Over the past two months, every Hartsdale and Fairview member along with members of the Greenville and Scarsdale FDs continued their trench series training involving live trenches. Members were able to put their skills to the test in real scenarios. Utilizing our equipment members practiced removing a victim in all trench scenarios including a “straight trench”, “L-trench”, “T-trench” and a “deep trench”. We would like to thank our mutual aid departments and their Chiefs for the continued support as well as the Town of Greenburgh Water Department for use of their equipment, including their Vacuum Truck. Also a special thanks to the City of White Plains Fire Department for the use of their rescue vac system.
This training resulted in the training of over 80 members who each received over 60 hours of specialized rescue training. This training covered the NYS Medium Collapse Tools Class, NYS Trench Rescue Awareness, NYS Trench Rescue Operations, and NYS Trench Rescue Technician along with a general inservice training on all of Squad 36’s Technical Rescue equipment. The training was conducted by members of both the Hartsdale and Fairview Fire Departments who are certified as instructors for each topic. The total training hours of the members and instructors equals over 5,500 man hours of training during this series. A large portion of this training was made possible thanks to grant funding.

Squad 36 is available as a Technical Rescue Asset to any requesting agency and will respond with a minimum of 16 technical rescue trained members on initial dispatch. Additional support staff and technical rescue trained members will supplement and sustain the initial response as necessary.