
(image via Kincardine Fire & Emergency Services Facebook page)
Kincardine Council has received a report on the core level services delivered by Kincardine Fire and Emergency Services (KFES).
Fire Chief Guy Gallant presented the report during Wednesday’s council meeting.
There was a particular focus on water-related rescues.
“Our jurisdiction as a municipality stops at the water’s edge. If there’s a search and rescue required, that’s actually the responsibility of the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard currently comes out of Goderich,” he explained. “That boat, could be as far north, as I understand, as Sauble. So there’s no guarantee where that boat may be. That level of service, if they’re required to do rescue, they may or may not be around. They do have teams that can go into the water to rescue people.”
Gallant shared that in Kincardine, there was an auxiliary rescue team called the Mysis, which has two vessels to carry out some rescue work.
“They’re a volunteer organization and can respond. They must muster and get everything through that way as well. They do not have the resources to go in the water from that level.”
Recommendations within the report were based on existing levels of service, as well as the community risk assessment.
Typically with water rescues, Kincardine Fire can only go as far as the shoreline, referred to as surf rescue. “What happens when a call comes in, you call 911, [say that] someone’s in peril in the water — that goes through the OPP comm service, the OPP automatically get dispatched, they would then communicate that to the Coast Guard, and together they are the ones that would respond. They then determine if they need someone further, so it could be auxiliary or it could be Fire that would respond to that. So the gap that we tend to fill is that we can generally respond quite quickly.”
He explained that it would be up to council to choose whether or not to permit Kincardine Fire and Rescue to be a resource for water rescues, adding “If council chooses to continue doing that, that’s probably one of the bigger costs – the hard boat with motors and things to do that type of rescue and additional training for the firefighters.”
If council wanted to implement the additional services within the report, additional funding would be required within 24-36 months.