‘It helped me grow’: Girls learn firefighting skills at Aurora Fire Rescue summer camp

AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) — A group of girls are learning what it takes to become a firefighter.

They are participating in a three-day summer camp led by Aurora Fire Rescue.

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The program is for girls 11-19 years old. The camp includes workouts, leadership lectures, motivational guest speakers, individual and team challenges and hands-on firefighter skills training, such as ladder raises, air packs, rescue and search, and hose pulls.

Campers are selected through an application process that typically opens up in late April or early May.

“It helped me grow. This is my second year doing it and I think it helped me become more confident,” said Icela Ciocarlan. “It’s a super cool opportunity because I’m able to talk with a lot of different women firefighters to see how they decided to choose this career.”

Fifty campers rotated in five stations getting hands-on fire training to develop skills in ladder raises, air packs, rescue and search, and hose pulls.

The participants also learn about life-changing skills.

“We really want to build some perseverance, some accountability, commitment and just consistency so that whatever they’re doing in life, if they can do it here, they can go and do it out in the world” Valerie Solano, Captain with Aurora Fire Rescue said.

Solano and Lt. Kathleen Hancock started the program five years ago.

“The girls get to experience exactly what we do as firefighters. They do it with real life-size equipment, real weight equipment,” said Solano. “Even if they are not in the fire service, and they are just going out into the community being good leaders and good women in our community, that’s above and beyond anything we can ask for.”

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“The program doesn’t stop here. It continues all the way to the fulfillment of their dreams. That’s the dedication that we give. Each of these ladies behind us in purple are also helping to volunteer.” Hancock said.

Ellie Brownfield is one of 30 volunteers. She graduated from the program four years ago.

“I’ve wanted to be a firefighter personally since the sixth grade. So, to have the opportunity to do something like this when I was 15 years old was amazing,” Brownfield said.

She comes back every year to help out.

“The excitement that they had just seeing these trucks go out and seeing the guys doing what firefighters do is amazing, I shared that joy, so seeing it somewhere else was really special,” she said.

Women represent about 7% of Aurora Fire Rescue’s professional firefighters. Nationally, roughly 17,200 women are professional firefighters, while 72,400 are volunteer firefighters, making a combined 9% of all firefighters in the U.S., according to the National Fire Protection Association’s 2020 statistics.

The participants have an overnight stay at the City of Aurora Public Safety Training Center, and they earn a CPR and Stop the Bleed certificate during the camp.

More information about Camp Spark can be found on the City of Aurora’s website.

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