Wake County Essentials of Firefighting Academy

Of the 28 students from Wake, Durham and Harnett counties that started the first Essentials of Firefighting academy of 2008, 22 graduated on February 10th after two intense weekends of basic skills and live burn training.

Instructors over the two weekends were David Zoltoski (Wake Co), Ben Averett (Raleigh FD), Bobby Boening (Morrisville FD), Tramp Dunn (Wake Co), Tim Herman (Garner FD), Sue-Lynn Hinson (Apex FD), Tim Medlin (Durham Highway FD), Matt Poole (Wake Co), Shaun Sweeney (Apex FD), and Tom Veasey (Wake Co). Patrick O'Boyle headed up medical / rehab with assistance from Tara Lester and Sarah Poole. Danny Durham (Garner FD) had the hottest dirtiest job of all, keeping the Class A fires burning for each evolution. (I hope I didn't forget anyone, but if I did please email me and let me know!)

Congratulations to Team 7 who earned the "Outstanding Teamwork" award. These firefighters had never met each other prior to this school. But over the two weekends, they became a true team - and not only completed each of the evolutions extremely well, but also did everything else together, and most importantly, stepped up to the plate to help their fellow firefighters however they could. Pictured left to right are John Hatzis (Morrisville), Jeffrey Howard (Parkwood), Instructor Tramp Dunn, and Steven Coley (Hopkins). Here they were singing some song with Tramp, which led most of us to think, "Don't quit your day jobs!"

Firefighters were initially divided into eight teams the first weekend. Click the thumbnails to view a larger photo in a separate browser window. If I have mis-labeled anyone's name or department please email me so that I can correct it!

Team 1 Brad Herring (Garner), Clarence Jones (Wake New Hope), Larry Reeves (Hopkins), Pablo Rodriguez (Swift Creek)	Team 2 Marcus Covington (Parkwood), Thomas Poole (Western Wake), Kevin Clark (Bay Leaf)	Team 3 Lee Tedder (Eastern Wake), Gayle Hagler (Parkwood), Robert Carter (Hopkins), Cris Florwick (Western Wake)	Team 4 Andrew Didsbury (Falls), David Powell (Durham Highway), Jermaine Walthour (Parkwood)
Team 5 Thomas Faison (Bay Leaf), Brandon Whitecross (Wake New Hope), Richard Weyant (Morrisville)	Team 6 Brandi Gillikin (Parkwood), Christopher Young (Bay Leaf), Shane Blue (Western Wake), Travis Dunn (NW Harnett)	Team 7 Steven Coley (Hopkins), Jeffrey Howard (Parkwood), John Hatzis (Morrisville)	Team 8 Bud Edens (Lillington), John Fish (Hopkins), Scott Dettloff (Western Wake)