Regional Training

Drill ground at SLC

SHIFT 22...Rick's ReFlections of his 32 years career in the Fire Service...

I'm the one standing in the background...

One of several areas of our ‘Continuing Education’ includes maintaining our FAA certifications. The FAA requires Airports, including their Fire Departments to be certified every year. For PAF&R this means maintaining a particular level of equipment and staffing, monthly drills on 13 different training responsibilities and lastly participating in live fire drills. Most departments do not have the resources to accomplish all of the necessary ‘live fire drills’ within their own area. For this reason scattered around the country are ‘Regional Training Centers’. Over the years we’ve utilized the centers in Salt Lake, Pittsburg, Dallas, North Bend (east of Seattle) and most recently San Bernardino. We've requested to test out the Hawaii training ground...without success ):

  

Mario Lemieux

Crew picture on a cold March day training at SLC

Along with training there is always the camaraderie time…taking in a ball game, maybe the Pittsburg Penguins and watching Mario Lemieux or the Dodgers play the World Champion St Louis Cardinals. Or it might be a day skiing Park City Utah. One such ski day was Randy, John and I. On our second or third lift John stops and looks down what Randy and I thought was nothing less than staring down from the top of a skyscraper. John looks back at us and says, “well, you joining me?” Randy and I being fully aware that our skills fell quite short of John’s…looked at one another and easily replied…ahh…No! Just for the fun of it we thought we’d watch John descend a bit before leaving. It was a good choice, as it only took him about 3 seconds before he was tumbling head over heals…to which we again looked at one another and then pointed…this way! Perhaps it was the only time that he fell all day, but it was enough to prove that at least two us were in our right minds. Well…at least for the moment.

There weren't many good 'training ground' videos. This one shows a little what it's like performing 'truck operations' with some communications. Unfortunately I could not find any that show 'transitions' (moving from truck ops to handline) or 'interior' of an aircraft.  The interior in particular is what the 'regional' training is of most value. Until next shift!