There are multiple agencies that can work with fire investigators. Each of these can either help with preservation of life, collection of evidence and finding the cause of the fire as well as helping fix any damage made and try to prevent it. Each of the agencies that will be mentioned help out with these.
Police
The police are usually the first people on the scene other than the fire services, depending on how long it will take for the fire trucks to arrive. When they are on the scene to ensure nobody gets too close to the fire and interview any witnesses that could be there. The police officer that arrives may be an arson investigator depending on the local police force.
Crime Scene Investigators
The crime scene investigators are involved with examining the scene of the fire. This is to collect, enhance and recover and evidence at the scene. While doing this the need to ensure that they keep a secure audit trial to ensure that the evidence can be used in a court of law. Each member of the CSI’s team can be asked by a court of law to appear as an expert witness to explain what the found at the scene.
Specialised dog units
Each of the dogs that are in this unit are specially trained to do a particular job, such as locating people, find any useable evidence and smell any accelerants that are used. An arson dog can search a large area in half the time it would normally take the average person. this is due to their sense of smell and their ability to cover a lot of ground quickly and easily. In area searches, the dogs are used to search large areas outside of the scene quickly, saving time as there could be evidence left behind by the arsonist. In crowd searches, the dogs are used to sniff out arsonists in crowds because many arsonists like to return to the scene of their work to admire the fire.
Another way that the dogs are used is by walking one of the dogs through a crowd. The dog might