Firefighters from around Hawaii Island and the state came together this week for mayday prevention and operations training at the Makalei Fire Station in North Kona.
Thirty personnel hailing from each of Hawaii County Fire Department’s stations and the Kauai and Honolulu fire departments took part in a four-day training program that focused on mayday prevention and operations taught by six master instructors with the International Association of Fire Fighters. The IAFF is an organization that advocates in North America for health, safety and training of firefighters and paramedics.
It was the first time the Fire Ground Survival program has been offered in Hawaii, said Hawaii County Fire Department Capt. Garrett Kim.
“This class will teach us better ways to save the lives of victims as well as ourselves,” Kim said. “We make it as difficult here as possible here so that when they’re out there, they’re accustomed to the situation and that’s a part of being a professional — we practice until we can’t get it wrong.”’
Bringing the program to Hawaii Island cost about $57,000, all covered by a federal Assistance to Firefighters Grant, Kim said. The $57,000 covers $45,000 to bring the instructors here with the remaining funding covering training equipment and props.
The county will keep the six props, among them props for training for upper floor exits and window hanging, disentanglement and breaching walls, following the training, Kim said.
Each of the firefighters who took part in the program in Kona will take that knowledge back to their assigned stations where they will teach their comrades.
“We’re very fortunate for this,” said Kim. “They will become our instructors islandwide.”
The multiday training program comprised not only group training but also classroom work and a real-life scenario that sent firefighters, decked in full firefighting garb weighing 75 pounds, with limited vision and blaring sounds of sirens, chainsaws, stomping, crackling and yelling, through a maze of simulations to test their abilities.
“It was intense,” Pahala Fire Station Firefighter Daniel Dierking said as he exited the real-life training scenario. “This is excellent training.”