Firefighters learn the ropes of advanced rescue training

  • Published
  • By John Turner
  • 341st Missile Wing Public Affairs
MALMSTROM AIR FORCE BASE, Mont. --  It was like watching a scene from an action movie as Airman 1st Class Ian Pieroni, 341st Civil Engineer Squadron, rappelled down two stories of concrete and steel to reach a man on a ledge below.

"I'm a firefighter and I'm here to rescue you," Pieroni announced before inverting himself on his rope. Now suspended upside down like Batman, he carefully attached safety lines to the 'victim,' fellow firefighter Staff Sgt. Brandin McGovern, Montana Air National Guard.

Pieroni then righted himself before giving measured instructions to McGovern, directing him to grab onto him and step off the ledge. With McGovern hanging in tow, Pieroni began to slowly ease down to the pavement below.

The scenario was a practical exercise held at the City of Great Falls Fire Training Center in Great Falls, Montana, July 22, and is part of a 15-day advanced rescue course July 13-31 at Malmstrom Air Force Base known as Rescue Technician One training. The course is taught to Air Force firefighters by instructors on temporary duty from Goodfellow AFB, Texas, and focuses on rescue techniques for heights and confined spaces.

A total of 12 firefighters enrolled in the course including Airmen from Malmstrom and the Montana ANG, F.E. Warren AFB, Wyoming, and Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota.

Trainees were evaluated on their ability to rappel down the tower, swap to a second set of lines midway, ascend back up to the roof, descend again, and finally rescue a partner and lower that individual to the ground. Students invert during the rescue procedure to demonstrate they have that capability.

While RTO training is ancillary to the firefighters' career progression, it is offered to expand their knowledge and could mean the difference between life and death in an actual emergency.

"In a situation where someone is stuck on a cliff side, they can go down and rescue them," said Staff Sgt. Adam McCarty, 312th Training Squadron rescue instructor. "If they were on a roof at the top of a building, (firefighters) could ascend up."

Confined spaces rescue training is taught later in the course.

Trainees are selected by their fire departments' upper management, McCarty said. Students can either wait for the mobile course or attend the Lewis F. Garland Department of Defense Fire Academy at Goodfellow AFB.