Joey Thurman Rain or shine fires are always happening Chief, right?
Chief John Cornish That's exactly right.
Joey Thurman What is happening behind... We've got smoke. There is some simulation bodies, what's happening today?
Chief John Cornish So today, the Oswego Fire Protection District is training and we call this a live fire revolution. So we have today's evolutions were set up to be single company evolutions to come out. And the skills that we're learning today are honing and getting better at is searching, searching for victims and removal of victims.
Part of one of the scenarios today was to use forcible entry techniques to force through a door inside the building that was locked to continue their search. Trying to open a door that's locked in zero visibility or searching for someone that could have been hiding, could be under a bed, could be in a closet, extremely challenging conditions to work under.
Joey Thurman And why is it important for your environment and women to be doing this?
Chief John Cornish Well, it's usually important to be up on all the skills. It's not something that they would do every day. A brand new, a probationary member, all the way up to somebody who's got 30 plus years in the job, to continue practicing and honing those skills so they can be good at it.
Joey Thurman Wow. Now, when they're going through and they're doing this, I know you can't really prepare for the unexpected, but what do you guys do as part of the fire district to help them prepare for those unexpected situations?
Chief John Cornish So it's absolutely training, education, and experience, and foremost is that training aspect of it, which is exactly what we're doing today. This isn't something that occurs on a regular basis, but we have to be prepared for anything that comes up.
So we come out here, we train, we try to switch up the scenarios regularly to force them to use the skills and the knowledge and experience that they've had over the years to get the job done.
Joey Thurman What's the favorite part of your job?
Chief John Cornish Being around the guys. It's just a great job. It's a great feeling. You'll never be rich, but you can go to bed at night knowing that you're out there for your community.
It's getting hot in here! Behind the scenes look at the Oswego Fire Department
Becoming a firefighter is the dream of many children growing up, but what does it take to truly become a firefighter, maintain the skills, and truly hone your craft? We get an exclusive behind the scenes look at the Oswego Fire Protection and their real life training - no matter if it's rain or shine.
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