Sunday May, 29 2011 Nature: Marine unit Training Exercises Address: Indian River & Rehoboth Bays On Sunday morning, the Indian River Volunteer Fire Company Vessel Committee continued its Marine Unit Training Exercises in order to become familiar with the operational objectives of Marine 80. Indian River’s Marine 80 is a 26’ foot vessel from SVI (www.svitrucks.com and www.sviboats.com) of Loveland, Colorado to serve our fire district. The 26’ SVI Boat is a vessel to serve fire companies and is constructed of heavy duty marine grade aluminum constructed vessel with a 72” power operated bow landing craft gate to transport manpower, equipment and/or ATVs. The vessel hosts a 12’ x 6’ working deck space; self-bailing hull design with seating for ten (10) and can be fully maneuverable while flowing water. The vessel host an array of technology and telecommunication devices which include: 800 megahertz radios, 400 megahertz radios, VHF Marine radios, Garmin Radar devices, FLIP thermal imaging camera, global positioning units, and much more. The fire suppression system is capable of running 5” large diameter discharges, monitor discharges, and 1 ¾” hand lines. The training exercises incorporated various maneuverability objectives with respect to launching the vessel, docking the vessel in various boat slips, pump operations, waterway navigational items with the newly identified channels for the summer season of 2011. Additional emphasis was placed on navigational instrumentation and waterway navigation during the peak summer seasons. Overall, the Vessel Training Committee is very pleased with the operational aspects of the marine unit and has recommended complete implementation for emergency response. Additional training exercises will commence in order to further enhance our membership’s ability to navigate our waterways and operate the vessel.