Newest Emergency Medical Responders – EMR Class of 2017

 

Congratulations are in order!

The following WPFD members recently completed training for Emergency Medical Responder!

Congrats to:
Henry Kessler (Station #1)
Mike Wilson (Station #2)
Virginia Austin (Station #4)
Brian Woepple (Station #2)
Mary Quaid (Station #4)
Steve Quaid (Station #4)
Blake Gilliam (Station #1) – not pictured
Cliff Spann (Station #3)
Joel DeWitt (Station #3) – not pictured
Ron Bruchwalski (Station #5)

EMR’s (formally called First Responders) are specially trained to provide pre-hospital care in medical emergencies or trauma situations, typically provide basic life support, and give vital assistance to Paramedics and EMTs.

These folks invested quite a bit of time over several weeks and completed 40 hours of classroom/lecture and practical (hands-on) learning. Adding the time for private study, class prep, and exam readiness can double the time commitment.

What will they think of next?

What an idea! I understand many vehicles on the road already have this not-so-new safety feature called a turn signal. What will they think up next, self -driving cars?

Watch the funny video if you have a few seconds.

<iframe width=”854″ height=”480″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/pMO4nyZ9xG8″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

Seriously, last night at a minor wreck at an intersection we had one of four lanes of travel partially blocked. Directing safe travel around the wreck was hard because drivers could not communicating to our traffic personnel what direction they wanted to go.

Help us out, please. A quick signal of your intended direction can help us guide you through traffic obstacles and detours more efficiently.

Thanks and stay safe!

Additional WPFD Repeater Tower Planned

Gallery

Hard at work. WPFD had a crew mixing it up on a mountain top with about 100 bags of concrete today. We set the foundation and base section of a new radio repeater that will serve our western part of our fire district. In the future we expect better communications for our crews working south of Lake Maumelle to the north side of Lake Norrell and toward the central part of our district near downtown Ferndale. We are glad it was a safe day and no one got hurt or slid down the steep mountain, luckily. Thank you to all of our guys that made it out to get this long needed project coming out of the ground and going skyward.

Brush Truck 4 Lost In Fire

 

 

This vehicle, based at Station #4, serves our Wye Mountain / Little Italy area and supports others in our district and neighboring departments for mutual aid. We are making plans for immediate and long-term replacement of this primary fire apparatus that is mostly used for grass/woods fires and secondary rescue or off-road support.

We expect insurance will cover the majority of costs to replace the 2008 Ford F-350 4×4 Heavy Duty chassis. We are already working to strip of the salvageable equipment like the fire-rated pump motor, water tank, hose, reel, and equipment. Realistically, we also lost emergency lighting, communication equipment and more that might not be fully covered with the cost of a comparable chassis and work bed.

Don’t worry. We are working hard to get a good quality truck chassis to rebuild from the ashes of our old truck. When the dust (or smoke) settles we may be able to get an even better truck to serve this area. If you would like to help in our rebuilding processes for constructing our replacement truck with a donation, please contact our business office at 501-821-9320 or email us at wpfd@sbcglobal.net to let us know how you might like to help.  We  hope to get things planned soon and start the construction of a replacement truck, work bed, and all the things that go into making a quality fire service vehicle for our Station 4 area.

Thanks!