May 07--Heavy smoke erupted Monday night from the top floor of the former Bowling Green Municipal Utilities building at 801 Center St. as loud music blared from inside, while several county and city firefighters stood at the door with 30-plus pound gear in tow, ready to go in for the rescue.
"They're looking for a live victim and the location is unknown," said Bowling Green Fire Department training Capt. Jason Sowders, who talked to firefighters about what to look for before they entered the smoke-filled building in which floors were covered in water during a training exercise.
Moments later the first group of firefighters carried out Woodburn Volunteer Fire Department Chief Bob Skipper who played the victim in the rescue training. Skipper was lying in a basement hallway waiting on crews to locate him.
"Once they started the evolution it took them less than five minutes," Skipper said, who described the environment inside the building as wet and smelly. "The more realistic the training is, the better the firefighters will be equipped in case of a real-life emergency."
The drills from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. Monday night were part of mutual-aid training between Bowling Green Fire Department firefighters and several county volunteer fire departments who worked on victim removal skills and search and rescue techniques.
"You've got just a matter of seconds to react to the pressure and then trying to find your way around the building," Sowders said. "This whole building is what we call a cut-up building, it has lots of turns, lots of doors, so you can get lost real easy, especially with low visibility."
A total of 61 firefighters from county volunteer fire departments and BGFD took part in the training and were split into teams. The county volunteer fire departments which participated included Gott, Woodburn, Browning, Plano, Alvaton and Smiths Grove.
"This is a good thing for us to be able to do with the county because these guys are out here, and they don't get paid -- they're volunteers," Sowders said. "They are out here because they want to be, and it's exciting to have that desire ... we're honored to have them."
Firefighters were equipped in full gear toting around axes, self-contained breathing apparatuses, self-contained breathing masks, helmets and radios, which can easily add more than 30 pounds, said Woodburn volunteer firefighter Brandon Peay of Oakland.
"There's times you wear it so much, you get used to it," Peay said about the heavy equipment. "We get called at any hours of the day, we're used to rapidly changing."
The groups took turns entering the building in an attempt to locate the victim, who was a firefighter from either a county department or from BGFD.
"We create a lot of chaos and a stressful environment for them," Sowders said. "We trap them down on the ground with a mat, and that allows them to get a little bit excited and work under pressure, because once they're trapped they have to get to a radio, or at least a crew to them to get help."
Gott Volunteer Fire Department Chief Craig Peay said the mutual-aid training was a way for city and county fire departments to get to know one another.
"Why wait until it actually happens?" Craig Peay said. "That's why we split everybody up to make it a little awkward on them, but that's good."
Copyright 2013 - Daily News, Bowling Green, Ky.
