Take a minute to ask yourself, “What do Palm Trees and Heavy Rescue Operations have in common?”

The Heavy Rescue Operations Course at the Orlando Fire Conference that’s WHAT! For 2015, the Orlando Fire Conference was held in late February. If you have not heard of the Orlando Fire Conference, there are two possibilities. You don’t like quality training….mmm….or you have been living under a rock. I had a great opportunity to teach at the HR Program alongside some great friends and the nation’s top instructors. District Chief Walt Lewis from Orlando Fire Dept. Spearheaded the Heavy Rescue Ops Program but the story behind the program is a particular one.

Lt. Bill Manning (Kissimmee FD/Lead at the Central Florida Fire Academy VMR Program) a good friend of Chief Lewis, had recommended doing a Heavy Rescue Program at the OFC. However, he never got the opportunity because he was tragically killed in a motorcycle crash while on his way to a Fire Department Union meeting. This tragic event gave the course a very particular meaning and was put together by Chief Lewis to see Bills vision through. To assist him, Chief Lewis assembled a top-notch team of instructors from all over the country.

This group of instructors allowed firefighters from as far as Germany to train on eight stations with numerous advanced scenarios per station. These advanced scenarios were set up to challenge the students and hands-on experience with the latest techniques and equipment. The program consisted of scenarios all the way from impalements to school bus over/under-rides and ran out of LKQ Orlando.

The primary scenario I worked with was a school bus rolled over onto a car with multiple patients trapped. During the rotation, we also covered bus size-up, big rig tactics, class D wrecker ops/familiarization, lifting and moving vehicles, stabilization, and obviously advanced extrication techniques.

The students worked hard over the weekend and were presented with a vast amount of information for them to take back to their departments. For our evolutions, Steve Clymer of Team Equipment provided equipment. Students practiced using Paratech Hydrafusions for lifting the school bus and finished off the evolutions with the assistance of Johnsons Wrecker Service’s Class D Rotator. Andy Kirshner from Palm Beach County F/R assisted me for the weekend, and I appreciated his help. The program was top notch, and thanks go out to the Orlando Fire Conference, the incredible students, all the instructors, equipment providers, LKQ, and obviously Chief Walt Lewis.