DOVER, Del. - Firefighters training at the Delaware State Fire School in Kent County will soon have a new tool designed to make their training look and feel more like the real thing.
Construction is underway on a new burn building at the school's 18-acre training grounds. The roughly $1.7 million project is funded through the state's bond bill and has been more than four years in the making.
The new facility includes five burn chambers where instructors can create different fire and smoke conditions. Unlike the school's existing brick-and-mortar burn building, which dates to around 1968 and primarily burns straw, the new structure can burn plywood, straw and wood pallets.
Officials say the new building can reach temperatures of up to 1,200 degrees at the ceiling, allowing firefighters to experience conditions closer to what they may encounter during an actual structure fire.
"This building will allow them to feel the temperatures and to operate in the conditions that they're going to see," Deputy Director Chad Ingram said.
The facility is designed for a variety of scenarios. Firefighters can practice forcible entry, search and rescue, hose operations from balconies and firefighter self-survival techniques. A garage area with a metal car frame will also allow trainees to practice responding to vehicle fires.
Training Administrator Jeff Brown said the variety is important because firefighters could respond to many different types of buildings.
"It's very important that we capture as many different environments as we can," Brown said. "We can train folks on single family homes, we can train folks on multifamily home fires, we can train folks on commercial fires."
The building also features ventilation chambers that instructors can use to help control conditions inside.
Fire School Director Matthew Dodds said the new facility will give trainees a better understanding of how smoke and fire can behave differently depending on the structure and conditions.
"This prop is really important because it allows the students to not only see different types of housing types, building types, but also different patterns and behaviors of both smoke and fire," Dodds said.
The existing brick-and-mortar burn building will continue to be used. Officials say the new facility is designed to complement it while bringing the school's training capabilities into 2026.
The new building was purchased from Drager and is the company's largest training prop on the East Coast.
Before firefighters can begin training inside, crews still need to finish a front porch and several punch-list items. Drager trainers will then spend about a week training Fire School instructors on how to operate and load the building.
Officials hope the facility will be operational this fall, though the exact timeline depends on construction and training schedules.
The Kent County facility is also expected to be the first of three new burn buildings planned by the Delaware State Fire School. Similar facilities are planned for the school's divisions in New Castle and Sussex counties, bringing more advanced fire training closer to departments throughout the state.
