RECYCLED TRAINING GROUND
INNOVATIONS: HOMEGROWN
When I assumed the position of training instructor for the 160-member City of Terre Haute (IN) Fire Department some seven years ago, I inherited, along with the title, a box of old appliances and some audiovisual aids. As is the case in most agencies today, training budgets are being cut while the need for training is increasing. A little creativity helped our department overcome the budgetary challenges and meet our instructional objectives for some of our training requirements.
A solution to my predicament of how to provide confined-space training at a low cost occurred to me as I drove past a school playground on a rural road. The “equipment” in it constituted assorted sizes of old tires and swings, climbing towers, and other play stations made of treated lumber.
On investigation, 1 found it was easy to obtain old tires from local dealers at no cost and some treated lumber, labeled “unfit for # 1 grade.” from local lumberyards at a next-to-nothing cost. Adding a little hardware, the willing and enthusiastic services of our department’s firefighter recruits/ carpenters, the backing of the chief and other department superiors, and the cooperation and expertise of our local industrial community, our department developed a versatile facility that provides demanding, efficient, and realistic training opportunities for department members, as well as for personnel of the local industries who donated training props and their services to help us set them in place.
TRAINING COMPLEX
The training ground includes the following components:
- Horizontal obstacle station. Approximately 25 feet long, its bolted frame consists of 36 truck tires, set up side by side, and treated lumber. It is used for simulated confined-space entry drills in which personnel use their air packs with the masks donned. Students push the tank and unit ahead of them or pull themselves through the station v/hile lying on their backs w ith the tank and unit resting on their thighs.
- Vertical obstacle station. Approximately 15 feet high, this “towerlike” structure is made from large, heavy-duty, mining-truck tires that weigh about 250 pounds each and measure about six feet across. It is used for drills in confined-space entry’, tripod/w inch rescue, and haz-mat rescue. In addition, it is used for personal protective equipment (PPE) dressout drills. Personnel are sent down in the tower “hole,” measuring about four feet across, for various training exercises ranging from simple tool retrieval to more advanced haz-mat operational procedures, depending on the student’s level (haz-mat leaks such as that of anhydrous ammonia
- are simulated by shooting water from a garden hose through the sides of the tire tower and carefully ejecting a small amount of carbon dioxide). Students entering the station must be fully dressed in the appropriate PPE at all times and must be reasonably comfortable. (We are fully aware of the instructors’ responsibility to have an emergency student rescue plan. W hile realistic simulation is a desired goal, carefi.il planning and safety first are primary considerations.)
- Plug-n-patch” suit ion. We also used treated landscaping timbers to construct a 24by 32-foot sandbox to define a haz-mat training area. Various sizes and shapes of haz-mat containers and props, such as a railcar dome on stilts, that might be encountered at a haz-mat incident are featured. The dome, approximately 4½ feet high, provides opportunities to practice patching with the type “C” patch kit (for railcars and trucks); and the oneton cylinder, such as that used to store chlorine, enables students to patch with the type “B” kit. Watersprav fog is used to simulate the environment during a chlorine leak. Another training experience is created by pumping water into the plug-npatch vessel —an old 275-gallon fuel oil tank —to simulate the expelling of a product. The vessels at this station are not permanently anchored in the sand and may be rearranged to vary the layouts.
