STOW – State Fire Marshal Jon M. Davine announced today that the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy has received nearly $435,000 in federal grant funding toward the purchase of a new mobile trailer, referred to as a training prop, that will serve firefighters across Massachusetts.
The FY23 FEMA Assistance to Firefighters Grant (AFG) funding will allow the MFA to replace the aging Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA) Training Maze permanently installed at its Stow campus, where about 450 recruit firefighters train each year. At nearly 40 years old, the Stow maze is approaching the end of its useful lifespan with damaged, outdated, or obsolete cameras, lighting, and electronics.
“The SCBA Maze is a fundamental fire training prop,” said State Fire Marshal Davine. “It helps users build confidence under stress, manage their air consumption, and operate in a confined space environment. These skills are foundational at the recruit level, but they remain important throughout a firefighter’s career. We are deeply grateful to FEMA for helping us expand access to this valuable asset.”
Transitioning to a trailer-based prop with modern components will not only enhance the training experience but also make it available to more experienced firefighters at local fire departments across the region. In addition to the Stow maze slated for replacement, the Academy currently hosts a 32-year-old maze trailer at its Bridgewater campus, where it remains usable in place but is no longer roadworthy and cannot travel. A seven-year-old maze trailer is based at the MFA’s Springfield campus, where it serves recruits on site and also travels to local fire departments, delivering training sessions to serve more than 500 municipal firefighters across the Commonwealth last year.
The new trailer is expected to cost about $500,000, with the balance funded through the Department of Fire Services’ budget. It will be the second based at the MFA’s Stow campus, which also serves as DFS headquarters and draws the largest share of recruit firefighters statewide. The other trailer is being funded with an FY20 FEMA AFG award and will alternate with the FY23 award trailer for on-campus and local delivery use, extending the useful lifespan of both props.
FEMA offers the Assistance to Firefighters Grant to meet the firefighting and emergency response needs of fire departments and non-affiliated emergency medical service organizations. State firefighting academies have been eligible for this grant program for about 10 years and the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy has successfully applied each year, receiving a total of nearly $4 million in funding for vital training resources.
In addition to the maze props, the MFA has purchased several other vehicles and training systems through the AFG program that would otherwise have been prohibitively expensive: a forcible entry trailer, a flashover training prop, search and rescue buildings on the Bridgewater and Springfield campuses, a Hazmat leak prop, and a Mobile Extraction Unit to clean large quantities of firefighting gear of contaminants that can contribute to occupational cancer.
