A Volunteer Firefighter that has no training is nothing more than a misappropriately revered citizen, an uneducated professional, and a tragedy waiting to happen.

-anonymous

We train, we fight, we win.

A note from the Chief-

One thing that I have said from day one and I will stand by is that while our resources and funding are finite I will spend the last dime on training. A shiny truck that shows up with the best equipment is no good if the person using it has no idea what he/she is doing. I like to think I have lead by example of attending, hosting, and pushing for the most training possible. While it can be difficult to balance home life and a training schedule the cold reality is that the fire doesn’t care. There is not an entrance of a burning building that is labeled “volunteer” or “full time” The fire does not care if you are trained or not and you cant train too hard for a job that can kill you.

We train in house and out.

While we rely heavily on the immense wealth of knowledge that OSU-FST provides to departments all over the state, we also do as much training as we can in house as well. We encourage all firefighters to attend via OSU;

  • Vehicle extrication technician 1A

  • Vehicle Extrication technician 1B

    But we have also done some of this training in house so we can be more familiar of the real world application of our tools and environment that is specific to our district. We like to train how we fight.

Firefighter 1 Training

We currently on our roster have 3 Firefighters who have completed firefighter 1 training and certification and it is our goal to send at least two a year but no more than 4 to the firefighter 1 academy at OSU FST west in stillwater. We pay for the room and board of a hotel nearby for the two weeks that the Firefighters are training so they can focus their full attention on honing their craft.

It is our belief that the firefighter 1 academy at OSU is the best training experience available to volunteer firefighters in the entire state at an incredible value.

Hazardous Materials

It is a requirement that all firefighters attend at minimum Hazardous materials awareness level training and obtain their IFSAC certification. For those that wish to obtain their Firefighter 1 certification Hazardous Materials Operations is a prerequisite for that certification. Each of these is put on by OSU FST and we have hosted them in Wanette as well.

Ropes Rescue Training

Ropes Rescue training is the foundation of all technical rescue training. With the ever changing technology in the industry we are incredibly grateful to have resources like OSU FST to help keep us up to speed on newer and safer equipment and safe use of all of it.

Interagency Training

The Fire Department is just one cog in the public safety machine. It is our responsibility to train and work with other agencies on a regular basis to keep the miscommunications and mistakes in a training environment and not in the real world incidents. We send our firefighters to FEMA ICS classes such as NIMS, 300, 400, as well as performing trainings with our local helicopter ambulance service Air Evac.

FLAG (Flammable Liquids and Gases)

Due to having many oilfield operations as well as a large Propane storage facility inside our city limits we feel its very important to send as as many firefighters as possible to this training as well it is simply just outstanding training and amazing live burn motivation. In this training the firefighter learns how to effectively use foam, water curtains, fog patterns and dry chemical extinguishers in addition to the saftey training about things like H2S and other oilfield hazards

Swift Water Rescue

In 2024 we intend to send as many Firefighters as possible to the swiftwater rescue operations and technician course provided by OSU FST. With the river on our southern side of the district being a hot spot for calls we feel its not a matter of if but when we have a water rescue = and we intend to be prepared.

Public Education

In addition to doing our own AHA CPR training we also do courses for the public because in reality the lay person is indeed the first responder. We also do AHA first aid as well as fire prevention week for the Wanette Public Schools