Firefighters in the Packerland Fire District are breaking in their new training facility.
We first told you last year that three area fire departments teamed up to have the facility built in order to do critical training while staying close to their respective districts.
“This container is the engineered container where we would do our live fire training,” Lt. Chris Hohol, training officer for the Howard Fire Department, showed us.
The facility is built out of old trucking containers, which have obstacles inside that firefighters could face when responding to a fire.
“The structure is certified by engineers, so we meet all the criteria for the NFPA [National Fire Protection Association] criteria. We have a self-contained breathing apparatus challenge prop inside, which is basically a maze that when they wear their air packs; it challenges them to control their breathing and calm down in tight spaces. There’s confined space prop built in and general search and rescue training,” said Lt. Hohol.