Alex Johnson (firefighter)
Alex Johnson QFSM, born in 1967, is a British firefighter who was named the Most Influential Woman in Fire at the Excellence in Fire and Emergency Awards in December 2019. In January 2020, she became the chief fire officer of the South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority (SYFRA).
She started her fire service career in Derbyshire in 1992 at age 24, when only about 1% of UK firefighters were women. She has said she often did not see other women firefighters in the early years.
Johnson joined South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue in 2017 as Assistant Chief Fire Officer and was promoted to Deputy Chief Fire Officer in December 2017. Before that, she spent more than 25 years with Derbyshire Fire and Rescue Service, working at stations across the county and rising to Area Manager. She led prevention, protection and inclusion work, and she worked at the training centre as a Breathing Apparatus Instructor and as Group Manager for learning and development. She is a qualified Fire Protection Officer.
She serves on the National Executive Committee of Women in the Fire Service (UK), a group that supports women in the service. In the early 1990s, she attended the Women in the Fire Service UK conference and the Fire Brigades Union women’s school, which helped her find a support network and see that women could reach higher ranks.
Johnson is dedicated to mentoring other women and to equality and inclusion. She helped re-establish South Yorkshire’s equality and inclusion group.
Awards and honours include: December 2019 Most Influential Woman in Fire; November 2019 runner-up in the Guardian Leadership Excellence Awards Public Service category; and the Queen’s Fire Service Medal in the 2021 Birthday Honours.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 14:47 (CET).