Jocelyn Fire and First Response

02/09/2026

Hello Everyone - We hope you are all keeping warm and safe!

Just a quick reminder about emergency vehicles:

When you see an emergency vehicle approaching with its flashing lights and/or siren activated, the Highway Traffic Act requires drivers to pull over to the right and come to a complete stop until the vehicle has passed (Highway Traffic Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. H.8, s.159).

This applies to traffic in BOTH directions, unless the roadway is separated by a median.

This is especially important at this time of year when roads can be icy and are sometimes narrowed from snow banks - this reduces everyone’s margin for error. Pulling over and stopping, even when the emergency vehicle is approaching from the opposite direction, gives us more room and helps keep everyone safe.

Also, we ask that you please treat our personal vehicles displaying flashing green lights the same way. While green lights do not carry a legal requirement to stop, yielding when it's safe to do so helps us respond more quickly and safely.

Thanks for your continued cooperation!

12/26/2025

Happy Holidays, Everyone!

We Just wanted to let you know that we're going to try burning the brush piles at the Jocelyn landfill this afternoon...

Please don't be alarmed if there's a bit of smoke as things heat up down there...

Hopefully the snow tappers off for us!

:)

12/09/2025

Hi Everyone,

We just wanted to give a Big Thanks to the Township for their funding and an Especially Big Thanks to the members of the former Jocelyn Recreation Committee who volunteered many hours and did a ton of work to put on a holiday dinner for the members of the Jocelyn Fire Department and First Responders this past weekend.

The food was amazing and endless, the town meeting hall was beautifully decorated and cozy, and we all had a terrific time.

Thanks so much to everyone who helped out!

10/30/2025

We've got some good news to share...

Last night we were officially presented with a cheque by the St. Joseph Island Lions Club to fund the purchase of a new AED (defibrillator) that now lives onboard our Pumper truck at #2 Hall on 4th Concession.

This replaces an old AED that we can no longer get batteries and replacement pads for.

It's a big deal for us to have a modern, working, AED at that end of the island as it probably cuts about ten minutes off our response time for our members that live down that way. They won't have to drive the wrong way up to #1 Hall to get one and then drive all the way back down to assist a patient. When an AED is required, minutes are precious.

The old AED still has enough life in it for one final use, so one of our members that lives towards Richard's Landing will retain it to provide extra coverage for that end of the island until it expires. It's a Win-Win for everyone.

We can't thank the Lions enough for their continued support of us and for all their hard work of fundraising and supporting our Island communities generally.

They're an awesome group and we hope everyone supports them as much as possible!

09/28/2025

Today is Ontario's annual Test Your Smoke Alarm day.

We encourage everyone to test their smoke and CO alarms today and to get into the habbit of testing monthly.

Remember, you need to have a working alarm on every floor of your house and outside of bedrooms, and they should be replaced every 10 years.

Most fire fatalities are in dwellings that didn't have working smoke alarms.

We've had a number of close calls in recent years with both fire and CO (carbon monoxide) poisioning, and we want to make sure everyone stays safe.

Learn about Ontario’s annual Test Your Smoke Alarm Day on September 28. Join the Saved by the Beep campaign, take the safety pledge, and access multilingual fire safety tools to protect your home and loved ones.

09/21/2025

Good News, Everyone!

We'd like to introduce you to our new #2 Pumper truck, which is now officially commissioned, equipped, in service, and is housed at #2 Fire Hall on 4th Concession.

It is a 2000 GMC C8500 chassis with the fire body done by Fort Gary fire trucks and an 800 gallon onboard water tank. And, amazingly, it's actually a little shorter than our old #2 pumper, so it fits in the hall quite comfortably.

It has a 1050 gallon/min pump, has two pre-connected 1.75" cross-lay hoses, a number of 2.5" discharges, a 4" High Volume discharge (making this truck perfect for relay pumping to feed other fire trucks), and even has a Monitor ("water cannon") nozzle on the top of the truck.

It is equipped with most of our forestry firefighting gear, three Scott air packs, a good selection of different sized hoses to mate up with the discharges mentioned above, and has an AED (defibrillator) onboard.

There will be some tweaks and fine-tuning to do as we continue to practice with and use it, but everything works and it's good-to-go!

In the last week or two, to make the truck feel welcome in its new home, we spruced up #2 Hall a bit as well. The back wall has been re-insulated and re-dry walled, the entire hall has received a fresh coat of paint, and the floor has new lines to help with guiding the truck in.

We'd like to thank Greg Gilbertson for finding the truck and then travelling to southern Ontario with our chief, Rick Sirvio, to inspect the truck and get its pump tested, Jocelyn Township Council for approving and funding the purchase, the Prouse GM dealership in town who helped us sort out a vehicle registration snag, and all our volunteer firefighters who donated a lot of time and effort in the commissioning of the new truck and fixing up the hall.

Hopefully we'll get a number of years of good service out of the new truck, and not have to use it "for real" too much!

09/17/2025

One of our members attended the annual ladder certification testing and thought some of you may find this interesting:

LADDER TESTING

At the beginning of August, a company came to the island to do annual ladder certification testing for the island fire departments. I had no idea there was such a thing. It was interesting and informative. I quizzed the men about everything to do with their work, and hope I wasn't too much of a nuisance.

The ladders placed horizontally on two sawhorses and extension ladders are fully extended. All the rungs are inspected and felt for deviations (dents, bends, etc.). If there are issues, such that a firefighter wearing all his gear (helmet, jacket, pants, boots, mask, air pack, about 250 lbs. combined weight) cannot safely step on a rung because it is defective, the ladder fails the inspection and cannot be used.

The ladders also have a number of heat-sensitive indicator patches on them. If any of the test patches (a little round patch with an orange circle in the middle) shows a black circle in the middle, the ladder may not be used. It is an indication that the ladder has been too near a fire and is now compromised because of the heat it was exposed to.

An additional test had the ladder with a five hundred pound weight attached to the center of it, holding it up for a 5 minute period. This causes the ladder to bend. When the weight is removed, depending on the length of the ladder, or extension ladder, a remaining bend deviation of more than 1/2" to 1 1/2" makes the ladder unusable in the fire service.

All the fire service ladders are rated for 750lbs, which works out to three firefighters at 250lbs each. They're strong, and Way heavier than a normal household ladder.

I found the whole experience fascinating. The rules for firefighting equipment are more strict and for a wider variety of our equipment than I knew and should make everyone feel more secure.

08/18/2025

Hi again, Everyone.

With the wet weather lately, it's safe now to rescind the Burn Permit cancellation.

All earlier fire restrictions are now lifted.

Please continue to keep safety in mind and follow the burn permit rules if you do intend to do a burn.

Thanks for your continuing cooperation!

08/08/2025

There's been a bit of activity down at our #2 Fire Hall on 4th Concession... A few weeks ago we took down the old and faded Fire Hall sign and gave the building a good hosing down/scrub, and did a bit of tree trimming.

Well, this week, the Fire Hall sign went back up, freshly painted by one of our members, and looking really spiffy!

We thought we'd share a few photos of the spruced-up Hall :)

08/07/2025

Hi All,

Because it's been very hot and dry for the last while, we have to CANCEL Burn Permits until conditions change.

The other townships on the island have done the same as well.

Until further notice, the only fires that are allowed are small campfire-sized fires for cooking purposes. They must be directly supervised and attended at all times.

Please let your friends and neighbours know.

Thanks for your cooperation!

07/31/2025

We had a bit of excitement on Thursday evening last week... while taking our old #2 Pumper truck home from getting its annual inspection and maintenance done, we had a fairly explosive rear tire blow-out.

The truck was brought to a stop safely and, upon further inspection, it looked like the inside right rear tire had blown but was still intact enough to not be rubbing on anything.

So we emptied the truck of water to lighten the load and limped back to #1 Hall at a crawl.

By chance, we saw Ian Murdock at the park and Rick asked him for advice on a good place to get a replacement tire. Not only did Ian give that advice, he helped us figure out exactly what tire to get, and offered to install the new tire for us when we got it on Monday.

Sure enough, by the end of the day Monday, he got the truck all fixed up for us and it's now back at its usual spot at #2 Hall.

We'd like to give Ian Murdock a big Thank You!

It's really nice to live in a community where people just jump in and help when problems crop up :)

07/21/2025

We just wanted to say Thank You to everyone who came out to our Open House on Saturday.

And we wanted especially to give a Big Thanks to the volunteers who made cookies and provided ice cream for the event, as well as to everyone who very generously donated money to our Fire Association. Your work and support are greatly appreciated!

We had a good time showing everyone around our trucks and gear, and giving the kids some hands-on experience with water fire extinguishers and forestry water backpack pumps.

It seemed like fun was had by all :)