Source: Daily Hampshire Gazette (Northampton, MA)
By SEAN REAGAN Staff Writer
Five Hilltown volunteer firefighters graduated this month from the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy’s I/II Basic Training Class.
Two firefighters from Goshen and three from Chesterfield were among 29 men and women honored after completing the six-month course.
”It was a great course,” said Susan Labrie, who serves on the Goshen fire department. ”It brought so much training to us, and now we can take it back to our departments.”
The program is not mandated for volunteer firefighters, but Labrie said that the extra training was still beneficial.
”It makes you safer, it makes the people you’re out there with safer and it gives you better skills,” she said.
Chesterfield firefighter David Hewes, who also graduated from the course, said he was grateful that the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy was now offering courses in western Massachusetts that are geared to call volunteers.
”We’ve got full-time jobs, so we really needed something on nights and weekends,” he said. ”It was a great opportunity to learn.”
Firefighters from communities in both Hampshire and Franklin counties attended the training.
Other Hilltown graduates included Dustin Culver of Goshen and Michael Welch and Roger Bancroft of Chesterfield.