8 Saipan firefighters are now certified instructors

Department of Fire and Emergency Medical Services Commissioner Claudio Norita, standing extreme right, poses for a group photo yesterday with South Dakota Businesses instructors Dave Boer, standing second left, and Travis Spier, standing third left, and the eight Saipan firefighters who are now certified instructors for pre-hospital trauma life support, pediatric education for pre-hospital professional, and emergency medical technician. Firefighter Daniel R. Suel, standing extreme left, also received recertification for the same courses. (Ferdie de la Torre)

Eight Saipan firefighters have been certified as new instructors for pre-hospital trauma life support, pediatric education for pre-hospital professional, and emergency medical technician.

The new instructors are Firefighters Daverrick Camacho, Adam Safer, Shawn Kaipat, Robert Cruz, Richard Manalo, Joshua Sablan, Christino George, and Sixto Aquino.

Firefighter Daniel R. Suel also received recertification for the same courses.

It means that the new instructors are now holding a national standard certification and are recognized nationally.

South Dakota Businesses instructors Dave Boer and Travis Spier conducted the five-day training. The two are also conducting basic certification of the fire cadets at the ongoing academy.

Department of Fire and Emergency Medical Services Commissioner Claudio Norita, in an interview yesterday, said every three to four years, Boer and Spier would come to Saipan and certify firefighters to be national registered emergency medical technician (EMT) instructors.

“All of our firefighters are EMTs. And they have expiration. So they have in-service training,” Norita said.

Norita said they brought Boer and Spier to certify instructors to teach the firefighters in the CNMI.

Spier said during the five-day training, they focused on EMT instructor component as well as on trauma care and on pediatrics.

Spier said they gave the firefighters the foundation and techniques on being successful instructors.

“They did very well. Their performance was exceptional. Their interaction with the students was very good. Their test was really good,” said Spier, who has been on the island three times.

Spier is a paramedic and a nurse.

Boer, who is also a paramedic and EMS consultant, has been on the island 10 times.

Boer said their whole goal is to make firefighters in the CNMI self-sufficient so they can do their own training here.

“So we’re doing instructor training so they can take care of their own training needs,” he said.

Boer said the training is important so that the CNMI will not have to pay money for people like them to come all the way from Dakota.

He said the newly certified instructors have now the same credentials as anyone in the states.

“It’s a tough course. It takes a lot of hours. But they all did very well. We are proud to help them get through this,” Boer said.

He stressed that their business is to make people self-sufficient.

“They’re capable of taking care of their own training here for the people now. And that’s our goal was,” he added.

Boer said there are 38 cadets in the academy right now so they need more instructors to meet national standards for these people.