Fire department hopes to receive grant for new thermal imaging equipment

By Riley Funk

The St. Joseph Fire Department is hoping to receive a grant to replace aging thermal imaging devices, which can be key to determining a plan for entering a burning building.

At Monday night’s city council meeting, council members authorized 9-0-0 the filing of a grant application with the Firehouse Subs Public Safety Foundation in the amount of $22,050. The funding would provide three thermal imaging devices to be used by the fire department.

“They’re a great group, they give out a lot of grants every year. They only take so many applicants, so you have to be on the ball getting those,” Fire Chief Kenny Cordonnier said.

A maximum of 600 grant applications are accepted on a quarterly basis, according to the website.

If the department gets the grant, thermal imaging devices that have been used for a number of years will be replaced.

“Thermal imagers are aging just like a lot of our equipment is,” Cordonnier said.

The piece of equipment is used specifically to help responders when they go inside a burning building.

“Thermal is the key word; they seek heat. When you point it at something, it’ll tell you if it’s hot or not,” Cordonnier said. “You can identify a body or an animal body inside a building if that’s what you’re looking for. But mostly they’re heat-seeking devices.”

In addition to replacing thermal imaging devices, the fire department received funding in December for a new truck. The hope is to have the truck available soon.

“I’m still hoping for mid-February, but with the supply chain issues we’re having, COVID coming back up a little bit around the country and cold weather shut some trucks down … there’s just a number of reasons that things just keep getting delayed,” Cordonnier said.

Once the truck arrives, it will be kept at Fire Station 6.