Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service are one of a handful of brigades within the UK to employ the services of their own fire investigation dog team.

Floyd is a chocolate brown Labrador who has been part of the fire investigation team in Merseyside since May 2004. During the period since then he has attended, along with his handler, Dean Bolton Numerous incidents where the presence of flammable or ignitable liquids has been suspected.

Floyd is there to assist the Fire Investigator and to give him the best possible assistance in determining whether 'Ignitable liquids’ (or ‘accelerants’) as they are more widely known, have been used to accelerate a fire.

Floyd is used to search through the debris and damage of a fire-scene to locate any remaining traces of ignitable liquids present. It remains the task of the Fire Investigator to determine the relevance of any finds made by Floyd.

Floyd is capable of recognising all of the readily available ignitable liquids, for example, petrol, diesel, paraffin, barbecue lighter fuel, camping fuel, cigarette lighter fuel, white spirit, cellulose thinners and acetone are all substances likely to be encountered. Now Floyd has acquired the skills to identify these materials it is highly likely that it will react to any other similar substances he encounters in the course of its work.