Firefighters set a house on fire in Templeton to better serve their neighbors and for some firefighters, to experience a structure fire for the first time.
Firefighters from the Templeton and Camp Roberts fire departments spent Sunday morning at a live fire training off Vineyard Drive in Templeton.
Templeton Fire Chief Tom Peterson said the home, donated to the department by the Templeton Unified School District, is the perfect place for firefighters to take their training into the real world.
“In the county, we don't have a lot of structure fires on a regular basis as opposed to other areas,” Peterson said. “These opportunities allow the guys, especially the newer guys, to get that exposure to live fire, the environment, what the smoke's going to do.”
Peterson said this training is giving four of his part-time firefighters the opportunity to battle a structure fire for the first time.
He said this experience helps build up the firefighters' confidence before they have to respond to a real scenario.
"It still gives the new firefighters exposure to actual fire and actual smoke conditions,” Peterson said.
Ryan Clayton has been part of Templeton Fire for a year and a half. He said this is his first time training in a structure fire outside of the classroom.
“You need to be confident in what you're doing in there so that you keep yourself safe and especially your coworkers and especially the people we serve,” Clayton said. “We need to be ready at all times. If there is an event where there is a fire in someone's house here, we want to provide the best service we can. This is a perfect opportunity to build confidence to do that.”
Chief Peterson said the department takes advantage of these rare opportunities by running as many drills with the building as possible before it goes up in flames.
He said they will be working on search and rescue, vertical ventilation and fire attack.
Clayton said this training is a humbling reminder of the danger of the job to keep his community safe.
“This is probably the best training I've gotten so far working here,” Clayton said. “This is as real as it can get.”
