Fire & Rescue
Proud sponsors of WMFS Breathing Apparatus Challenge 2022
FireAngel were delighted to support this year’s regional event, where competitors hoped to qualify for a spot at the national championships.
Fire & Rescue
After four days of difficult challenges, the winners of the West Midlands Fire Service’s (WMFS) regional Breathing Apparatus Challenge have been announced.
Held this year at Oldbury Training Hub, 14 crews competed over 17th-18th & 21st-22nd July to secure a finalist place and represent WMFS at the National Breathing Apparatus Challenge (NBAC). The challenge involved tackling a property fire and persons reported within a 30-minute time frame. Crews had no prior knowledge of the challenge and to help keep it as life-like as possible, competitors found out limited information on the day, just a few minutes prior to taking part.
The Breathing Apparatus challenge has been running for more than 20 years and teams have competed for the Castleton Trophy since 2009, named after Phil Castleton, a retired Breathing Apparatus dept lead who sadly passed away this year. FireAngel were proud to be event-sponsors in 2022, alongside The Fire Fighters Charity, Dräger, Torq Energy, MSA-Bristol and Hero Wipes.
In this year’s challenge, competitors were assessed in a realistic incident to test crews ability in the areas of breathing apparatus, entry control procedures, incident command and incident ground and scored accordingly.
Stuart Mayo, West Midlands Fire Service, said: “A huge thanks to all of you for supporting the WMFS BA Challenge this year. Even with the adverse weather we were finally able to get the challenge started and with your help it has been a great success. All the crews have asked for me to pass on their thanks.”
Congratulations to this year’s overall winners and those who received individual awards!
Breathing Apparatus Challenge overall winners 2022
Additional accolades were also awarded to Foleshill Red Watch for the ‘Best Breathing Apparatus Team’, while Ward End White Watch won ‘Best ECO’ and Binley White Watch named ‘Best Fire Ground’. Joint winners for ‘Best Incident Command’ were Smethwick Green Watch and Foleshill Red Watch.
It was fantastic to be part of the WMFS Regional Breathing Apparatus Challenge 2022 and we wish the finalists the best of luck at the upcoming NBAC in October which will be held at The Fire Service College in the Cotswolds.
