By: Ryan Duey
Photo Courtesy of Ryan Duey
What began as a friendly visit by Clay Center Fire Chief Johnny Ihnen to a Fire Chiefs meeting in Dickinson County has turned into a newly expanded mutual aid agreement among Clay County Fire Chiefs that will benefit Clay County as a whole.
The agreement will help response times around the county in the case of a residential house fire throughout all districts. In many cases, CCFD is able to respond much quicker than the smaller departments, as the smaller stations are run by volunteers who are not at the station at all times.
Chief Ihnen spoke of how this agreement with CCFD, and the other departments work and why it’s important.
“We have always had a mutual aid agreement with every city and district in Clay County, where they would get on scene, and if they needed help, they would call for us.”
“The problem is that every 45 seconds, a structure fire doubles in size. So, for instance, the Miltonvale district, if it took them 10 minutes to get on scene, and they decide they need help from us, and it takes us another 10 minutes to drive there, that’s a 20-minute head start on a structure fire. That’s a pretty big jump.”
“When we discussed this during our meeting, it was decided that in the event of a residential structure fire, the city will respond with one truck and half of the department, half of the manpower.”
“The trade-off for that is if I get a commercial fire downtown, I’m going to have to call for all of those guys to come in and help. And that’s kind of the deal.”
Some citizens of the county have already seen the benefit of the agreement, with quicker response times to their homes.
In an event such as this, CCFD will still have staff and two trucks at the station in case of an emergency in the city, keeping the city protected.
“We’ll still have our protection over the city. We’re still leaving two fire trucks and half the department.”
“And if we’re out doing something like that and a call comes in for the city, then we would have to leave that incident and respond to Clay Center, and the Chiefs understand that.”
Chief Ihnen noted that once CCFD gets a good knockdown on the fire, the lead department takes over the scene.
With a fire growing very quickly, this expanded mutual agreement between all departments will be a great benefit to the many rural homes in Clay County, along with the city of Clay Center.
