City Police, Fire Officers Complete Rescue Task Force Instructor Training

The training course presented the attendees with the knowledge and education needed to instruct Police, Fire and EMS personnel to properly respond to situations such as an Active Shooter Incident. Effingham Police Chief Jeffrey Fuesting and Fire Chief Bob Tutko have been working together to develop a Rescue Task Force program for the Effingham Community that will integrate both Police Officers and Firefighters into teams whose mission is to rescue victims of active shooter incidents and ultimately save lives.

There are currently no active Rescue Task Force teams operating in the area, and both Chief Fuesting and Tutko recognize how important a properly trained integrated team of Police Officers and Firefighters will be in the event one of these active shooter type incidents occur within the community.

The first phase of this program involves certifying at least one member of Police and Fire as Rescue task Force Instructors, which has now been completed. The next phase will be to acquire the needed Ballistic Personal Protective Equipment for the Fire Department staff. According to Chief Fuesting and Chief Tutko this process is nearing completion. Once the Ballistic PPE is acquired, the departments can start training the staff in the use of their protective equipment and initiate team training needed to properly deploy a Rescue Task Force Team.

The program combined with the current 4E Active Shooter course offered by the police department will eventually involve EMS partners as well as the Hospital Staff. Chiefs Fuesting and Tutko said, "We will eventually train our public and private entities with Bleeding Control and first aid training that will better prepare our community to respond to these types of incidents and more importantly save lives."