On June 4th at about 9:00 am, Winlock Fire & Rescue conducted a "Burn to Learn" exercise at the old Mickelson Dairy in the 100 block of Military Road. Approximately 30 members from Napavine, Onalaska & Toledo Fire District's were also in attendance to gain valuable experience.

This section of the industrial park is owned by EQT Exeter (Exeter is a real estate investment management firm specializing in the acquisition, development, leasing, and management of industrial, office and related business park properties through an array of value add and core return private equity investment vehicles.) and they allowed Winlock Fire & Rescue the opportunity to conduct this training instead of them tearing down the structure with more conventional methods. It was the hope from Exeter to establish a positive working relationship with the fire district and to maintain their tight timeline in developing this section of the industrial park. Exeter has been very supportive of the fire district and was excited to have to provide this structure available for use.

The main theme of the training was to provide new and experienced firefighters the valuable experience of fire behavior in a controlled, safe environment that yields maximum value over that of other training methods. This type of training experience accurately reflects "real world" fire fighting conditions, with actual construction materials, that they will face when called to a working structure fire. The firefighters learned the characteristics of "flash over" using "penciling" method of cooling a ceiling to prevent it. That type of fire behavior can only be experienced in a training such as this. It was the comments of all in attendance that they learned something new during the time spent in training.

Winlock Fire & Rescue would like to thank EQT Exeter and Perlo Construction for the opportunity to have this training and their time in preparing the site.