American Chief Podcast

How does a small-town fire chief end up on the radar of departments across the country? Kurt's answer is dumb luck, world-class timing, and maybe a little genius. This is the first of two episodes on how he came to write a book and start this podcast. It begins in 2018, when Hadley Township set out to replace its front-mount pumper. A phone call from Spencer Manufacturing then offered the department something no one else had: the world's first SAM-equipped engine, and two weeks to say yes. In...

I have to believe most firefighters keep their radio or pager open just to listen — and for Chief Nass, nothing beats the anticipation of a second alarm. In this episode, he walks through what makes it his favorite call in the fire service: the information advantage, the pre-scouting habits that come with it, and a string of real-world moments where thinking two steps ahead of the first-due department turned into a genuine assist. He also opens up about how that same mindset extends into pre-...

Episode 3: The Hadley Way Every fire department has an identity, whether it's ever been said out loud or not. For Hadley Township, that identity is moving water — drafting it, hauling it, supplying it, efficiently and without hesitation. In this episode, Chief Kurt Nass traces that identity back to a lost house in 1969, through the 1980s "surround and drown" era, into how the department actually trains its new recruits today, and the hardest run of his early career. In this episode Why onboar...

Episode 2: Draw the Line — Show Notes When you arrive on scene, you don't get the luxury of perfect information — you have to make a call and commit to it. In this episode, Chief Kurt Nass breaks down "Draw the Line," a directive he's drilled into every member of his department since becoming chief in 2005: identify what you have, decide what you can and can't lose, say it in one sentence, and commit. Kurt walks through the origin of the concept, two formative fires from his own department's ...

The American Chief Podcast isn’t a training platform. It’s a place where successful operational ideas and time-tested general practices meet real personal experience—stories and lessons that firefighters of every rank can relate to, think through, and put to use in their own departments. Episode 1: Fire departments are like snowflakes — no two are the same. In this inaugural episode, Chief Kurt Nass explains why he's telling these stories, and takes listeners on a personal journey through som...