Firefighters from across Illinois train in Glenview for battling high-rise fires
CHICAGO (CBS) – Hundreds of firefighters from across the Chicago area gathered in Glenview on Wednesday for some intense training simulating a raging fire in a high-rise building.
CBS 2's Noel Brennan reported it's a rare chance for hands-on training that could save lives.
There's a fine line between training and battling a fire.
Bob Hoff and fellow instructors from the Illinois Fire Service Institute offer a one-of-a-kind experience in Glenview.
"If you get overwhelmed, all's I want is the company officers," Hoff told the trainees.
The victims are fake, but the first is very real.
"This is the real deal," Hoff said. "They have fire conditions. They have heat conditions. They have heavy smoke conditions."
Nearly 20 fire departments from northern Illinois practiced together fighting a rare and risky kind of fire.
"High rise fires, they're very rare. They're very taxing, labor intensive," said Glenview Fire Chief Tony Derose.
Hoff added they're "high-risk, low-frequency events, but it seems like we've been getting more and more of them lately."
The training comes one week after a Chicago firefighter collapsed and died in the stairwell of a Gold Coast high-rise.
The importance of practice is not lost on anyone.
"You can't put a price tag on the training that we're doing today," Hoff said.
"In every community, or most communities, there are structures similar to this," Derose said.
If the call comes, departments are now battle tested.
"It puts them to the true test," Hoff said.
All of the radio traffic from the training has been recorded so the instructors can go over it with each department and figure out what went right and what could be improved. For many of the firefighters, this is the only chance they'll have to train in these conditions unless they face the real thing.