Agoracom

Someone suddenly becoming trapped in a confined space or falling off of a catwalk would be a nightmare. With the newly trained Confined Space Team citizens of Choctaw County can rest easier.

Seven people spent four days learning how to rescue people from confined spaces using many different techniques.

The Mississippi Lignite Company, Choctaw Generation and Choctaw Gas Generating co-sponsored the Confined Space training as a way to give back to the community.

"We do have quite a few confined spaces in the power plant, gas plant and also the coal mine," said Jim Ward, of Choctaw Generation.

He said the three industries need their first response team-the volunteer fire departments-to know how to come in and help in certain situations.

"We get them trained for us so they can respond to our needs and they receive the training and be prepared for other jobs," said Ward.

Emergency Response Training out of Port Allen, La. trained the team on different techniques of ropes and rescue in confined spaces.

Gerald Mann, lead instructor, said some of the top skills the team learned are the falling system, lowering system, self rescue, knots, and how to identify anchor points.

"Each class is tailored to specific job sites because each job site is not the same," said Mann.

One of the teams learning rescues was to think they were on a catwalk rescuing a man hanging from a dragline.

Brian Roussel, instructor in training, hung on ropes and waited to be rescued.

"We hope to see them take the tools we gave them the past three days and apply them," said Mann.

He said there are many types of rescues and the team has to decide, on their own, which is best to use in each situation.

"We only gave them tools and suggestions. They are all on their own," said Mann.

The team successfully took the weight off of the man's line and lowered him to the ground.

Those who participated in the Confined Space training were Weir Fire Department-Anthony McGee, Fran McGee, Bywy Fire Department-Michael Holmes, Shawn Morris, Kenny Prisock, Billy Murphy, Coal Mine-Brian McCool.

Instructors from Emergency Response Training were Gerald Mann, Brian Roussel, John Fontnot and Ernesto Morejon.