Area first responders are helping to celebrate Fire Prevention Week throughout this week by offering presentations for students at Benjamin Logan Schools.
Students in pre-school, kindergarten and first-grade will have the chance to interact and become comfortable with firefighters in full gear to alleviate any fears and to help prevent them from hiding during an emergency.
Mike Overturf, along with Rushcreek Fire & EMS volunteers, have been providing fire safety education to Benjamin Logan Elementary students for 27 years.
“Teaching students how to get out of burning houses safely and quickly while helping them to know not to ever go back into a house or building to retrieve anything is one of the main objectives,” Overturf said.
Jeremiah Brisson, D.C. Foulk, Deb Roberts and Trace Robinaugh assisted Overturf
Monday to educate the students on various fire safety topics, including:
• Not to breathe smoke, smoke is dangerous.
• Crawl low and stay under the smoke and go to your meeting place.
• When smoke alarm sounds, Get Out and Stay Out
• Check the door with the back of your hand, don’t touch if hot
• Go to a window and if you can, get out of the window safely
• Have a meeting area outside of your house that everyone in the house knows about away from the house
• If you cannot get out of your window safely, stay low on the floor right by your window, don’t hide
• Never go back into house for any reason.
Firefighters encouraged the students to identify items in the home that may be fire hazards, such as candles.
The presenters also sounded a smoke alarm so that students would know what it sounds like. Overturf encouraged the students to go home and talk with their parents to make sure that every floor of the house has a smoke detector with fresh batteries.