Live fire training in Jackson Township

A multi-department live fire training exercise was held on State Road 19 near Hamilton Heights High School Saturday afternoon. Cicero, Jackson Township, White River and Sheridan fire departments all participated. The Cicero Fire Department acquired the house and organized the training event.

Photo provided by Jeff Muszar, Jackson Township Fire Chief

According to Cicero Fire Department Assistant Chief Steve Smith, this training was made possible by a donation of property from Beck’s Hybrids in Atlanta.

“Beck’s has been really good to donate properties to fire departments in the area so we can use them for training,” Smith said. “The value is really huge to us. It gives us an opportunity to do training with live fire in our own backyard, as opposed to going to county training center. This also gives us the opportunity to do training with agencies we work with every day.”

Exercises like this involve setting fires inside the building to teach new and veteran firefighters what to look for and how to react in an actual emergency.

Jackson Township Fire Chief Jeff Muszar told The Reporter, “We are a family and we give credit where credit is due. Cicero put all this together and Jackson Township Fire Department dovetailed in with them.” According to Chief Muszar, after exercises like this one, “When something does happen, it is just reaction from training. Instead of having to think it through, they can just react from how they’ve been trained and keep everyone safe.”

Photo provided by Christina (Chris) Miller, Jackson Township Trustee

Assistant Chief Smith told The Reporter, “We always make sure to get as much interagency cooperation as possible.”

According to Cicero Fire Chief Lance Overholser, that cooperation is necessary because so many of their calls may involve multiple departments.

“We run 25 percent of our calls with Jackson Township,” Overholser said. “We see them on a regular basis. We have agreements for automatic aid, which means on a large incident we get called out together. We need to train more together and understand how each other work so we can work better when we are together on big scenes.”

Smith said this is a great opportunity for both new and experienced firefighters to work together and collaborate.

“We test our capabilities together and teach new firefighters; we also requalify some of our veterans to make sure everyone is doing a great job,” Smith said. “This was another successful day of training.”

According to Jackson Township Trustee Christina (Chris) Miller, “This is a good day for northern Hamilton County because multiple firefighters from multiple department were able to work together so everybody is better prepared to handle emergencies in the future.”