Three graduate from fire academy

Three New Albany firefighters recently graduated from the Mississippi Fire Academy.

They are Chandler Bryant, Taylor Lyons and Hunter Wigington.

The course usually lasts seven weeks, but due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, it was delayed and taught quite a bit here in house locally. “These three young firefighters should be commended for staying strong through a very trying time,” Acting Fire Chief Mark Whiteside said. “They stayed the course and did what was needed to complete the course as requested.” Whiteside added that it was announced last week that Hunter Wigington graduated with the highest GPA in his academy class. “Just an awesome testimony to the drive and commitment this group of guys had,” he said.

The academy trains concerning basic firefighting, of course, but adds more special skills such as pumper apparatus, dealing with hazardous materials, auto extrication, basic rescue and others.