Coffee County Fire Department

Coffee County Fire/Rescue, headquartered at Station 6 on Mahogany Road in Douglas, Georgia, is a combination department: a small core of career and part-time firefighters is backed by 120 volunteers spread across 19 additional volunteer-staffed stations reaching every corner of the county's 591 square miles. That network keeps roughly 93% of county residents within five miles of an ISO-recognized fire department, and every station in the system carries an ISO Class 4X rating, which translates into lower property-insurance premiums for nearby residents.

Beyond structural fire response, the department also runs the county's Emergency Management Agency function, handling disaster planning, mitigation, and recovery, and fields a dedicated Public Safety Dive Team of 15 divers equipped with boats, sidescan sonar, and dry and hazmat dive suits for water rescue and recovery work. The department's own training division develops in-house instructors and public safety educators and puts new recruits through the Georgia Registered Firefighter course, including a live fire exercise, before they go into service.

With an average of about 650 calls a year spread across a large, largely rural coverage area, Coffee County Fire/Rescue leans heavily on its volunteer stations to keep response times down, while its career staff anchors day-to-day operations, training, and administration out of headquarters in Douglas.

Coffee County Fire/Rescue is a combination department: a small paid staff (7 career and 14 part-time firefighters) is based mainly at headquarters in Douglas, while the other 19 stations are staffed entirely by volunteers. The department recruits volunteer firefighters on a rolling, walk-in basis rather than through posted job listings.