Iowa firefighters train to optimize response to CMV accidents

Firefighters in Iowa spent last weekend training to optimize their response to commercial vehicle accidents. 

The training happened outside of Le Mars, Iowa and involved firefighters from Le Mars, Hinton, and Sioux City looking to optimize their response to CMV accidents. The organization that held the training was called Crossroads Training.

“We spend the first day sitting up and building skills, so we give them a skill set, we teach them the skills that they need to be able to complete complex scenarios, and then the second day, we set up those complex scenarios and put them through those scenarios and allow them to practice those and be able to become proficient at it,” said John Shackelford, the owner of Crossroads Training, reported Siouxland News.

“We have a concrete mixer overturned on a car, we have a school bus overturned on a car, we have a car underneath a semi, and they’re all smushed, smushed together in a very small area. So we’re going to work on in concert with the wreckers and the rescue personnel to support these vehicles. There’s a five-step process that we go through when we’re dealing with heavy vehicles on how we do the extra stations, and we’ll be working and setting those scenarios up. And then they have to work those scenarios to prove to us that they learned everything that we taught them on the first day,” said Shackelford.

Not only does the training instruct firefighters on how to optimize their response to these wrecks, but it familiarizes them with heavy equipment they may not encounter often. 

“These trucks running up and down the road, they can be 80,000 plus, 96,000, 100,000 plus. A lot of these fire departments don’t have the equipment to be able to move that kind of weight, and if you get a vehicle that’s pinned in by a commercial vehicle, we’ve got heavy wrecker rotators that are capable of lifting 60 ton,” said Jason Wood, a wrecker driver with a local tow company. 

“We do not get this a whole lot, so it is very valuable for everybody to hone their skills a little bit and get their hands on and actually see how these things cut apart, and they’re not like regular vehicles because you’re going to have the height difference on the semis. A school bus is also higher and bigger tires,” said Steve Schwarz, the assistant fire chief with Le Mars Fire Department.

“Every community, no matter what, almost has school buses going through them to pick up kids drop off kids and whatever. So it is a very valuable time to learn how to extricate out of a bus for any town. It doesn’t matter who you are,” said Schwarz.