By Bob Strohm
bstrohm@wbcowqel.com
With Duane Hord’s old residence set for demolition, a few local volunteer fire departments took the opportunity to brush up on their firefighting skills Thursday evening.
Volunteer firefighters from Jefferson and Bucyrus townships went to the former Hord residence to practice their skills. Bucyrus Township Fire Department member Shawn Rowlinson explained how they were using the residence as practice.
“Tonight is going to be non-fire training, there is going to be no fire, no smoke.” Rowlinson said. “It is going to be roof ventilation, we are going to search and rescue training, wall breaching, we are going to simulate if a guy were to get trapped in a structure how to get out. Anything that would happen in a real life fire we are going to try to simulate without the fire.”
Rowlinson explained why they weren’t using fire for the training.
“We have to file paperwork with the EPA, and we didn’t have time to fill it out,” Rowlinson said. “Plus with all the surrounding structures and the wind today we really didn’t want to take a chance and burn something down that we shouldn’t.”
The group of volunteer fire fighters broke up into groups and took turns at the different stations of search and rescue, wall breaching, and roof ventilation.
While Jefferson and Bucyrus Township fire departments were on hand at the beginning of the training session, Rowlinson did note that all of Bucyrus Township’s mutual aid respondents were invited to the simulation.