AF&RS now has a wider remit promoting community safety through events and education work, alongside attending a range of incidents and emergencies from road traffic collisions and fires, to flooding and chemical spills.

This was a preparedness upgrade from the previously "day-crewed" status of 08:00–17:00 hours daily and firefighters responding from their homes and work places.

In 2009, it emerged that the service had banned white males from four out of five of its recruitment workshops, with two only open to ethnic minorities and two for females only.

The Bristol charity Support Against Racist Incidents similarly criticised the practice, arguing that there "has to be a level playing field; that's the law".

[22] On 28 July 2017, Chief Fire Officer Kevin Pearson was suspended following the publication of a report from the Home Office on an investigation into how the service is run, citing that it was being run as an "old boys' club", with endemic bullying, and that Pearson had been "unchallenged and not held properly to account for too long".

Following the suspension of Pearson, the board met on 2 August 2017 to discuss what changes needed to be made and how the authority should be governed in the future, but no conclusion was reached.

[26] The authority released a statement afterwards announcing that it could not "fix itself" and that the police and crime commissioner, Sue Mountstevens is to be appointed to the board in September.

[27] On 11 August 2017, it was announced that Mick Crennell had been appointed as the interim chief fire officer on a six-month contract, whilst the investigation of Pearson is taking place.

[29][25] Following the 2017 report, AFRS commissioned a consultancy firm to conduct an independent review of the themes raised by staff.

[30] Staff across all areas of AFRS complained of a lack of feedback, high workloads and the tone of internal communications within the service.

[31] The report promised a zero-tolerance approach, retraining for middle management, and training for all employees in equality, diversity and inclusion.

[34] It also operates a number of specialist appliances that are used for response, resilience, or urban search and rescue (USAR) purposes.