SCARBOROUGH, Maine — The number of volunteer firefighters across the country hit a 35-year low in 2020, according to the National Fire Protection Agency. Meanwhile, the agency said the call volume for firefighting services has tripled.
On Sunday, more than 65 children participated in Scarborough's junior firefighter muster, showing the next generation have a desire to fill the gap.
17-year-old Camden Zsiga demonstrated his firefighting skills at the muster. The public watched Zsiga and dozens of other kids as they took turns attaching valves to a fire hydrant, connecting it to a hose and fire truck, eventually filling the pipes with spewing water.
"That's how you get water on a fire scene. That's your source of water. That's your lifeline," Zsiga said.
Still in high school, Zsiga might not have a career as a firemen out yet, but he is learning the skills to one day make a career in the industry.
"It's something I look forward to all week long." On Sundays, Zsiga heads to Scarborough's junior firefighter program. Through firefighting drills and scenarios, he learns life-saving tasks that he said have already impacted his life.
"There's such like a bond here that all these kids, we have together," he said.
During the muster, that bond was especially visible as junior firefighters from around Maine gathered together.
"We can meet other kids that share the same passion as us and get to show the town what we can do," Zsiga said.
Many of the different drills the groups have learned were performed together in front of an audience.
"The first year we did this, the committee and myself came up with the slogan 'the future of the Maine fire service' and that's exactly what this is," Scarborough Fire Department Captain Daryen Granata, said.
Granata created the event as a way to show off the kids' hard work and also remind the public why offering junior programs is important.
"Communities are evolving and what happens is, if you don't have a good feeder program for your fire department, your fire department goes away. They either can't staff it or fund it and it turns into a problem for that community," Granata said.
Granata's said he hopes, one day, the kids who participated Sunday will make a career out of it.
Zsiga said if the drills he does is anything like the job, he plans to stick around.
"It's unmatched, you can't get it anywhere else. How close we are, the friendships we've formed here. It lasts forever. It's perfect," he said.
