Conference Brings National Experts to Address Critical Air Supply Challenges in Modern Firefighting; Municipal Leaders Urged to Understand Firefighter Air Needs
COLORADO SPRINGS, CO, UNITED STATES, February 24, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — With registration approaching capacity, Fire in the Sky 2026 is set to transform how America’s fire service tackles the most pressing challenge of modern firefighting: sustaining interior operations in high-rise, mid-rise, and big-box structures where traditional air supplies fall dangerously short. Scheduled for March 17-19, 2026, at Hotel Polaris, Colorado Springs’ first hotel equipped with an installed air standpipe system, this nearly sold-out conference brings together the nation’s foremost experts to address a critical reality: without air, firefighters cannot save lives or property.
THE CRITICAL AIR CRISIS
Every firefighter entering a burning structure carries between 15 and 30 minutes of breathable air. In a single-story residential fire, this might be sufficient. But when that firefighter must ascend 20 flights of stairs in a high-rise, navigate the labyrinthine corridors of a million-square-foot big-box retail center, or penetrate deep into a mid-rise apartment complex, that air supply becomes a ticking clock measuring the difference between rescue and tragedy.
“To successfully accomplish an interior fire attack, we need air and water. Without air, nothing else matters,” states Mike Gagliano, President of the Firefighter Air Coalition. “Firefighters cannot conduct search and rescue. They cannot achieve extinguishment. They cannot perform overhaul and salvage. Every tactical decision, every operational strategy becomes meaningless if our personnel run out of air before completing their mission. And the brutal mathematics of modern construction’s taller buildings, larger footprints with deeper penetration distances, means we’re asking firefighters to do the impossible with inadequate resources.”
The reality is stark and unforgiving. A firefighter climbing 10-20+ floors consumes a significant portion of their air supply before ever reaching the fire. Once there, the physical exertion of search operations, hose advancement, and forcible entry accelerates air consumption exponentially. In a million-square-foot warehouse, the distance from the entry point to the seat of the fire can exceed a quarter mile – an impossible distance to cover, operate, and return to safety on a single bottle of air.
THE HOTEL POLARIS INNOVATION
The choice of Hotel Polaris as the conference venue is no coincidence. As Colorado Springs’ first hotel to install a comprehensive air standpipe system which is specifically designed for firefighting operations, Hotel Polaris represents the future of life-safety infrastructure in large buildings.
Conference attendees will have unprecedented access to see and understand the engineering behind this revolutionary system. Guided technical tours will demonstrate how strategically placed air connections throughout the building allow firefighters to replenish their SCBA bottles without retreating from the fire floor, transforming a 30-minute air supply into sustained operational capability that can make the difference in mass-casualty incidents, extended search operations, or complex fire suppression scenarios.
“This isn’t theoretical,” emphasizes Gagliano. “Attendees will walk the stairwells, examine the connection points, and understand the engineering principles that make sustained interior attack possible in buildings that would otherwise be logistically impossible to defend. Municipal leaders and building officials need to see this. Community planners need to understand this. Because if we’re going to continue approving multi-story residential towers and five hundred to million-square-foot warehouses, we have a moral obligation to ensure firefighters can actually protect the people inside them.”
EPIC INSTRUCTOR LINEUP: NATIONAL EXPERTS CONVERGE
Fire in the Sky 2026 has assembled an unprecedented faculty of firefighting experts, each bringing decades of experience from the busiest fire departments in America. These instructors represent the cutting edge of high-rise, mid-rise, and big-box operations:
– Dave McGrail (Denver Fire Department, ret.) – “High Rise Operations: Mindset Not Myths, Standpipe Operations: Over Analysis= Paralysis”
– Mike Gagliano (Seattle Fire Department, ret.) – “Fire in the Sky – And Now You’re Out of Air”
– Captain Mike Dugan (Fire Department of New York City, ret.) – “Fire in the Sky – And Now You’re Out of Air”
– Captain Jimmy Davis (Chicago Fire Department) – “Protecting Vertical Cities: The First 5 Minutes”
– Captain Clark Lamping (Clark County Fire Department) – “Big Box Fires= Big Problems”
– Battalion Chief Chris Sleigher (Mesa Fire Department, ret.) – “Mid-Rise Mindset: Making Elevated Decisions”
– Brent Brooks (Toronto Fire Services) – “High-Rise Firefighting 2.0: Lithium-ion and Modernizing High-Rise Firefighting”
– Chief Kris Blume (Meridian Fire Department) – “Bringing the Firefight to Mid/High-Rise Buildings Under Construction”
– Captain Jay Bonnifield (Everett Fire Department) – “Anatomy of a Stretch”
– Daniel DeYear (Dallas Fire Department, ret.) – “Big Box Fires – Thinking Outside the Bigger Box”
– Lieutenant Mike Ciampo (Fire Department of New York City, ret.) – “Truck Company Operations at Large Structure Fires”
Conference hosts Mike Gagliano and Mike Dugan will guide attendees through 3 intensive days of training, tactical discussions, and guided access to Hotel Polaris’ revolutionary air standpipe system.
OPERATIONS CAN CONSERVE AIR, ONLY INFRASTRUCTURE CAN PROVIDE IT
The conference curriculum makes a critical distinction that every municipal leader, fire chief, and community planner must understand tactical operations and strategic efficiency can help firefighters conserve their existing air supply, but they cannot create additional air. No amount of training, fitness, or tactical innovations can overcome the fundamental physics of distance and exertion in modern buildings.
“We can teach firefighters to move more efficiently, breathe more economically, and operate more strategically,” explains Captain Mike Dugan, FDNY. “And we will teach all of that at Fire in the Sky. But let’s be brutally honest: you cannot train your way past the need for air infrastructure in tall buildings. A firefighter ascending 30 floors will consume air. A firefighter searching a 200,000-square-foot floor or hallway will consume air. A firefighter conducting overhaul and salvage operations will consume air. Training can reduce waste, but only engineering can provide firefighters with air resupply in these mega tall and sprawling structures.”
This is the uncomfortable truth that Fire in the Sky 2026 brings to the forefront. Communities that approve high-rise construction without mandating air resupply infrastructure are sending firefighters into impossible situations. When a 40-story residential tower catches fire at 3 a.m., and firefighters must search every floor for sleeping residents, operations and tactics become secondary to a simple question: Do we have enough air to complete the rescue?
AN URGENT CALL TO MUNICIPAL LEADERS AND COMMUNITIES
Fire in the Sky 2026 is not solely a training conference for firefighters. It is a wake-up call for municipal leaders, city councils, building code officials, and community planners who shape America’s built environment.
“If your community is building high-rises, you need to be at this conference,” states Daniel DeYear, Deputy Chief, Dallas Fire Department (ret). “If you’re approving million-square-foot warehouses and distribution centers, you need to understand what you’re asking your firefighters to defend. If you’re a municipal leader or city planner, you need to see Hotel Polaris and understand what life-safety infrastructure looks like when it’s done right.”
The moral equation is stark: every tall building, every sprawling warehouse, every mid-rise apartment complex, represents a promise to the community that if tragedy strikes, firefighters will enter and save lives. But that promise is hollow if those firefighters lack the air supply to reach the victims, conduct the search, achieve extinguishment, and return safely. “Plain and simple, the air standpipe system is not just a firefighter’s tool – it becomes their lifeline to do the job that is expected of them,” said DeYear.
Communities build these massive structures because they drive economic development, create jobs, and generate tax revenue. But with that development comes responsibility – the responsibility to ensure that when those buildings burn, the men and women sent inside have the air and resources to do their jobs and come home alive.
URGENT: NEARLY SOLD OUT-REGISTER IMMEDIATELY
Fire in the Sky 2026 is approaching maximum capacity. With firefighters, officers, and municipal officials from across the nation recognizing the critical importance of this content, available seats are disappearing rapidly.
“This isn’t a conference you can catch next year,” warns Gagliano. “The instructors we’ve assembled, the access to Hotel Polaris’s air standpipe system, and the comprehensive curriculum we’ve developed represents months of planning and coordination.
The registration window is closing. Departments are securing blocks of seats. Progressive municipal leaders are sending their building officials and city planners alongside their fire chiefs. The message is clear: those who understand the critical relationship between modern construction and firefighter air supply are taking action now.
For firefighters: This conference will change how you approach high-rise, mid-rise, and big-box operations. The tactics and strategies you learn could save your life and the lives of your crew members.
For municipal leaders: This conference will illuminate the infrastructure gap that exists between your community’s building approvals and your fire department’s operational capabilities. What you learn could drive policy changes that save entire communities.
Register Now – the investment in this training will pay dividends in operational capability and firefighter safety for years to come.
CONFERENCE DETAILS
• Event Name: Fire in the Sky 2026
• Location: Hotel Polaris, Colorado Springs, Colorado
• Dates: March 17-19, 2026
Special Feature: Exclusive tours to Colorado’s first hotel with the installed air standpipe firefighting system
Target Audience: Firefighters, fire officers, municipal leaders, building officials, city planners, community safety advocates
THE BOTTOM LINE
“Air is everything,” concludes Gagliano. “Without it, search and rescue stops. Extinguishment stops. Overhaul stops. Salvage stops. Everything we do in the interior attack depends on breathable air reaching our firefighters. We can optimize operations to conserve what they carry, but if communities continue building vertically and horizontally without providing air infrastructure, we’re sending people to do impossible jobs with insufficient resources.”
“Fire in the Sky 2026 is where the conversation changes. This is where we stop accepting the status quo and start demanding that our built environment matches the realities of firefighting physics. This is where municipal leaders see what’s possible when buildings are designed with firefighter air supply as a foundational safety system. This is where firefighters learn the operations and tactics that keep them alive in extended scenarios. And this is where communities decide whether they’re going to build responsibly or keep asking for the impossible.”
The conference will sell out. The instructors are assembled. Hotel Polaris awaits. The only question remaining is whether your department, your community, and your leadership will be part of this critical conversation.
Register Now – the lives you save may include the firefighters in your own community.
ABOUT FIRE IN THE SKY
Fire in the Sky is the nation’s premier conference focused exclusively on the topics of air management and sustained operations in high-rise, mid-rise, and big-box structures. By bringing together expert instructors, cutting-edge infrastructure demonstrations, and comprehensive tactical training, the conference addresses the most critical resource challenge facing modern firefighting: ensuring adequate air supply for interior operations in increasingly large and complex buildings.
FIREFIGHTER CONTRIBUTORS
Daniel DeYear is originally from The Bronx in New York City and began his Fire Service Career in the Northeast. His time in the Texas Fire Service began over 43 years ago with the Carrollton Fire Department where he worked for nearly 10 years. He spent the next two years as an International Fire Marshal for the U.S. Department of State providing fire and life safety to the United States Embassies and Consulates in more than 35 different countries. Thereafter, he devoted more than 30 years to the Dallas Fire-Rescue Department where he recently retired as a Deputy Fire Chief. Daniel has Master Level Certifications as a Firefighter, Fire Inspector, Instructor, Fire Investigator, Fire Officer IV, Hazardous Materials Technician, Incident Safety Officer, Incident Commander, and has served as a licensed Paramedic for more than 20 years. Daniel serves as Chairman of the Firefighter Advisory Committee for the Texas Commission on Fire Protection and is a member of the Curriculum and Testing Committee and the Health and Wellness Committee. He serves as Vice President of the Dallas Firefighter’s Museum and is a Board of Director for Search-One. He was named the TAFE 2020 Instructor of the Year.
Mike Dugan is a 45-year veteran of the fire service and a 27-year veteran of the New York City Fire Department (FDNY), retiring as Captain of Ladder 123. As a firefighter in Ladder Company 43, Dugan received the James Gordon Bennett Medal in 1992 and the Harry M. Archer Medal in 1993, the FDNY’s highest award for bravery. He developed training programs that were taught to all FDNY members. Mike is a contributing editor at Fire Engineering magazine, a teacher at the Fire Department Instructor Conference (FDIC), and a Fire Engineering and FDIC Executive Board member. He is a featured lecturer across the country, teaching Truck Company Operations, the impact of building construction on firefighter safety, leadership, and issues affecting today’s fire service. He was awarded the “Tommy Brennan Lifetime Achievement Award” in 2021.
Mike Gagliano has over 33 years of fire, crash, and rescue experience with the Seattle Fire Department and the United States Air Force. He teaches nationwide on Fireground Tactics/Decision-Making, Air Management, Leadership, and Company Officer Development and currently serves as the president of the Firefighter Air Coalition. Captain Gagliano has authored numerous fire service articles and co-authored the bestselling books Air Management for the Fire Service and Challenges of the Firefighter Marriage. He is a member of the Fire Engineering/FDIC Advisory Board and the Emeritus Board of the Firefighter Safety Research Institute. (retired)
Shawn Longerich
Firefighter Air Coalition
7198861100 ext.
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Fire in the Sky, Colorado Springs, CO
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