Local Businesses Support Tewksbury Fire Department Open House

Photos by 2001stormphotography.com

On Oct. 11, the Tewksbury Fire Department hosted its annual Open House in recognition of National Fire Prevention Week. The event was a tremendous success thanks to the efforts of on- and off-duty Tewksbury firefighters, Safety Officer Jenny Welch from the Police Department, Upper Merrimack Valley MRC Unit and Tewksbury Board of Health Member Raymond Barry, and community volunteers. The department also wants to give special thanks to its long-term Open House partners Ken Smith, Jr. of Penney’s Auto for providing a demonstration car and to Joe and Jason from Tewksbury Papa Ginos for providing free pizza to the crowd on hand.

Members of Tewksbury Fire Department and Student Awareness of Fire Education (S.A.F.E.) Team came together to put on a variety of demonstrations including a “Jaws-of-Life” demonstration and a 110 foot ladder climb at the Open House. Fire District 6 provided their mobile Fire Safety Smoke House, which was on hand at the event to teach and reinforce lessons about smoke detectors and fire safety.

Fire Prevention Week activities were made possible by State Grant Funding through the S.A.F.E. Program and by Cummings Properties of Woburn. John Sholl and Dennis Clarke provided a very generous donation to the Tewksbury S.A.F.E. Program through Cummings’ Employee Directed Giving program. These funds helped enable the Department to provide handouts at our Open House and allowed firefighters to visit to each of the elementary schools with the Smoke House.

“This was a great opportunity to reach out to a large amount of kids in the school setting,” said Chief Michael Hazel. “Rick Hamm and his team of firefighter educators did a great job getting our fire safety message out this year and support from our community partners helped make that possible.”