Firehouse.com

Firehouse® is the world's largest publication devoted exclusively to the fire service. Our primary editorial objectives are to educate, inform and entertain our audience of 1.5 million career and volunteer firefighters and thousands of fire buffs.

Generally, we are interested in all incidents, innovations, controversies and trends that affect the fire service world. Specifically, we concentrate on the following areas:

• MAJOR FIRES AND DISASTERS: Detailed accounts and technical analyses of firefighting operations at major incidents (see "On the Job" specifications).
• APPARATUS AND EQUIPMENT: Innovations in fire apparatus and other equipment (including protective gear), advice on purchasing, new and best uses of equipment, converting and repairing equipment, analysis/critique of equipment.
• COMMUNICATIONS: Equipment, dispatch systems and dispatchers, command centers, fireground communications systems.
• TRAINING: Methods and tools, new, successful courses, training simulations.
• HAZARDOUS MATERIALS: Incidents, training, equipment, command, protective equipment.
• ARSON: Investigation, prevention, analysis, trends.
• LAW: Fire-related legislation at local and national levels.
• FIRE SAFETY: New and successful ways of educating the public.
• MEDICINE: Health concerns, fitness of firefighters.
• LEADERSHIP: Improving command skills and systems on the fireground, interviews with high-ranking fire service personnel (commissioners and chiefs of major fire departments).
• RESCUE: Unusual incidents, successful methods and tools.
• EMS: Major events involving EMTs, concerns of medical technology in the fire service.
• FIREFIGHTING HISTORY: Great fires of the past, collectibles and memorabilia, fire museums, old-time equipment.
• HEALTH AND SAFETY: Issues pertaining to firefighter health and safety.
• PUBLIC RELATIONS: Improving relations with the community, fundraising.
• HUMAN INTEREST: Lifestyles, profiles of firefighters with unusual hobbies and interests.

Query us first so we can give you more specific guidance, required length of the manuscript and deadlines. Firehouse® does not accept multiple submissions; that is, the material submitted must be an exclusive to Firehouse. The writer must verify, in writing, that the material submitted is his original work, it has not been published previously and that it is not under consideration at another publication.

For information on submitting to Firehouse.Com, please visit our Online Content Submission Information Page.

We would appreciate receiving manuscripts that are submitted on computer disk accompanied by a printed copy. Please use Microsoft Word for text documents, saved on a CD or floppy disk. For those writers who do not yet have word processing capability, clean, original typewritten pages are required. Please use a Courier 10-point typeface (the standard issue of typewriters) or comparable with one-inch margins throughout the document. If you make corrections, apply Wite-Out and retype. Do not handwrite corrections on typewritten copy. Handwritten, dot matrix-printed (without floppy disk) Xeroxed or faxed manuscripts will be returned.

Please keep in mind that you are writing a magazine article. Most magazine readers, including those of Firehouse®, want to be able to learn the important aspects of a given topic without having to read through numerous paragraphs of background information. The average length of each article in Firehouse® is between two and three pages including visuals. In the past, we have received manuscripts that would be suitable for the first chapter of a book. Making these stories fit in the allocated space requires a great deal of editing on our part. More importantly, we may be cutting material that you would rather have included. A good rule of thumb is that one typeset page in Firehouse® is equal to about four double-spaced, typewritten pages.

Firehouse® is a visually-oriented publication. Please include photographs (color preferred) with captions (or a description of what is taking place in the photo), illustrations, charts or diagrams that support your manuscript. The highest priority is given to those submissions that are received as a complete package. Please keep a copy of all of your material, including visuals. Firehouse® makes every effort to ensure that all material is returned to the writer, whether it is published or not; however, we cannot guarantee the return of unpublished material. Enclose a stamped, self-addressed envelope (SASE) with all submissions. Submissions lacking the necessary SASE will not be returned. Please make sure that the return envelope is large enough to house your material. Also, please make sure the envelope has sufficient postage; do not include payment (checks or cash) for postage.

Please include your current mailing address as well as a daytime telephone, cell phone and fax number (if available). If we have any questions regarding copy or additional information is needed, we will contact you directly. If you have any stories ready to send prior to deadline dates, please send them along. We appreciate early arrivals.

Firehouse® makes payment only upon publication of written and photographic material. Once accepted, articles are published depending on timeliness and space availability. We cannot guarantee a publication date. Please include your social security number so that payment is not delayed.

If you have any story ideas, questions, hints, tips, etc., please do not hesitate to call. We appreciate and thank you for your assistance, enthusiasm and promptness.

Firehouse® Contact Information:

3 Huntington Quadrangle - Suite 301 North

Melville, New York 11747

Harvey Eisner, Editor-in-Chief

Jeff Barrington, Associate Publisher