Record numbers for the Whitecourt Fire Department last year, both in calls and members’ hours

Aaron Floyd, one of the Whitecourt Fire Department’s two Deputy Fire Chiefs, recently provided
Town Council with the department’s 2023 Annual Report, which highlighted the work, training,
calls and activity from last year.
The Whitecourt Fire Department consists of three full-time staff members (Fire Chief, Deputy
Chief, Deputy Chief/Safety Coordinator), one part-time Fire Clerk, six volunteer officers, one
Health and Safety Officer, and thirty-six volunteer firefighters. Several volunteers (an education
coordinator, one photographer, and two videographers) round out the crew and help with public
education and recruitment campaigns.
“This annual report shows the significant contributions our members make around the region,”
explained Lee Hardman, Director of Community Safety, who joined Deputy Floyd for the late
April presentation. “I would like to acknowledge the passing of former Fire Chief Bruce Parrent.
He passed away on April 29, 2023. He served as the Fire Chief from 1992 until his retirement in
2010,” stated Hardman. After his passing, the Whitecourt Fire Department’s training grounds
were renamed the Bruce Parrent Training Grounds to celebrate his memory.
Last year, the Whitecourt Fire Department recruited eleven volunteers, with eight recruits
completing their training and officially becoming level-one firefighters. The new members meant
that yearly recruitment wasn’t necessary to kickstart 2024. In the last decade, the department
has only had two years where recruitment wasn’t needed. “We’ve had good retention,” said
Floyd.
Numerous promotions were handed out last year. Chris Green and Johnley Camposano were
promoted to Captain, Bill McAree to Chaplain, and Jerry Adam to Health and Safety Officer. Two
members, Denis Beaudoin and Chris Keay, were promoted to Lieutenants, while Chad Hagen
rose to Senior Firefighter. Six members (Jessica Brown, Terry Corke, Justin Labine, Austin
Komar, Beomjun Jeon, and Andrew Kentner) reached the highest level of professional firefighter
qualification, level two, making for thirteen now at the department.
Now to the numbers. “We had the busiest fire season to date. The department logged 14,442
member hours,” said Floyd. “Two thousand, four hundred and eleven of those hours were spent
on out-of-area deployments, which included the Northwest Territories, Fox Creek, Edson and
Parkland County,” he added.
Thirteen members spent six days and logged 509 hours in Parkland County, and four members
spent one day in Fox Creek, totalling 28 hours. The last two deployments for members were
Edson and the Northwest Territories. Five members spent three days in Edson for a combined
total of 112.5 hours, and a crew of eleven spent 28 days and just over 1,700 hours in Fort
Smith, NWT.
“I can honestly say that having the privilege of responding to other communities that the
appreciation was felt in these communities, beyond measure,” said Deputy Floyd. “I want to
acknowledge the sacrifice of our members, not just those that went there, but also those that
stayed back.”

The 14,442 hours collectively logged by the department last year were a combination of seven
different categories, including working hours, training, public education, meetings, and
deployments both in and out of the response area.
The three categories with the highest member hours were in-area response
(Whitecourt/Woodlands County), which had 4,354 hours, working hours (6,766), and training
(5,867 hours). “We have a very comprehensive and active training program,” said Deputy Floyd.
Compared to previous years, nearly four thousand more hours were logged than in 2022 and
2021, an increase of almost 36 percent. The uptick also included 41 home assessments, which
members do with homeowners to help encourage FireSmart decisions at the residential level.
Regarding calls coming into the department, 2023 was higher with 395. There were 343 calls in
2022 and 353 in 2021. “We did have the busiest year on record, smashing our records from
previous years, with nearly 400 calls. A lot of those are false alarms that don’t account for a lot
of hours. We are looking deeper into the reasons and making some administrative changes to
curb the impact that has on us.”
Of the 395 calls last year, 151 were false alarms, just shy of 40 percent. The next closest type of
call on the chart was medical assistance, with 67. When asked why false alarms remain so high,
Floyd said smart homes were one component. “The alarm goes off, goes to the monitoring
company, then the monitoring company notifies us, and then they try and get ahold of the
property contact,” he explained. The department then heads out with minimal information on
what type of call they are responding to. He said they are looking into how they can get more
information to try and lessen the impact of false alarms on the department.
Last year, they also saw an increase in structure fires. Deputy Floyd said there wasn’t any
particular reason for it. “We were able to determine a lot of the causes and it is spread all the
way from not applicable to arson and all the way to electrical. There are no real concerning
trends that we need to address, but they are tracked, and we monitor them,” he said, adding
that fires account for fifteen percent of their calls.
Public engagement was strong last year, with members attending various events to interact one-
on-one with residents. A big part of this was interacting with the youth and being present in the
schools. The department also replaced its vehicle extrication and rescue tools with faster and
stronger equipment and its Argo with a side-by-side UTV unit to help rescues in hard-to-access
areas.
The last piece Deputy Floyd touched on was a two-part grant received from the provincial
government’s Supporting Psychological Health in First Responders program. The department
snagged first—and second-round funding to create a resource guide of supports available to
members and to provide additional training.
In terms of value for the community, Deputy Floyd said he had some numbers to share. “These
aren’t exact by any means, but with our fire statistics reporting, we have estimated dollar values
and dollar losses to give you an idea of the fire department’s impact on the community. We
estimated a 2.8-million-dollar fire loss to the community, which covers everything from vehicles
to structures, and a total of 12.5 million in dollars estimated saved.”