The public is invited to attend the event on Friday
The City of Española Fire Department will celebrate the installation of its new burn tower at 11 a.m. Friday (5/2) at the Española Fire Training Facility located at 2013 Industrial Park Road.
The event is free and open to the public and will include a free turkey dinner-style lunch provided by Apple Valley Kitchen.
The $700,000 burn building is a five-story-tall galvanized steel structure used for live fire and other types of training. It was paid for with leftover Capital Outlay money from Fiscal Year 2023.
It is the first-of-its-kind facility in Northern New Mexico and will allow firefighters from across the area to obtain their Fire 1 Certification without having to travel to Socorro for training.
“This training facility has been needed and wanted in Northern New Mexico for a long time, and we would love for the public to come out and do a walk-through and check it out,” Assistant Fire Chief John Wickersham said in a telephone interview.
The day’s events will start with a ribbon cutting ceremony and include distinguished guests, including Lt. Gov. Howie Morales and District 5 Sen. Leo Jaramillo, D-Los Alamos, Rio Arriba, Sandoval and Santa Fe counties.
There will also be a wet-down of the facility, where firefighters will spray it with water to commission the new building, along with various other activities.
There will be no live-fire demonstrations at the celebration, Wickersham said, but there will be tours of the new burn building, fire station and information about Phase 2 of the fire station renovation project.
While the firefighters have used the burn building for training, they have yet to use live fire in the area.
Wickersham said they wanted to keep the area free of smoke and carcinogens, but they will start live fire trainings soon.
Representatives from surrounding fire departments, like Rio Arriba, Taos and Santa Fe Counties, will also be in attendance.