By Michael N. Ciampo
The Midway Fire Protection District is located in the panhandle of western Florida in Santa Rosa County. The county is primarily a bedroom community for Pensacola and Eglin Air Force Bases. It is also widely known for its pristine sandy beaches as it sits on the Gulf Breeze Peninsula (Fairpoint Peninsula), surrounded by Pensacola Bay, East Bay, and Santa Rosa Sound. Life for most of the southern residents of the county involves numerous water activities such as boating, paddle boarding, swimming, surfing, fishing, and relaxing along the shore lines. In the northern section of the county, it is mostly forest and farmland today but did once contain areas with oil and gas fields.
The Midway Fire District was a volunteer organization and incorporated in 1963 with most apparatus parked at either resident’s homes or at sheds of areas businesses. In 1982, the Midway Fire Protection District was formed and in 1998 career firefighters began serving during the daytime periods. In 2001, firefighters began working two shifts of 12 hours and working seven days a week until 2002, when the district went to a 24-hour shift schedule. In 2004, the district became a licensed advance life support first response agency, the first in Santa Rosa County. Additionally, it started a hazmat team, a special operations division, and fire prevention bureau.
The district serves an area of about 26 square miles in the 32563 zip code, running out of two stations: Station 35 (located centrally in the district) and 37 (located on the east end of the district). They also provide mutual aid responses to Gulf Breeze, Navarre, Navarre Beach, Pensacola Beach, and Avalon-Mulat areas. The operations division has 26 members who work 24-hour shifts in a three-shift rotation. These personnel are required to be certified Firefighter II by the State of Florida and either be emergency medical technician (EMT) or paramedic-trained. Many of these personnel are also trained as hazmat technicians, and all firefighters in their first year must complete 80 hours of apparatus operations and fire service hydraulics training. A unique feature of the district is that it owns and operates its own training academy—the Midway Fire Academy—which was established by the Florida State Legislature. Not only does it provide training for its own members, but it has also branched out to include continuing education classes and entry level training for local firefighters. The main training props and buildings are located either adjacent to or behind Station 37. The academy’s engine is also stored in one of the apparatus bays at the station.
Truck 37 is a 2006 Rosenbauer 100-foor aerial ladder, equipped with a tank and pump, that runs fire and EMS runs out of Station 37. It is painted black over red, with the aerial control box on the turntable also painted black. The truck is equipped with roll-up compartment doors on each side of the apparatus that aren’t painted. There is a black reflective stripe running low along the crew cab, and then it goes higher on the body of the apparatus. One distinct feature is the addition of reflective markings on the left rear compartment, which has RIT (rapid intervention