Local fire academy graduates honored
By SUE RYAN
News staff writer
June 10, 2008
Zach Moran marched to the stage with pride in his step as
he joined the rest of his red-shirted class in graduating Saturday night
from the 2008 Fire in the Gorge Academy.
He was following in the steps of a family tradition by
becoming a volunteer firefighter for the Parkdale Fire Department. His
father, Daniel Moran, and brother, Jake Moran, have been involved for 17
and 3 years respectively. Zach had joined the department a year ago but
decided to pursue the academy training four months ago.
So did high school senior Rebecca Gehrman. Her dad
volunteered for Parkdale, and she did so for Odell. She believes her
training has helped her feel more confident about responding to fire
calls.
“I got to know that fire is hotter than it looks in a fire
pit,” she said.
After an intensive series of classes in both the classroom
and active training, the moment had arrived to be honored Saturday in the
auditorium of the Hood River Middle School. They joined 22 others from
fire departments throughout the Columbia Gorge.
Hood River Fire Assistant Chief Devon Wells, who
coordinated the academy, told graduates to conduct themselves with pride,
honor and integrity in everything they do for their departments.
Wells came up with the idea for the academy four years ago
after attending a conference in the South and learning of another
department’s approach to training volunteers in a concentrated span of a
few months rather than sporadic trainings.
Guest speaker Kim Lightley brought a sobering reminder to
the evening by sharing her experiences as a survivor of the 1994 Storm
King blaze in Colorado that killed nine of her coworkers.
Lightley served on the Prineville Hotshot crew that was
fighting a wildfire when the tragedy struck.
“Take the academics and apply it in the field to be safe,”
she said. “On July 6, 1994, we had the opportunity to be safe and we
failed.”
Lightley had not been able to bring herself to read the
safety report on the fire for 12 years when she opened it up two years
ago. After that she decided to start sharing her experiences as part of a
campaign to make sure firefighters stand up for safety.
Wells underscored her message by advocating the
firefighters bring it to their superior’s attention.
“Courage to be Safe is the name of the new program out
there to teach recruits to be safe. Even if someone above you has been a
captain for years, if it’s an unsafe act then it’s an unsafe act,” Wells
said.
