After Metro’s poor response to the January 2015 smoke incident outside the L’Enfant Plaza station, WMATA made a number of safety-focused changes. Within six months, they also created a new job: fire liaison, a uniformed officer who is embedded in the Metro Rail Operations Control Center specifically to help coordinate the response to an emergency.

Now, Metro says, they will staff the position 24/7 (up from about 80 hours a week), starting in June.

“The Rail Operations Control Center is the heartbeat of the rail system, of Metro really,” MTPD Chief Ronald Pavlik said in a video. But it was singled out in a July FTA report for “serious safety lapses,” and again in a September report for “distracted and understaffed workers.”

Getting a liaison in there is “something the fire chiefs have been looking for for a long time,” said Prince George’s County Fire Chief and Chair of the MWCOG Fire Chiefs Committee Marc Bashoor.

Currently, the liaisons work Monday-Friday and during special events. “But we know that emergencies can happen at any hour, and that’s why I could not be more pleased that we have reached an agreement to expand the position around the clock for the safety of Metro passengers and employees,” Bashoor said in a statement.

When they aren’t coordinating the response to the day’s emergency—despite a system-wide shutdown, fires and smoke incidents are still happening—the fire liaisons help provide emergency training for rail controllers and recommend policy changes.