Help With Training Gear

[FFPCogs 863]

Morning all,

As you may or may not know we here in Stamford have started a volunteer firefighter recruit training program. Unfortunately like everyone else we are short of funding but in need of some PPE. Through the generous donation of the Burlington, CT VFD we were able to acquire enough coats and pants to outfit our trainees, but we are still in need of about 20 pairs of boots and the same number of helmets to complete their ensembles. To that end I figured I'd take a shot and see if any of the contributors here have anything lying around, or knows of anyone that does, that they could pass along to us. Because our recruits do not enter any IDLH environments these items can be used, worn but still functional and out of date. If anyone can lend a hand please let me know here on this thread, by PM or via email at bvfd122@yahoo.com.

Thanks

[FFPCogs 863]

Hey all,

Just refreshing this thread to give it another try. If anyone can help out it would be much appreciated.

Thanks

[SECTMB 612]

With all due respect, and I mean that, between City of Stamford, Belltown, Turn of River, Long Hill, Springdale, am I missing anyone? you had to get a donation from Burlington?

[CTFF 65]

Long Ridge not Long Hill and you left out glenbrook.

[FFPCogs 863]

With all due respect, and I mean that, between City of Stamford, Belltown, Turn of River, Long Hill, Springdale, am I missing anyone? you had to get a donation from Burlington?

Quite simply the supply of used gear available for our purposes is non existent, nor is there any money available to purchase it. Used gear that has not yet reached the ten year mark and that is still in service is used by active members of all of our departments and we're not going to pull gear from an experience FF to give it to a new member who may or may not stay around. With our recruitment efforts beginning to bear some substantial fruit we need to provide these recruits with gear to train in, so with little money and less gear available to fill that need, seeking throwaways from other departments solves two problems at once. The donor gets their used, out of date PPE disposed of and we are able to outfit our recruits for their initial training without shortchanging any of our active FFs. Seems like a win win to me. And if past practice is any guide, as probies complete their recruit training than gear rotation coupled with attrition as older members leave/come off the line should provide an adequate source of in service gear for these recruits to go on the line safely.

As I'm sure most here can relate, Stamford may be a wealthy community but that doesn't mean that the fire departments are wealthy. We do what we have to do to do what we do.