FRACKVILLE — Groundbreaking ceremonies were held Wednesday at the site of a soon-to-be “Multi-Purpose Training Facility” on the grounds of the Schuylkill County Fire School.
“This is a long time coming,” said David Sattizahn, president of the Schuylkill County Volunteer Firefighters Association and Pine Grove fire chief.
Sattizahn told county and state officials in attendance, as well as firefighters and representatives from the business community, the importance of the $1.4 million project and said the facility would not be possible without a joint effort by government, private businesses, firefighters and the general public.
He said the new 7,000-square-foot building replaces the old “burn building” that was built in 1990 and served as a training site for firefighters from Schuylkill and surrounding counties until it was forced to close in 2013.
Eric Eichenberg, Minersville fire chief and lead trustee with the Schuylkill County Firefighters Association, said the previous building had a life span of 20 years but by making concessions that time was able to be extended an additional three years.
At that time, Eichenberg said fire officials realized they were in a predicament.
Such a structure was needed to train volunteer firefighters so they can do their jobs better, safely saving lives and property, and without the burn building that would mean having to travel to other facilities, some as far as Lewistown.
With that in mind, the association, along with the Schuylkill County Fire Chief’s Association, began to formulate a way to replace the structure and in 2014 hired RDG Planning and Design of Omaha, Nebraska, to draft plans for the project.
After hours of work, Eichenberg said the project was placed on bid and in September awarded to Performance Construction Services Inc., Pottsville.
Sattizahn said that to date, more than $600,000 has been obtained from various sources to help fund the project.
He said the building will serve Schuylkill County for decades.
“This main structure will be here long after I’m gone,” Sattizahn said.
Unlike the previous building that was mainly for training with live fire, Frank Zangari, president of the Schuylkill County Fire Chiefs Association, said the new facility will serve firefighters, police officers, EMS and county businesses and industry. He said Class A fires, up to 1,400 degrees, can be lit and firefighters can also train on bedroom fires, living room fires, kitchen and garage fires, cell block fires, and warehouse fires and fires in both residential and commercial rooms.
Training areas available will be business and industrial areas, roof and flat roof training, forcible entry, breaching walls and chimney fires.
Also available will be areas for attic searches, balcony rescue, caged safety ladder rescues, ladders on ships and training with live sprinklers.
Zangari brought statistics to show how hard the Schuylkill County Fire School grounds are used.
Over the most recent one- year period, he said 215 classes were conducted, comprised of 3,268 students for 41,462 training hours, all by volunteer firefighters.
Zangari said that with increasing family obligations and rising costs of raising a family, volunteers no longer have the luxury of taking time from work and traveling for training.
This is evident in the decrease in volunteer firefighters in Pennsylvania, down from 300,000 in 1974 to just under 50,000 today, he said.
“We as leaders have to be the ones who not only keep the interest in the volunteer fire service but keep those volunteers well trained and safe,” Zangari said.
Sattizahn said that Schuylkill County has a total of 108 fire companies, all volunteer, and each one has access to the fire school grounds and, later this year, the new training building.
Eichenberg stressed the importance of training and the value of the new building.
“As fire chief, I assumed the responsibility to maintain a crew of trained professional volunteer firefighters,” he said. “This facility will provide the tool for training firefighters to perform their jobs safely.”
“It also gives me peace of mind knowing this valuable resource will be available to future fighters for 50-plus years,” Eichenberg said.