Watkins Volunteer Fire Department can boast of six newly certified volunteers – in the area of VR – that stands for vehicular rescue, not virtual reality.

While many their age may be more interested in virtual reality with video games and other computer-based technology, these young volunteers have devoted their weekends to participating in their own VR certification process to be able to better serve their community.

Assistant Chief Brandon Link said his department has accomplished quite a feat, and he and Chief Brian Clayton have nothing but praise to shower on this group of volunteers.

Link is in charge of training and operations at the department. He told John C. Rose Monday on Town Talk that what started out about three years ago really snowballed. “We started off with a couple or three (people), and then they started coming out of the woodwork,” he said. The state recently teased out vehicular rescue into its own separate series of training courses, and Link said that’s what the group has been working on since the first of the year.

The training occurs on the weekend, and the participants sleep on cots or in hammocks at the fire department to be on site for the whole weekend. They cram in as much as 30-40 hours of training over the course of a weekend.

Link points to Matt Overton as a critical link between the older firefighters and the younger ones. Overton spent a lot of time when he was younger at the department with his father.

“He’s our bridge with these guys,” Link said. Overton knows “the things that this (younger) generation calls ‘cool.’ It’s keeping them close,” he added.

Having the interest from younger residents in the community is vital to keeping a volunteer fire department healthy, productive and ready to respond to a fire, accident or other emergency.

Link said he can put  17-18 men on structure fire responses, “more than what anyone else is doing in the four counties,” he said.

“They want to help, but they want to do more than help – they want to learn and they want to do it right. It’s just remarkable. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Link acknowledged partners Ken Reeves, who led the instruction, Steve Barney at Vance-Granville Community College, the Vance County Rescue Squad and Fred’s Towing for their support in providing expertise, equipment, tools and vehicles during the trainings. They’ve cut roofs off cars, tunneled through trunks and popped doors to simulate ways to get victims out of vehicles, he said.

Some exercises, however, have less to do with using equipment and more to do with promoting collaboration.

Link gave an example, which he called a huge team builder. A table was laid on the ground, its legs folded underneath. The group had to figure out how to raise the table in order to extend the legs. And, by the way, without spilling a drop of water from the glass that was sitting on the tabletop.

“If they spilled the water, they had to restart the exercise,” he said.

Within 20 minutes, Link said the group had figured out how to successfully execute their plan, which recreates a technique called “cribbing,” which Link defined as lifting an object, an inch at the time, stabilizing it, then lifting another inch.

The Watkins department has paid staff at the station during the week for the first 12 hours of the day.

Having additional personnel available to go out on calls is so important, Link said. And having those young, dedicated volunteers undergo the training to make them better is crucial to the department’s mission of Commitment to Community.

“This training, we can’t put a price tag on it. It’s invaluable.”

Three more volunteers are wrapping up their certification and Link expects them to complete it soon.