EASTON, Md. - An emergency services training center will be coming to the town of Easton.
The group called Friends of Easton Volunteer Fire Department (EVFD) says it will be a state of the art training campus.
President of Friends with EVFD, Brett Whitehead says training facilities are not available around the mid-shore.
"We currently do not have any training facility within the mid-shore location that is dedicated just to training. We have a training facility which is the MFRI [Maryland Fire and Rescue Institute] facility in Centreville, Maryland. We also have a training facility in Princess Anne, Maryland but these facilities are primarily used for certification." He added, "Our facility will be used for skill enhancement."
The town of Easton owns the 2.7 acre plot of land on Mistletoe Drive and the EVFD will be able to use this land for 20 years for the facility.
Within the land, it will have three training centers and it's not designated only for the EVFD. Emergency personel like law enforcement and EMT's are encouraged to use it.
One will be a building as a classroom setting.
One will be an area to mimic car fires. Whitehead says, the infrastructure will contain two pads. Those two pads will contain a gas feed. It will allow them to do car fires and extrication. It will also allow the police to do law enforcement drills as it relates to the vehicle. And, it will allow the medical EMT side to do their thing when it comes to a motor vehicle accident.
Whitehead says a large part all three groups calls are motor vehicle collisions, so it's a perfect training piece.
The third piece to the property is something they call a burn building or public safety building. It's a 3-story building were they will set a small fire to generate a lot of smoke. The fire department will use this to practice with entrapment, smoke inhalation, and of course rescue. The police can use this for hostage rescue or physical training. Whitehead says, "The same thing would apply to the medical side. They could join in an do medical extraction, medical treatment or triage, etc. within this building.
Along with that 3-story building, personnel will be able to repel off of it, climb it, and do latter drills.
Firefighter Edward Forte says it's something that will impact the county.
"Its not just the Easton Fire Department. It's gonna be better for the area in general for the police departments and for the EMT's to train together," says Forte. "When you train continuously with one thing its the muscle memory where if you continuously do the same thing over and over again, when it happen it's easier to react to a situation. If we have all three agencies working together I think its going to be a positive for everybody. "
The project is estimated to cost $5 million. EVFD says they're looking at this as a 3-year-project in regards to finding funding.
They just received a 1 million dollar private donation from A. James & Alice B. Clark Foundation.
But they are still working to get private donations and grants.
For more information or to donate contact Brett Whitehead. whitenj20@gmail.com