Smoke pours out of a metal building, alongside a window spitting out water from the inside.
Teams of firefighters surround the area alongside beeping, radio calls, and the whooshing of water traveling from hose to nozzle.
Recently, Garrison Manager, Kenneth Musselwhite partook in a simulated indoor fire training alongside the U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground (YPG) Fire Department.
“As soon as you walk in, you can feel that heat in there,” said Musselwhite. “Having the gear on and then walking in and being hotter, it hits you.”
Safety is a primary focus at YPG, and that applies to their fire department as well. Firefighters at YPG go through rigorous training to prepare for any emergency calls they may face. Whether it’s on the testing grounds or civilian homes, having that knowledge and experience is of the utmost importance when it comes to facing the unpredictable nature of fire.
By sharing this experience with someone who is not experienced in firefighting creates a new perspective to how it physically feels to get geared up and extinguish a fire. The pitch-black darkness from the smoke, the constricting space and the toxic chemicals that need to be washed off gear afterwards are all part of the experience.
That level of importance doesn't just come from the situation at hand but understanding the gear itself as well. The pressure from the hose, the weight of all the gear all at once, and knowing what effective methods there are when putting out the fire.
Brad Gray, a firefighter paramedic and acting captain at YPG, was one of the many to assist Musselwhite and navigate him throughout the process of extinguishing a fire within an uncertain, hostile environment.
“That physical stress, that we are physically putting on our bodies, moving that hose and the heat, it’s a lot, and Mr. Musselwhite got to experience a little bit of that,” said Gray.
“You have to have that person behind you supporting that hose to even be able to do it,” said Musselwhite.
For the training the YPG fire department used several Conex boxes stacked to simulate a multiple story building.
“We are making it predictable with these training simulations, we have control, but in a normal house fire not every structure is made in the exact same way. It’s never controlled for us when we go to a hot structure fire.”
Giving that experience to someone who does not go through something like this daily opens that opportunity to learn and educate more about what it truly means to be a firefighter at YPG.
“That was 11 minutes we were actually in there. I can’t imagine having to fight a fire now that lasts an hour and being still able to stand up,” said Musselwhite.
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