Nearly a half-dozen Lake County area fire departments have banded together to help their brothers and sisters in the fire service more than 3,500 miles away. The local fire departments, including Grand River and Painesville, recently collected dozens of sets of decommissioned but still viable firefighting gear – including breathing apparatus, turnout gear and air tanks – to be donated to the all-volunteer fire service in Peru.
Specifically, the gear will be donated to firefighters in Huancayo, Peru, which is roughly 180 miles east of Lima. The idea behind the massive donation came from firefighter Luis Salas, who works part-time at the Grand River Fire Department in addition to his full-time career firefighting job at another area department. Salas is originally from Huancayo and still has family living there.