Elementary students get up-close look at fire safety

Published 8:00 am Thursday, May 16, 2019

DALTON, Ga. — Westwood School fifth-grader Slade Swaney sat with classmates on Wednesday as flames poured out of a simulated house fire, watched as firefighters pulled a “victim” from the fire and immediately started life-saving measures.

In spite of spending one class a month in the Dalton Fire Department’s Fire Safety program at his school, Swaney thought firefighters went in and rescued people and then put the fire out.

“I was surprised they got the victim out and immediately started doing CPR on the victim,” Swaney said. “I thought that was something they would do in the ambulance, but that just shows the firefighters do more than just put out fires.”

Wednesday’s fire demonstration at Dalton Fire Department Station 2 off Abutment Road was the culmination of three days of in-person demonstrations to fifth-graders at three of the Dalton Public Schools’ elementary schools. Fire department safety coordinator Donnie Blankenship and other firefighters held classes once a month at Blue Ridge, City Park and Westwood schools.

The classes addressed different topics, from home inspections and burn injuries to cooking safety and emergency safety escape plans. Blankenship said students completed activity sheets each month and a point system was used for a competition among the three schools. Blue Ridge was the winner of this year’s contest and received a trophy and a pizza party after Tuesday’s fire demonstration.

While the program has been in the school system for the past three years, this is the first time students have seen firefighters in action. DFD Chief Todd Pangle said the program is equal parts education, community relations and recruitment.

“Being able to get the safety message and having these kids be able to take that message home and spread it is huge,” Pangle said. “They know what to do in the event of an emergency and have a plan in case of a fire. It has given them a sense of responsibility as well as learning a lot about fire safety. That is a huge benefit for us.”

Pangle said students can build relationships with firefighters and that encourages them to be curious. The firefighters, he said, get almost as much out of it as the students.

“For some of these guys, they relate well with the kids because they are still kids themselves,” Pangle said with a laugh. “Our guys do have a lot of fun with this. A lot of them really enjoy the interaction with the kids and being able to share their knowledge. They promote the safety and promote the department from within and either way it is a win-win for us.”

Another win is that it may inspire the next generation of firefighters.

“There are several positives I see as the chief, and one of them is longterm recruitment and planting the seed that maybe some of them want to be servants when they get older,” Pangle said. “Whether that is with the fire department or the police department or in the military, it plants a seed of service.”

Swaney said he thought the fire demonstration was cool but said he couldn’t do all the things firefighters do. Still, he said he is more “fire aware” now than he was at the start of the year.

“I really liked the program,” Swaney said. “I felt like it taught me a lot of important lessons on how to survive a house fire if it were to happen. My mom was a chaperone and they were telling us we needed to have a fire extinguisher. I looked at my mom because we don’t have a fire extinguisher, and I was like, ‘Mom, we really need a fire extinguisher.’”