Notice of enforcement: NFIRS 2015 specification cycle

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To improve data quality and consistency, we will enforce several 2015 specification cycle rules previously not enforced by the National Fire Incident Reporting System (NFIRS) validation process. Enforcement will begin with the October 2020 release of the U.S. Fire Administration's NFIRS applications.

Important points

There are no specification or documentation changes for the upcoming NFIRS 5.0 specification cycle.
We will enforce the relational edits listed below to improve data quality and consistency.
Critical errors and invalid status incidents will occur upon import to the NFIRS national database if the items described below are not addressed by October 2020.

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Relational edits

Failure to follow the specification for the following relational edits will result in a critical error and an invalid incident status.

Edit	Module	Block	Field	Relational edit
#30	Basic	F	Action Taken	Cannot be duplicate, except for blanks.
#35	Basic	H1	Civilian Fire Casualty	If Incident Type > 100 series then Civilian Casualty Form is not available (allowed).
#59	Fire	E3	Human Factors	If Age Was Factor is checked then age must be greater than zero (0), and gender must be present.
#64	Fire	H1	Mobile Prop Involved	If None is checked, then no data entry is allowed.
#74	Structure Fire	L1	Presence of Detector	If Presence of Detectors is YES, then L2, L3, and L4 are required. If Presence of Detectors is left blank, then L2, L3 and L4 are not available (allowed).
#75	Structure Fire	L4	Detector Operation	If Detector Operation = 2, THEN L5 is required. If Detector Operation not = 2, THEN L5 Detector Effectiveness entry is not allowed.
#76	Structure Fire	L4	Detector Operation	If Detector Operation = 3, THEN L6 is required. If Detector Operation = 2, THEN L6 Detector Failure Reason is not allowed.
#79	Structure Fire	M1	Presence of Automatic Extinguishment Systems (AES)	If not present (code not = 1 or 2), then M2, M3, M4 and M5 are not available.
#81	Structure Fire	M5	AES Failure	If M3 = 1, then M5 is not available (allowed).
#105	Hazmat	H	Hazmat Action Taken	Actions Taken 1, 2 or 3 cannot be duplicates.
#122	EMS	H1	Body Site and Injury Type	Each Body Site must have an Injury Type. Body Site may be repeated up to five times. Injury Type may be repeated; however, the Body Site and Injury Type combination may not be repeated.
#123	EMS	I	Procedures Used	At least one procedure must be selected, but they are not mutually exclusive; except no treatment.
#151	Arson	M2	Age	If subject Age is greater than 17, then Arson Module blocks M1 through M8 (except for M2) are not allowed.

Software-related items to verify

Users must be able to upload fire department information data files separately from incident data files when importing data into the national database.
Conversion-only codes for 4.1 data are not allowed. Using them will result in an invalid status for the incident.

Reminders

The NFIRS 5.0 specification expected length for Incident Number is 7 maximum digits in numeric format.
Negative values are not allowed in the Basic Module Section G2 Loss fields (Property Loss, Contents Loss, Property Value, Contents Value) or the H1 Casualty fields.
Per Incident Type/Module Rule #6, if aid is given (codes 3 or 4), then only the information on the Basic Module through block G1 (Resources) must be completed by the department giving aid. If the department giving aid had a fire service casualty, then the department must also complete the Fire Service Casualty Module. The remainder of the Basic Module and any other modules associated with the incident may be optionally completed but are not required. The department receiving aid is responsible for completing all the required modules for the incident.
When the incident's Aid Type is code 3 and 4 (Automatic Aid Given or Mutual Aid Given), the Assisted FDID and the Assisted FDID's incident number should create warning error messages if left blank; they should not create critical error messages.