Boca Raton Firefighters, Captain Phil Santa Maria and Firefighter Nat Nichols traveled to Prescott, Arizona to pay tribute to fallen firefighters. Santa Maria and Nichols were among thousands of brothers and sister firefighters who came from every state in the nation and around the world to honor the elite group of 19 wild land firefighters know as the “Hot Shots”. Outside Station 7 where the group worked firefighters and citizens erected a memorial of shirts, flags, flowers and signs to honor the fallen heroes.

Boca Raton, Florida: Boca Raton Fire Rescue Services A Team, Shea Miller, James Haag and Jeff Lazzeri took first place at the 13th Annual Randy Boaz ALS Competition. Eighteen teams from throughout Florida met at Miami Dade Community College Campus to take part in this year’s event. Each team handled three different scenarios that were given back to back. The scenarios were designed to test the team’s ability to handle a variety of basic and advanced medical issues and perform the correct medical procedures in the correct order in a determined amount of time.  The final scenario called Miller, Haag and Lazzeri to a party at a residence where they treated multiple patients. Injuries included a head injury, traumatic burns, dehydration and an arterial hemorrhage.

Boca Raton’s competition team placed first in 2007 and 2011 in this competition. In 2012 they placed second. This year Boca Raton had two teams in the top “5” with Boca Raton’s Team B placing 4th. Both teams are set to compete at the Clinical Conference on Pre Hospital Care in Orlando “Clin-Con” on July 16th.  Training for competitions takes dedication and commitment with members putting in hundreds of hours on their own time training. Teams come together and share ideas, and network bringing back valuable information to share with their co-workers. This helps the department deliver the best, efficient and effective emergency medical service to our citizens.