New Danbury, CT, Fire Academy Provides Training to Regional Fire Departments

Michael Gagne
The News-Times, Danbury, Conn.
(TNS)

Jul. 29—DANBURY — You'll never take the danger out of firefighting, Danbury Deputy Fire Chief Shawn McGee says.

"That's always going to be there," McGee said. But you can train to "recognize as many hazards as you can, prepare yourself for as many hazards as you can so that hopefully in a bad or tough situation, you handle it the best you can."

McGee and other fire, city and area officials gathered Monday to celebrate the opening of Danbury's new Fire Training School, a four-story building made of galvanized steel and supported by a concrete foundation, with concrete floors, on Plumtrees Road.

The nearly $1 million building was built using American Rescue Plan Act monies.

The building has a parapet roof, with four rappelling anchors, which McGee said can be used to practice rope rescue skills. It has a large smoke generator, which the deputy chief said is capable of emitting 50,000 cubic feet of white smoke per minute. The smoke is controlled and pumped through eight different locations in the building, he said.

Officials described the facility as state of the art. It can be reconfigured, with moveable walls to simulate a variety of fire and rescue environments.

The new building is a few hundred feet away from the department's former fire training school building, which is 40 years old, and no longer structurally safe, according to officials.

"I think it's exciting," said Danbury Fire Capt. Jeff Nolet, a 12-year veteran of the Danbury Fire department.

One of the things Nolet said he is most excited about is ability to configure layouts on each of the first two floors. The former building, located just a few hundred feet away, has a static layout.

"It doesn't take very long to know the exact layout of that building," Nolet said. "So you're constantly going through the same evolutions, the same thing over and over. It's not very challenging."

But the new building, having the capability to move walls and to move smoke into different areas, "just makes the challenges a lot more realistic," Nolet said. "Because as firemen, you could go to every house on the same street, that all might be single story ranches, and they're all different from the inside. In that aspect it's huge."

Fire Chief Richard Thode noted that before the facility was completed, the closest training school options for firefighters in Danbury and neighboring departments were in Fairfield, New Haven or Torrnington, sometimes more than an hour drive.

"This site is close to home, yet it has state of the art facilities to train on," Thode said.

Mayor Roberto Alves described the new building as "a huge regional asset."

"It's about safety, it's training, making sure our men and women who are protecting us across our region have the best tools to learn, train, and to deliver the public safety that we value," Alves said.

Bethel First Selectman Dan Carter agreed. "This is a big win for the region," he said. "To have this kind of a facility right here in our backyard for Bethel is huge."

Officials said the building, built by contractor Hawley Construction, was completed ahead of schedule.

Fire safety was on the minds of public safety officials, as they called for a moment of silence to mourn the loss of a fallen comrade in Plainville over the weekend. Volunteer firefighter Raymond Moreau died on Sunday after he was struck by a piece of firefighting apparatus while battling a house fire.