Biography

John McDonald is a twenty year employee of the Naval Submarine Base Fire Department, Groton Conn. During the past fifteen years, John has been assigned to the Fire Prevention Bureau. John was promoted to the Assistant Fire Chief of fire Prevention in 2000 where he is in charge of the Division.

As the Assistant Chief of Fire Prevention, John oversees the overall management and direction for the Div. and efforts/goals of four Fire Inspectors. His responsibilities include overall code enforcement for forces afloat and a wide variety of tenant commands associated with the installation. The types of occupancies include industrial, assembly, business, day care, hotel-motel, dormitories, food establishments, and many special types of occupancies. The regulations and standards that are applied to these organizations are from the National Fire Protection Association, National Fire Protection’s Life Safety Code, International Fire Code, and various federal regulations.

John is also responsible for policy and procedure development as the technical field subject matter expert for the various types of occupancies which include fire control systems, extinguishers, confined space entry, blood born pathogen, and construction safety. He manages the control and development of the Public Fire Safety Education and technical training programs: i.e. fire extinguisher training, confined space entry and new employee orientation to name a few topics.
In addition to training and policy development, John also reviews plans for new construction and facility renovations to insure the facility code compliant with all applicable regulations. Additionally he reviews plans for the development of new military residential housing developments, hotel-motel, industrial, dormitories, business, and special types of occupancies.

After the facility is constructed, he is responsible for the fire alarm and sprinkler acceptance tests. This encompasses positive corrective actions for all identified deficiencies prior to certification including the fire alarm system i.e. checking for the proper decibel levels in the sleeping areas and general functionality, the sprinkler system for sprinkler head placement and the systems hydrostatic test results and etc.