West Central Play-Mobile Group Teams up With Fire Departments
In our ever-changing world, firefighters are having to find new ways to share ideas and teach our communities about fire safety. So, for this reason, the Kerrobert, Kindersley, and Eston Fire departments have teamed up with the West Central Play-Mobile group to run an exciting giveaway and spread some safety tips!
Since 2015, the West Central Play-Mobile has been operating in the West Central Region as a mobile family resource program, setting up pop-up play opportunities for families and
other educational events in communities to promote the importance of play in the early years. This year, due to COVID-19 restrictions, the focus has been on providing fun and interactive packages in the form of books, crafts, and games to families. These packages are meant to support, encourage, and promote family engagement and literacy.
Although the departments have Public Education Officers, because of COVID guidelines, it has not been possible to do events such as open houses or go into the schools to teach basic fire safety to the younger kids.
By teaming up with the West Central Mobile-Play group, the departments hope to share their fire safety messages with thousands of people. To add to the excitement, 60 lucky winners will win a bag full of goodies, crafts, books and more!
Some basic safety measures the departments really want to emphasize, especially to children ages 3-6 are:
- Fire Fighters are not scary, they don’t want you to hide from them!
- Also, remember to stop, drop and roll, (don’t forget to cover your face).
- If you hear a beeping from smoke alarms, it means it’s time to get out and stay out (not that Dad burnt supper again)!
Eston, Kerrobert, and Kindersley Fire departments share a combined first response fire coverage area of nearly 8000 km2 and well over 10,000 km2 for rescue. Many of the people within these rural areas count on local fire departments to provide safety and educational information to them and their families.
“It’s my hope that we are able to get our message of fire safety out to over 10,000 people. I hope that when they see this article online that it reminds them to test their smoke alarms and change the batteries, practice their escape plans and educate their families,” said Captain Mitch Hope with Kindersley Fire.
Public Education Officer April McDonald with Eston Fire reminds residents to “encourage all our families to be prepared, to talk to your kids about fire safety and to have a plan in place for all types of emergencies. Having a home fire escape plan and practicing it, knowing two ways out of every room and having a meeting place are just a few ways to prepare.”
Nick Hutchinson, a public education officer with Eston fire, would like to remind everyone to check that your carbon monoxide detector has not expired and that it works. Carbon monoxide is colourless and odourless–annually in Canada it claims more than 300 lives and hospitalizes 200 more.
Kerrobert 2nd Lieutenant and Public Education officer Luke Alberts said, “I cannot stress enough the importance of planning for emergencies, we all never expect it to happen to us, but the truth is that it could. Checking your detectors for proper functioning and placement, having an escape plan with a meeting place and teaching your family to GET OUT and STAY OUT are just a few ways that we can help protect our families.”
All departments would like to remind the public to prepare and educate their family for any emergency and for parents and caregivers to ask themselves:
- Do my kids know how to call for help? Do they know how to direct help to our home?
- Do my kids know how to access a phone in the event I am hurt?
- Is there a neighbour or a safe house that my kids can count on in an emergency? Have we talked about it before?
- Have we made an escape plan, and have we practiced it? Where is our meeting place?
- Do my kids sleep with the door open or closed? (A closed door can save a life)
- What would my kids do if they find needles, matches, lighters or other dangerous objects?
Be sure to watch on Wednesday, March 10th for the links required to enter this great giveaway. It will be created and shared by the West Central Mobile-Play group and reshared by Kindersley Fire, Kerrobert Fire and Eston Fire. The draw will run for one week, and the winners will be posted on the West Central Mobile-Play page. To be entered to win a prize bag, you must “like, share and comment” on the original post by West Central Play, so please be sure to follow the links and practice cyber safety. None of these groups will ever ask you for personal information or to click on a link to claim a prize.
Eston Fire would like to thank their sponsor DT’s Restaurant for their support towards this event.
Kindersley Fire would Like to thank Panago Pizza for their continuing support towards events like this.
Kerrobert Fire would like to thank its members for pooling together for this event.
For the latest information and for more updates on everything Kindersley ‘Like’ the Kindersley Social Facebook page below…
Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google LLC.
