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Omar Group Host Suffolk Fire & Rescue Service Training Exercise
As an employer of on-call firefighters at Brandon Fire Station, Omar Group is proud to have played host to a Suffolk Fire & Rescue Service training exercise, ‘Exercise Omar’, at their head office and main production facility in Brandon, Suffolk.
The exercise, which took place on Thursday 24th January, gave fire and rescue crews from Brandon, Mildenhall and Newmarket the opportunity to test their skill-set and knowledge, both operational and tactical, in response to an incident, with simulated casualties, at a large and complicated, commercial premises. The exercise involved around 30 firefighters and 4 appliances (fire engines).
On-call Firefighters are a vital part of the Suffolk Fire & Rescue Service, working in small towns and villages from home or their place of work. Trained to the same high standard as whole-time firefighters, including training in first aid and trauma, emergency response duties can include road traffic collisions, forest and heathland fires and domestic and industrial fires. On-call firefighters also assist the RSPCA with animal welfare issues such as trapped animals and help in the local community with youth education - conducting fire station tours and talks for local children.
The fire station at Brandon consists purely of On-call Firefighters and five of the eleven are employed by Omar - Les Field, Lloyd Kent, Jason Spooner, Craig Tyson and George Roberts. Emergency calls can occur at any time and on average the team is called out around 30 times a month, many of which are during work hours.
Graeme Craig, Chief Executive at Omar Group commented: “We’re delighted to have been able to support Suffolk Fire & Rescue Service in this important exercise; the work the team do is critical in being able to provide life-saving services to the local community. We’re also very proud to be an employer of on-call crew members - it’s fantastic to be able to give back to the community by releasing them when needed.”
Henry Griffin, Deputy District Commander for the Suffolk Fire & Rescue Service commented: “We’re incredibly grateful to Omar for their continued support to the service and allowing the site to be used for the exercise. It gave us the opportunity to train our firefighters at a large, commercial premises and challenge them with the rescue of live and simulated casualties. The exercise also gave us the opportunity to test our incident command, operational procedures and breathing apparatus procedures.”
Brandon Fire Station is currently looking for new firefighters to join their team. For more information or to apply visit www.suffolkjobsdirect.org.