Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College

Basic Firefighter Indoctrination Training (B-FIT)

Course Overview

Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College, together with city and county fire departments and the NC Department of Insurance is proud to announce “B-FIT”: Basic Firefighter Indoctrination Training, a new program designed to train and certify firefighters for the state of North Carolina.

Students able to enroll full-time can complete the training in just 11 weeks. The hours for this academy are 08:00am until 5:00pm Monday through Friday. Academy is scheduled to convene March 3,2007 through June1, 2008.

This is a comprehensive training program that will be challenging physically, mentally and academically. Student feedback will be provided in the form of test scores and subjective evaluations collected by the instructors. The B-Fit instructors are excited about providing students with the best possible opportunity to become fire service employees either in our own region or across the state.

To apply for the Fire Academy, complete the following three steps:

• Take the reading comprehension test (TABE).The TABE is offered on the Asheville Campus in the Pines Building, room 213, Monday through Thursday 8:30-11:30am, 12:00-4:30pm and from 5:00-8:30pm. It is also administered on Fridays, 8:30-12:00.
• Complete Fire Academy application packet and return to AB Tech Fire Service Continuing Education Office.
• Perform a physical agility, and written entrance test. Contact Kevin Griffin at kgriffin@abtech.edu or John Norejko at jnorejko@abtech.edu in A-B Tech's Fire Service Continuing Education Office, or call 828-254-1921 Ext. 139 to schedule an appointment.

The deadline for application is December 4, 2007.

Candidates will be advised of their results by December 21,2007.

The Davis Dotson Combat Challenge

When you hear that name, you’re about to face one of the toughest physical and mental challenges of your firefighting career. It will literally take your breath away.

A firefighter dons about 50 pounds of personal protective gear including a Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus and starts by carrying almost 50 pounds of fire hose up several flights of stairs. At the top of the stairs, the firefighter drops the hose bundle and pulls up a second roll of hose at the end of a long rope. Back down the stairs, still carrying the original bundle of hose, the firefighter simulates a forcible entry by pounding a sledge hammer against a five-foot railroad tie, moving the heavy wooden beam five feet along a steel track. By this time, only a couple of minutes have passed and your strength and breath are failing, but there’s more!

The firefighter race-walks about 140 feet, picks up the nozzle of a charged (full of water) one-and-three-quarters-inch hose line and advances the hose 100 feet, opening and closing the nozzle at the end of the advance. After that, the hardest part of the challenge is staring you in the face – the dummy drag. The firefighter must drag a 185-pound mannequin (nicknamed Rescue Randy) 50 feet. Once you cross the line, you don’t know whether to throw up, pass out, or cry – but you’re finished and you just hope you’ve completed the challenge in under seven minutes – the minimum requirement for graduation. ~ Bentley Andrews