Written about us

NPP Fire Service Winning Professional Competition

At the final of the 8th National Competition of Fire Professionals and the national final of the 4th Professional Contest of Contingency Detection Teams held on 3 and 4 November 2011, NPP Fire Service team earned the first place in a contest of industrial fire department teams. On this occasion, I have interviewed team leader István Schreiner and asked him about this outstanding professional success.

First of all, how have team members been chosen and how have you prepared for this professional challenge?

The basic approach taken in selecting team members was to ensure that each of them had a mastery of up-to-date theoretical knowledge and practical skills that had already been acquired for their daily jobs, and was physically fit for full compliance with the relevant requirements. Since competitions like this one require maximum performance in solving a number of special tasks, we needed and need some additional preparations to acquire all the necessary skills.

Our training programme features several checkpoints to ensure that performance of the team members taking part in the preparation can be measured and assessed in an objective manner. We laid special stress on building a genuine team of the prospective members through special situation practice drills designed to develop team-level cooperation, communication and fire fighters’ mental abilities to take control in stressful situations. Our team, representing NPP Fire Service in both Hungarian and European contests and exercises, has been made up of members of the personnel who perform at a consistently outstanding level.

How did the competition take place and what challenges did you have to overcome?

The nationwide professional contest was hosted by the City of Baja. 18 teams entered for the National Competition of Fire Professionals, in three categories. Besides professional municipal fire departments, full-time industrial fire brigades and volunteer fire services were also present to demonstrate their skills and excellence. Trained by István Schreiner and József Tóbi, NPP Fire Service team members were Rajmund Pesztericz, János Cseh, József Farkas, Tamás Szabó, Tibor Váncsodi and István Wolf.

Three sites were designated for the professional contest. The first was a driving course where the drivers of pumper engines could demonstrate how fast and skilful they were in manoeuvring the engines. Besides demonstrating their driving skills, they also had to provide written proof of their theoretical knowledge by filling out a test form of 25 questions. The second venue was an industrial establishment where fire fighters had to perform a technical rescue exercise.

Maybe the third damage site featured the most attractive challenge where the teams of knights of flames had to compete in putting out real fires in a ruinous building as part of their fire fighting and technical rescue operations. The only information that the judge, as door-keeper, could provide to the fire fighters upon their arrival was that they had to search for two persons in the building full of smoke, with the roof on fire. To make the task more difficult, the ground level was flooded with smoke using a smoke generator and blackened out with a black foil.

It is the third time that NPP Fire Service team has won the cup of this competition series, also obtaining the right to take part in the next international exercise, and was also given an opportunity to practise on an Austrian training course as part of its preparations for next year competitions.

Thanks for the interview. Congrats on the team victory, and I wish you further success!

BR
Atomerőmű
December 2011