The brigade is one of two fire services in France that is part of the armed forces, with the other being the Marseille Naval Fire Battalion (BMPM). It is a unit of the French Army's Engineering Arm (l'arme du génie) and the firefighters are therefore sappers (sapeurs, thus sapeurs-pompiers).
Category Status Number of fire fighters and paramedics
---------------------- ------------- --------------------------------------
Civilian fire services professionals 40,354
Civilian fire services volunteers 168,727
Which countries have volunteer firefighters?
- 1.1 Argentina.
- 1.2 Australia.
- 1.3 Austria and Germany.
- 1.4 Canada.
- 1.5 Chile.
- 1.6 Finland.
- 1.7 France.
- 1.8 Indonesia.