Big Lake Volunteer Fire and Rescue members will be taking auto-extrication training at the end of October.
“We get a bunch of highway accidents out here,” said Fire Chief Joel Bruneski, who will be teaching the course.
Bruneski was an auto-ex instructor in the Middle East and taught there for three years.
“The Abu Dhabi police started an ambulance and rescue division so we trained their paramedics, drivers and auto-extrication crews all through translators.”
Bruneski said the department is in the process of switching its training program over to College of the Rockies.
“We did ice rescue last year, which was kind of new for us. We had a couple of members train the year before. We hosted the course - a day at the fire hall and then a day out on Big Lake.”
Bruneski, who has been on the fire department for 27 years and grew up in the community, said the department has 19 members but some of them are just support members.
“We are looking for more members,” he said, adding they meet on Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m.
In the summer, the department launched a special barbecue sauce fundraiser thanks to the leadership of deputy chief Mark Wilkie.
A former chef, Wilkie went to French culinary school in the early 1980s and got his first job at Bridges Restaurant on Granville Island.
The sauce is available for other fire departments to use for fundraising.
“It’s been exciting,” Bruneski said. “There has been a lot of interest in the product and the program throughout B.C. and back east. It has huge potential.”
READ MORE: Saucy fundraiser a sizzling success for Big Lake fire department
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