It’s more of a mental exercise than anything, the firefighters said.
Still, the training exercises conducted in the crowded upstairs rooms of the Alpena public safety storage building on Wednesday left firefighters panting, hearts pounding, sucking in air after a real-life scenario gave them a taste of what they might encounter while saving property and lives.
Completing a six-week training regime, Alpena firefighters in full gear — seeing only dim light though the wads of wax paper tucked inside their masks — crawled, shimmied, and groaned their way through an obstacle-laden course, following a fire hose 180 feet through simulated danger and very real stress.
Tight tunnels simulating a fallen ceiling, 18-by-22-inch holes in the wall through which to squeeze, enclosed 90-degree corners nearly impossible to belly-crawl with an air pack on the back, and the dreaded entanglement box gave firefighters a full workout, physically and psychologically.