Repeated Fires Take Toll On Training Tower

Falling tiles are forcing Spokane Valley Fire District officials to repair its training tower.

The building’s walls and ceilings will be coated with a spray known as “refractory concrete,” said Fire Chief Pat Humphries. That will replace the fire resistant tiles. Furnace bricks will also be added to the tower’s floors.

The repairs, which are slated to begin next month, will cost $40,000. Humphries expected work to be complete in time for a May recruiting class.

The improvements will make Valley Fire’s training tower similar to the state fire training tower in North Bend. The spray was applied to that facility four years ago and has held up well, Humphries said.

Four-foot square tiles recently began falling off the walls and ceiling in the Valley Fire tower, worrying Humphries about injuries to his firefighters.

The tiles themselves are not failing, Humphries said. They are cut from the same material used to protect the space shuttle from the heat of entering and leaving the earth’s atmosphere and have proved quite durable, he said.

The pieces that fasten them to the walls are causing the problem, Humphries said.

The training tower was built in 1985, Humphries said. Valley firefighters battle between six and 12 training blazes a year in the tower, which is also used for ladder, rope and first aid training.

“We try to go to the maximum temperature a concrete building can take without hurting the building,” Humphries said.

The intense heat of those fires has begun to add up.

“Buildings are not built to have fires in them,” Humphries said. “Whether it’s a training tower or not, fire takes a toll on them.”

, DataTimes