Training for new C. Oregon wildland firefighters set
The Central Oregon Fire Management Service will host its annual Guard School training the week of June 11 this year, where 57 men and women will begin their initial training to become wildland firefighters. At the end of the week-long event, students will be qualified as entry-level firefighters, and will join more than 300 other federal and state wildland firefighters working in Central Oregon this summer.
“This type of intense training provides the essential foundation for becoming an effective, well-informed, and safe firefighter,” said Nate LeFevre, acting fire staff for the Central Oregon Fire Management Service, the combined Forest Service and BLM fire and fuels organization in Central Oregon.
This year, attendees are coming from a variety of agencies, including the Forest Service, the BLM, the Oregon Department of Forestry, the Bend Fire Department, the US Fish & Wildlife Service, the Oregon Military Department and the Oregon National Guard.
During the week of training, the new firefighters will go through a rigorous schedule of classroom and field exercises designed to teach a variety of subjects including fire suppression techniques, fire behavior, fire ecology, maps/navigation skills, radio communications and risk management. The firefighters will also learn how to operate engines, pumps and other mechanized equipment.
On Thursday, June 14, the firefighters will go through a live fire exercise designed to provide hands-on experience in line building techniques, setting hose lays, and applying mop-up standards. Specialists will ignite a small prescribed burn in order to give the new recruits an opportunity to apply their new knowledge on an actual fire line.
Classroom work and some of the field exercises will be taught at the Biak Training Center east of Redmond, and the live fire exercise will occur on Forest Service lands near Black Pine Springs along Forest Road 16, about 6 miles southwest of Sisters. The practice fire will be a low-intensity maintenance burn in an area that was previously treated.
