Some volunteer fire departments in Washington County have had a boost in the number of fire truck operators through a cross-training agreement with Washington County/Johnson City EMS.
Limestone, Gray and Nolichuckey fire departments all have EMS personnel stationed in the same building with an EMS response vehicle. EMS isn’t always dispatched to a fire call as a separate unit, but now those advanced EMTs have had firefighter cross training on how to operate the pumper trucks.
Because volunteer fire departments are not staffed around the clock, volunteers respond from home or work. Often, those volunteers have to drive past a fire to get to the station and respond on a fire truck.
“We have several of our stations in the county located in the volunteer fire departments,” EMS Chief Dan Wheeley said. “It started as a request from Limestone. They asked if our rescue techs would be willing to respond on the fire engine rather than the rescue vehicle.