The primary mission of the Fire Department has always been to prevent fires and minimize their destruction when they get started.  Over the years however, the Fire Department has taken responsibility for a number of other emergencies, one of which is the response to an incident involving the spill or release of a hazardous material.  Many hazardous materials can be found in area homes and businesses, as well as being transported on our roadways.  In addition, the Fire Department responds to domestic terrorism incidents involving weapons of mass destruction (WMD) such as chemical, biological, or other hazardous agents.  WMD incidents have been referred to as "hazardous materials incidents with an attitude".

In the area of hazardous materials response, there are three primary levels of training; Awareness, Operations, and Technician.  Awareness is the lowest level of certification and training while Technician is the highest.  Currently, our firefighters are all trained to the Operations level.  Each year many training hours are devoted to improving the didactic and practical skills of our firefighters in order to effectively respond to hazardous materials incidents.  The Technician level requires specialized equipment and response personnel, as well as additional training.  For incidents in Leawood requiring a higher level of response, we depend on other agencies in the Kansas City metropolitan area who currently operate these specialized hazardous materials units.

This area of our website is used to showcase some of the hazardous materials & domestic terrorism training we do in Leawood, as well as some of the training we do with other responding agencies.  Should you ever have questions about our training program or anything else you see here, please don't hesitate to contact me.

 

Tim Stamm

Training Chief

Leawood Fire Department