Last week, the Whitesboro Fire Department (WFD) sent five firefighters to College Station to train at the 95th Annual Municipal Fire School hosted by Texas A&M’s Engineering Extension Service (TEEX) at the Brayton Fire Training Field.
Firefighter/EMTs Jonathon Sheffield and Seth Knight attended the Ag Rescue class, where they learned skills focused on accessing and rescuing victims of agricultural rescues, including victims trapped in silos or penned in overturned tractors.
The skills learned will be an asset to the department, as they directly correlate to emergency call potential in the Whitesboro area.
Firefighter/Paramedic Cody Woolsey took a Ropes II Technical Rescue class that taught advanced level ropes and riggings that can be used to move objects, raise and lower victims, and included training on integrating the stokes basket for rescues of unconscious victims.
Lieutenant Josh Velten took the Public Information Officer class. This class delved into the legal and ethical liabilities of sharing department and emergency call information with the press and public, as well as fostering and growing relations with the press, community stakeholders and the public.
Lieutenant Kevin Walton spent his week helping instruct students on a propane emergency prop. This prop required many live burns where Lt. Walton worked with the students on the fire lines as well as serving as the Safety Officer.
The Brayton Fire Training Field is a 297-acre training facility that hosts tens of thousands of emergency responders each year. It is the premier training facility in the United States, and is unmatched globally in what it can offer students. It has over 130 training stations and dozens of classrooms to host first responders. Over 1,000 firefighters and instructors were on hand last week participating in the fire school. Lt. Velten shared that the experience was top notch.
“We are fortunate to have the opportunity to train at a facility like this. Whitesboro Fire Department has been sending personnel there for over 20 years, and the caliber of training and classroom instruction our personnel receive is second to none,” Velten said. “We are thankful for department and city leadership that see the value not just in the training, but in how it betters our department as a whole.”
The classes were paid for through a combination of a HB 2604 grant through the Texas Forest Service and the department’s annual training budget. The HB 2604 grant is specifically for fire training in the state of Texas.
