86th Firefighter Recruit Academy graduation to be held today.
The Des Moines Fire Department will host a graduation ceremony for (20) new firefighters today. The 86th Firefighter Recruit Academy graduation will be held at McCombs Middle School, 201 SW Army Post Road, Des Moines, Iowa at 1:00 PM.
These (20) firefighters have recently completed 14 weeks of firefighter, emergency medical services, and departmental operations training and have completed the classroom portion (10 weeks) of Mercy's Paramedic Program.
These recruits are currently Firefighter I, Firefighter II, and EMT-Basic certified. They will complete their paramedic field training and be Nationally certified paramedics in July of 2003.
Past recruiting efforts did not require Des Moines firefighters to become certified paramedics during their recruit training. However, a continuous effort is being made to have more paramedics available throughout the department to replace those paramedics that have been promoted or retire and fill-in for those paramedics that are injured or not available.
Note: The Des Moines Fire Department responded to 16,952 alarms in 2002 with 12,238 of those being medic calls and the remaining 4714 being fire calls.
Today's ceremony will be lead by District Chief of Training, Dale Bunting with Council Member Chris Coleman and Fire Chief Phillip Vorlander as guest speakers.
Linda Frangenberg Lieutenant DMFD
