KAT mission in Lower Austria and the tragic building collapse in Schärding. The year 2024 was also marked by elections at the section and district level.

Awards for Merit

Retiring officials were also honored at the conference. Johann Penzinger was recognized as an honorary section fire inspector and received the district medal of merit in gold. Alois Steinmann was awarded the Upper Austrian Fire Department Merit Cross 2nd level (silver). Honored by the State Fire Brigade Association. Further awards went to Stefan Biereder, who received the ÖBFV merit badge 3rd level (bronze), and Alfred Deschberger, who was awarded the BMI recognition badge.

For those interested, the district fire department's annual report is available on the website bfkschaerding.at ready for download.

Austrian Fire Brigade and Civil Protection Academy

An important milestone for the Austrian fire service landscape was the founding of the Austrian Fire Department and Civil Protection Academy (ÖFKAD) in 2024. This academy has set itself the goal of further developing fire service training at the federal level. The primary target audience is senior fire department managers and members in specialized subject areas. A future expansion to managers and members of other authorities and organizations with security tasks as well as fire brigade members from abroad is also planned.

A particular focus is on disaster control, which is being increasingly focused on as a core competency of the Austrian fire departments. Events are advertised to the state fire brigade associations and professional fire brigades, while registration takes place taking into account the specified requirements.

Fire brigade statistics and success figures

The statistics for 2022 show that the number of members of Austrian fire departments increased to 350,283, which means an increase of 4,852 compared to the previous year. The number of active members has increased by 1,675 members. Also noteworthy is the increase in the proportion of women in the fire departments to 30,926, which makes up 8.8% of the total team.

At first glance, one can see a decrease in the number of operations by around 5,000 compared to the previous year, although fire operations have increased by more than 3,000. In 2022, 7,930 people and 13,710 animals were saved, which underlines the outstanding work and commitment of the firefighters. Further information on the membership situation and deployments, especially from Vienna and Vorarlberg, is not available.

Overall, these developments and statistics show that the fire departments in Austria are experiencing continuous progress in both training and operational capability. Strengthening disaster protection and training is considered important in order to be able to respond to emergencies in the best possible way in the future.