A building at Petrolia’s wastewater treatment plant has been transformed into the JH Fairbank Fire Training Centre.

It was officially opened this week, although Petrolia/North Enniskillen Fire Chief Jay Arns says firefighters worked on retrofitting the building through the pandemic and have been using it for training exercises for some time.

The fire department had been talking about a new training centre for nearly eight years. At one time, the department planned a building behind the Centre Street firehall. But when the municipality built a new wastewater treatment plant, the existing building became vacant. The town donated it to the fire department and firefighter went to work transforming it to a training centre.

Arns says walls were removed and “the total interior was refinished” by volunteer labour from the firefighters.

Arns says the department can now provide the courses new recruits need to become a firefighter and help veterans hone their skills on everything from high angle rescues and grain bin accidents.

The centre is named after John Henry Fairbank – the first fire warden in Petrolia. His great grandson, Charlie Fairbank, and his spouse, Pat McGee, were among those on hand to cut the fire hose to officially open the centre. McGee says Fairbank loved his work as the fire warden, continuing in the position for over 12 years.

In her book, the Story of Fairbank Oil, McGee says “The Belden Atlas of 1880  noted the town’s fire department was ‘first class’ and added, ‘in no town is this attribute more required… considering that everything in and of the town is of the most inflamable.'”

Fairbank presented the department with a historic gift for the occasion. a souvenir booklet from an Ontario Fire Chief’s event held in 1935. The booklet has been saved by the Fairbank family since 1935 and Fairbank thought the Petrolia Fire Department should have it.

On its cover was a Petrolia rescue unit from that time period, the same one which was recently refurbished and has been seen in local parades.