TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Okla.—Firefighters with the Tinker Fire and Emergency Services here conducted live fire training with students enrolled in the fire academy at Oklahoma State University-Oklahoma City November 21, 2022, to help them acquire basic qualifications to allow them to find jobs in the local area.
“TFES has a long history with metro area fire training programs,” said Justin Dulworth, TFES assistant chief of training, “We have had off-duty personnel working for training centers in the area for over twenty years and it allows our personnel to foster relationships with metro departments and learn from fellow firefighters.”
OSU-OKC academies are hosted twice a year and several days are set aside to help facilitate the students learn specific skills.
“We host several live fire training sessions annually for our personnel and when our schedules align, our personnel will train with the academy students,” said Dulworth. “Primarily our personnel conduct several skill sessions during these events, to include fire behavior, fire suppression, ventilation, search and overhaul operations.”
By utilizing the training facility on Tinker, TFES can prepare the students for their future careers as well as keep current TFES trained to face unique challenges they may face on base.
“Our training complex has been a four-year project to upgrade our facilities to provide first rate training for our personnel,” Dulworth said. “Several personnel have had a hand in the development, design, build and implementation of the new facilities. Most bases have some similar facilities, but they all vary due to mission requirements, ours has been built around what TFES has deemed our high-risk responses.”
“Our T-prop trainer is full of movable doors so we can create different training scenarios,” Alex East, TFES firefighter said. “We can also make it a long hallway to mimic some of the longer buildings on base.”
Throughout the training, firefighters ran through several scenarios including loss of visual due to heavy smoke where firefighters had to rely on their other senses to communicate and successfully fight the fire.
TFES host several fire departments from around the state of Oklahoma.
“We have partnerships for our aircraft fire training with Will Rogers, Tulsa, Stillwater, Ardmore airports, as well as the 137th Special Operations Wing and the 507th Air Refueling Wing,” said Dulworth. We also train regularly with our mutual-aid partners in Midwest City, Del City and Oklahoma City.”