Providence firefighters on bike patrol save lives.

PROVIDENCE − Not only city police officers will be patrolling local streets on bicycles this spring.

Firefighters are also on site and are carrying out the second season of bicycle patrols.

Both groups wear blue uniforms. But the color of the fire apparatus is quite recognizable.

They wear red helmets and red saddlebags. And the paint job on their bikes has a lot of fire engine red.

After the debut run last year, the Fire Department expanded the bicycle patrol this year.

The patrols reduce response times in two different areas of the city that typically generate a lot of calls, Providence Fire Chief Derek Silva said.

Why do firefighters on bicycles patrol Providence?

Patrols also help protect the city’s emergency medical resources.

“It worked,” Silva said.

“We’re trying to find a level of service that doesn’t overburden our first responders,” Silva said.

The patrols proved effective last year in two specific neighborhoods: downtown, which includes Kennedy Plaza, and another area that includes parts of Broad Street, north and west of Interstate 95.

The fire brigade is frequently called at both locations.

It is also not uncommon for emergency responders to learn that a patient may not want or need transport to the Rhode Island Hospital Emergency Department.

Here’s how bike patrols are helping save EMS services

The main rationale for choosing bicycle paramedics is that their agility and proximity allow them to get to the scene faster.

Firefighters are often the first on the scene to begin providing life-saving medical assistance after the ambulance arrives to transport the patient to the hospital.

If transport is not necessary or not as urgent, the bike patrol also takes care of this and resumes the patrol.

Both areas have generated numerous man down 911 calls over the years. Sometimes it’s someone sleeping or unconscious. Other times it’s much more serious, like an opioid overdose.

“You never really know what the problem is, so you have to send someone in,” said Zachariah R. Kenyon, an assistant deputy chief of the Providence Fire Department who heads the department’s EMS section.

How did the program fare last year?

Last year, operating in August and September, Silva said the bike units were at the forefront of 58 emergency transports to the hospital.

They also gave away Last year, 500 Narcan kits. The kits enable the administration of life-saving medicine that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose.

This year they have already launched 38 transports.

Two firefighters on bicycles carry a wide range of advanced medical equipment.

They can deal with heart attacks and other types of life-threatening cardiac events.

They can start an IV and provide oxygen.

Kenyon said bicycle emergency medical personnel are on scene 60 to 90 seconds faster than their colleagues in fire department transports.

This can make a difference.

“When it comes to the heart, seconds count,” Kenyon said.

This article originally appeared in The Providence Journal: Providence firefighters ride bikes to emergency services