It was a scene worthy of a double-take: A San Diego Fire-Rescue Department truck parked outside a Tijuana hotel on Monday morning, its ladder reaching toward smoke blowing from the third floor.
In the heart of the city’s bustling Río Zone, firefighters from both sides of the border were conducting a high-rise rescue exercise, and for the first time San Diego crossed units to Tijuana for training purposes.
The operation followed a four-day course imparted last week by San Diego firefighters on high-rise fire response policies and procedures to 45 members of the Tijuana Fire Department.
The exercise brought dozens of firefighters in protective gear to the Hotel Real Inn. They divided into teams, some carrying injured victims on stretchers down the stairwell. Others operated the ladder, while another group prepared to step in should any of firefighters become injured.
A high-rise fire “requires a lot of power, a lot of resources,” said San Diego Fire Chief Brian Fennessy, standing with his Tijuana counterpart, Carlos Gopar. “If Tijuana had a high-rise fire and they did by chance request help, we’ve already got that relationship, we know how we can work and complement each other.”
It is a skill that will become increasingly important to Tijuana firefighters in coming years as growing numbers of residential towers are built in the city. But the simulation was as much about building cross-border relationships as imparting technical training.
“In case of emergency, we don’t talk about U.S. citizens and Mexican citizens, we talk about saving lives,” said Tijuana Mayor Jorge Astiazarán, watching from the street below.
The Tijuana and San Diego fire departments have collaborated for years, and in both directions. Tijuana firefighters crossed the border in 2007 to help their San Diego counterparts fight the wildfires.
“What we’ve learned is that the Tijuana Fire Department is very well trained, they’re very well equipped, and their apparatus is state of the art,” said Fennessy.
“We’re truly one region,” he said. “While there’s a fence that divides us, we’re trying to take that down from an operational perspective.”
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