The Estevan Fire Rescue Service (EFRS) assisted with several different emergency situations in the first half of this week, including a collision.
The incident occurred in the north-central part of Estevan at about 11:30 a.m. Wednesday. Firefighters rushed to the scene, where the Estevan Police Service (EPS) was assisting with traffic control, and EMS was treating people involved in the incident.
The fire department had to return vehicles to zero energy to disable the airbags that were posing a threat to workers on site, and also dealt with fluid leaks. The scene was then turned over to the EPS for further investigation.
Firefighters were also busy with a number of fire alarms in different areas of the city.
The first commercial fire alarm report came in at about 4:30 p.m. Monday. Crews were called out to the weigh scales at the Highway 39 west. Firefighters did a 360-degree check of the building, however, there was no visible smoke or flame. The keyholder was called on scene, so specialists could gain access.
Firefighters searched the building with thermal imaging cameras and inspected the fire alarm panel, which didn’t indicate an alarm being activated. Further investigation showed that one detection device appeared to be faulty. The scene was turned back over to maintenance staff, who were instructed to fix the piece of fire safety equipment.
Another commercial fire alarm went off at about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday. The system activation occurred in a large commercial industrial building on Highway 39 west. There was no smoke or flame either on the exterior of the building or inside it. The staff was also onsite. They received a notification from the monitoring agency but said that the fire alarm wasn’t activated in the building.
Firefighters searched all three large buildings on the property, but all fire alarm panels were reading normal.
“There is reason to believe that dust from the process that they do out there entered one of the fire alarm sensors, mimicking smoke,” explained Fire Chief Dale Feser.
The staff was advised to contact the monitoring agency for help to troubleshoot the situation.
Wednesday came to an end with another fire alarm going off. This time a residential fire alarm system was activated in the central area of the city at about 9:30 p.m. Upon arrival, firefighters couldn’t see any smoke or flame coming out of the building. The tenant explained that it was a cooking-related incident.
With not enough smoke remaining, the person was advised to just open the windows and naturally ventilate the building.
“Make sure that any time that you are cooking anything, attend it at all times,” said Feser.
Tuesday evening the fire department also held their regular 1001 training, in which firefighters were working on structural search and rescue drill. The task was even more difficult, as the participants were blindfolded for the sake of training.
“That way the firefighters that were training could experience what it was like to be in a smoke-filled environment and to do proper and safe primary and secondary searches, looking for people that may be inside the structure,” explained Feser.
