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Monterey CA - July 2010

Duggan Promoted to FDNY Battalion Chief

There was good reason that Joseph Duggan Jr. was excused from class June 30.

Duggan, a master’s degree student at the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and Security, was promoted to Battalion Chief with the New York City Fire Department and needed to leave his in-residence session a bit early for the ceremony.

Not just a student and firefighter, Duggan is also an Iraq War veteran and plays in the FDNY’s Pipes and Drums corps.

Duggan, a member of cohort 0905/0906, said he will take what he has absorbed as a CHDS student to his new post.

From the Sept. 11 attacks to the more recent failed Times Square bomb plot, terrorist events in New York City have resulted in fire safety professionals adding homeland security to their core duties.

"The fire service when I started was purely a single-discipline endeavor meaning structural fires, collapses, things of that nature," Duggan said. "From there it went to emergency medicine and then in the late 90s and after 2001 it expanded to include homeland security and terrorism."

Course work at CHDS has added to his perspective in maintaining situational awareness of potential terrorist threats. He added that situational awareness has been stressed during class.

"Everything I do tactically will involve the situational awareness I’m going to bring," Duggan said. "I keep my eyes open to things like the Times Square bombing attempt that was first really recognized as a terrorism plot by the first two units that were sent there for a car fire. My role as a battalion chief is to make sure I know what is going on and making sure we know this is not just a car fire, it could be a homeland security situation."

CHDS has also been beneficial by fostering a sense of collaboration by admitting students from varied agencies and backgrounds. In pursuing his master’s degree, Duggan is exploring effective collaboration in his thesis titled "New York City Urban Search and Rescue Team (NY-TF1): A case study of interagency effectiveness."

That Urban Search and Rescue team is composed of an equal number of firefighters and police officers, two professions that have been known at times to have an antagonistic relationship. Duggan is writing about how this team rises above those traditional agency boundaries and works together effectively.

"That’s going to help me, hopefully, point to new ways that we as a city and emergency first responders can bridge that gap," he said. "That gap, even nine years after 9/11, is still present in New York City and across the country."

His perspective on the need for collaboration has been furthered through interaction with fellow students.

"Interaction with classmates from other disciplines has really been one of the strengths of the course that has helped me to view not just my own little comfort zone, where I look at how a threat affects my agency, but how other people might see it," he said.

In taking on his new position, Duggan will be in charge of four to six fire stations and about 50 firefighters. After earning a bachelor’s degree from Fordham University in 1990, he began his FDNY service in 1991 and was promoted to lieutenant in 2002, before ascending to captain in 2007.

In 2003, as a Captain in the U.S. Army Reserve, Duggan was deployed in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was responsible with working with Iraqis to re-establish the Baghdad Fire Department.

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