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and severely damaging more than 20 units in the shopping arcade; a No. 4 alarm which damaged a polyurethane manufacturing factory in Tai Po Industrial Estate on July 6; a No. 3 alarm at Yue Wan Estate, Chai Wan on July 11, claiming two lives with nine injuries; a fire on board the Panamanian passenger ship Zenith off Penny's Bay on July 19, which took firemen 47 hours to put out; a No. 4 alarm two days later at a plastic toy factory in Aberdeen, another No. 4 alarm at a North Point factory on July 23, in which 15 people were injured, nine of them firemen and a No. 4 alarm at an industrial building in Kwai Chung on December 12, in which 20 firemen were injured.
Special Services
The department also provides wide-ranging rescue services in incidents such as traffic accidents, people trapped in lifts or locked in rooms, gas leakages, house collapses, floodings, landslides, industrial accidents and attempts to jump from a height. In 1995, the department received 21 420 calls for special services.
The major incidents included landslips on August 13 in Chai Wan and Aberdeen in which three people died. Extremely heavy rainfall in early October caused widespread flooding in parts of the territory and firemen had to use dinghies to rescue about 190 villagers in the New Territories.
Ambulance Services
The demand for ambulance services from the public remained high during the year, despite the transfer of non-emergency ambulance services to the Hospital Authority. The last phase of this exercise was completed by October. During the year, ambulances answered 425 343 calls, conveying a total of 451 488 patients and casualties.
The year saw the paramedic ambulance service expand, with the fleet of ambulances increased to 33. More than 150 personnel have qualified as Emergency Medical Assistant II (EMA) and are now able to give patients enhanced pre-hospital care such as cardiac monitoring, defibrillation and application of selected drugs.
In May, the department commissioned a consultant to review emergency ambulance services and to recommend ways to improve the effectiveness of emergency cover in a cost-effective manner. Some of the recommendations made by the consultant are already being implemented, and others will be implemented as additional resources become available.
Communication
The department is replacing its existing radio network system with a computer-aided Trunked Radio System. The new system, which can provide more channels and maintain better communications between the Fire Services Communication Centre and all fire appliances, fireboats and ambulances, will improve operation efficiency. It will be fully operational in late 1996.
The department introduced an Incident Resources Control System during the year to enhance the efficiency of monitoring fire and ambulance resources deployed to incidents. This system, which uses bar code technology, has been installed on every Mobile Command vehicle since mid-August.