Using Simulation Training to Buy Back Time
As deputy fire chief for the Township of St. Clair in Ontario, Canada, Steve Bicum is especially sensitive to the increasing complexity of disaster response. In St. Clair Township, 16,000 residents live alongside local businesses, farmland, petrochemical refineries, industrial production sites, and vital transportation and logistics hubs. The St. Clair Township Fire Department (SCTFD) has to cover 250 square miles with 150 paid, on-call firefighters operating out of six fire stations—all of which is managed by just four full-time staff.
As one can imagine, their most valuable resource is time. As Steve has explained, adopting immersive simulation-based training has allowed SCTFD his crews to make more of that resource:
“Most departments—even the big ones—don’t often get the opportunity to teach vital mental skills tied to order of operations, communication, and situational awareness. With simulators, in an evening, we can run five or six scenarios with one person. We can do that over and over again without exhausting everybody, without having to reload the hose on the truck or relight fires.”
At Natural Disasters Expo USA this year, FAAC’s team will be demonstrating two of our leading simulators for disaster and industrial fire response:
- inCommand: FAAC’s interactive 3D incident command and control simulation tool for comprehensive tactical and procedural training.
- Pump Ops Digital Touch (PO-DT): FAAC’s standalone touchscreen-based pump operations simulator, capable of emulating any pump panel configuration and accurately simulating the hydraulics of both water and firefighting foams of all types
Visit us at Booth #1710 to learn more about FAAC’s turnkey solutions for optimized response training.
Connect With FAAC to Learn More
As Bill Martin, FAAC’s public safety business manager, notes “This is our first year attending the expo, and we’re eager to connect with more stakeholders. We’re seeing renewed investment in domestic industrial capacity—petrochemical production, industrial processes, and the logistics and communities that support that—which means an increasing risk that more people will be more seriously affected if something goes wrong. Preparing for large-scale high-risk/low-frequency has always been the strong suit for inCommand. With Pump Ops Digital, our latest pump operations simulator, we’re expanding our simulator line to meet evolving demands and help bridge that training gap, especially as Class B foam formulations are changing.”
Bill, Steve, and Phil look forward to demonstrating how the latest advancements in simulation and modeling are creating new opportunities to improve complex, hands-on training. They’ll be at Booth #1710 on October 14 and 15.
Can’t make it to Houston this year, but still want to learn about new ways simulation is helping agencies optimize emergency responder training? Contact FAAC whenever you’re ready to learn more.
