Firefighters train at new Columbia Falls facility
Columbia Falls firefighters Brad Peterson, holding hose, and Ryan Smith go through training last week at the new facility in Columbia Falls last week.
By CHRIS PETERSON
Hungry Horse News
Folks driving past the Columbia Falls Rural Fire Hall on Highway 2 may have seen smoke pouring from a building last week or a car on fire with a slew of firefighters attacking the blaze.
It was just a drill and part of a Montana State Fire School.
All told, four Kalispell, two Columbia Falls, one Ferndale and one West Valley firefighter went through the two-week long course to become certified firefighters, explained Columbia Falls Fire Chief Karl Weeks.
The complex, built by the rural department, is a state-of-the-art training facility. The main building is designed for live fire training, as if a house were on fire.
Sensors inside the rooms monitor the temperatures, which aren’t supposed to rise above 900 degrees for firefighter safety.
The building has an outside monitor that tells instructors the temperatures inside. The building itself is pretty much fireproof — the floors are firebrick and the walls are fire resistant material as well. They can only burns wood inside, however, due to air quality control, Weeks said. That means normal household items that contain plastic or insulation can’t be burned.
Still, once the pallets are on fire, it might as well be a house fire, as firefighters drill on how to deal with smoke and heat and the intricacies of using self-contained breathing units.
They even drill on how to break down the door — a specialized door is also used and firefighters during the drill use a variety of tools to bust it open. Firefighters also practice rescuing people and other firefighters during the school.
In a separate building out back, firefighters work on two different pitched roofs, as they train on how to cut through them with an ax.
The facility also has a tower they use to train on hotel and other multi-story commercial building fires.
There they practice on how to hook up hoses to internal fire hydrants and how to shut off sprinkler systems if need be.
Firefighters ranged from decades of experience to no experience at all, Weeks noted. The certification process doesn’t require a minimum amount of experience.
Columbia Falls firefighters Brad Peterson and Ryan Smith were taking the course. They have decades of experience between them. Peterson noted he took a rather cold shower working on the fire tower, trying to shut off a valve.