Champaign Firefighters Local 1260 posted on its Facebook they were hit by gunfire on Saturday night. No firefighters were injured during the incident. Facebook Post: Champaign Firefighters Local 1260 have been alarmed and saddened by the amount of violence in the community this year. We as Firefighters respond to many of these scenes when someone has been injured. We have even dealt with shooting victims being dropped off at our firehouses. We see first hand the loss when a family member is taken too soon. Sadly that violence hit close to home for us last night. Overnight, Station 1 was hit by gunfire. Luckily none of our members were injured in this event. We are here to serve the community, we spend a third of our lives at the firehouse. We will always be there when you need us, but we as a community have to do better. The violence needs to come to a end.  

The Peoria Fire Department is one of 11 local fire departments to receive a $1,000 Illinois American Water Firefighter Grant. It's the fire department's second year receiving the grant. Nate Rice said this year, the money will go towards helping educate Peoria Public School kids on fire prevention. He said the money will cover the cost of materials handed out to students. "We want it not only present to them, but we also want to distribute that stuff that they can take home and learn from and good activities, youth activities, that they can do to kind of promote the fire prevention practices that we promote in their homes," Rice. Rice said this week, they will be visiting 14 Peoria schools for Fire Prevention Week. American Illinois Water also donated a chlorine kit that will help firefighters stop chlorine leaks.  

The city of Effingham has agreed to receive assistance from the Illinois Fire Chiefs' Association in finding its next fire chief. The city council voted unanimously this week to accept a proposal from the IFCA's Assessment and Consulting Services to help with promoting the fire chief vacancy across the state. IFCA will craft an ad to be placed in a variety of different spots, from IFCA's website and Facebook page to the daily dispatch of the International Association of Fire Chiefs' Great Lakes Division. The ad will also be posted on forums for female, African-American and Hispanic firefighters, in addition to a posting for 30 days on the Illinois Municipal League's website. In addition, IFCA will also review resumes and provide a list of their preferred candidates. The city will pay $6,620 to IFCA for its services.  

Firefighters are encouraging their communities to "learn the sounds of fire safety". It's part of National Fire Prevention Week, which continues through Oct. 9. Throughout the week, Peoria firefighters have held presentations for Peoria Public Schools K-2 students. Friday, the Peoria division chief of fire prevention Nate Rice spoke to children at Charter Oak Primary School. His main message was the importance of smoke detectors. Rice says it's vital that fire safety is ingrained in children at a young age "Making a plan to get out, getting out of your house as soon as you hear those three beeps, what to do when the battery's low in a smoke detector and the sound that's going to make, and just having a plan of action when it's necessary," are what Rice said he told the students. Rice said a smoke detector can be the difference in preventing fires, injuries, or death.  

Michael Pickering, a 45-year-old veteran Chicago firefighter, died from COVID-19 complications Friday morning. Pickering's stepson, John Christian, said his death was unexpected. "Him getting sick like this was just the last thing any of us saw coming," Christian said. "We really didn't expect it to go this way." Pickering's relatives said he got sick a few weeks ago and was eventually hospitalized and placed on a respirator. It's unclear how he contracted the virus. Pickering, who joined the Chicago Fire Department in 2003 and was assigned to Engine 29 in the Bridgeport neighborhood, is the fourth member of the department to die from complications of the virus.  

VIDEO/PHOTOS: The Mt. Angel Fire District said a four-alarm fire broke out in the early morning hours on Saturday. At 12:48 a.m., officers from the Mt. Angel Police Department discovered that a building in the 200 block of South Main Street was on fire. The officers called in what they had found, and the Mt. Angel Fire District was dispatched to respond. Upon arrival of the first engine, the building was fully engulfed in flames. Additional alarms were called, and the fire eventually went to four alarms. There were 35 fire apparatus that responded with nearly 120 firefighters battling the flames. Over a million gallons of water were used to knock the fire down. The businesses affected by the fire were The Blackbird Granary, KP Harvesttime, Wood Pellet Stoves and Hiddenbed of Oregon.  

A Palm Harbor firefighter and paramedic received a hero's welcome at a community fundraiser Saturday after she was nearly killed on the job just a few weeks ago. Lt. Ashley White, 38, was hit by a speeding pickup truck while responding to a crash in September in Palm Harbor, authorities said. "It's a miracle, honestly, seeing the damage to our apparatus that was done and knowing that he was driving at a high rate of speed," she said Saturday at a fundraiser organized for her at the Tarpon Springs Elks Lodge 1719. The driver of the pickup died. Lt. White sustained several injuries to her legs and arms. "Pretty amazing seeing my crew members working on one of their own and knowing what was going on," she said. One of those crew members was Lt. Steve Gorby.  

Firefighter Dan Felt still has some of the gear Chief Daniel "Skip" Bergbauer used at Red White & Blue Fire District in Breckenridge. "This is his jacket, this is the car he used to drive," said Felt. "We're hanging on to his equipment, but we miss the guy." Fire Chief Bergbauer spent 25 years working as a firefighter at Red, White, and Blue. He died unexpectedly in July. Next to firefighting and his family, Skip loved roasting coffee. So much so, when Skip died, fellow firefighters found 3,000 pounds of coffee beans in his house. "We walked into his garage and the coffee was packed into bags piled halfway up to the ceiling," said Felt. Those beans are now at Cuppa Joe/Breckenridge Coffee Roasters where Andrew Iwashko has been roasting them into three blends Skip would have loved.  

PHOTOS: Mifflinburg Hose Company turns 125 years old in 2022 and when it celebrates that milestone, a piece of its past will proudly be displayed. The volunteer fire company commissioned a full restoration of an 1899 hand-drawn ladder wagon built by the American LaFrance Fire Engine Co. in Elmira, N.Y. The results are stunning. Isaac Reiff and sons from Vicksburg Buggy Shop carefully photographed the 16-foot steel-frame wagon before beginning their work. It looked rough to fire company members, Mifflinburg Hose President Chuck Klose said, but Reiff said it was in pretty good condition. "We did retighten the wheels. Otherwise, it did not take any repairs. It was just cleaning, removing all the paint and with these good pictures we were able to get it (to its original look) as close as I could," Reiff said Friday inside the station where the wagon sat at rest next to a modern fire engine.  

As a massive investment to repair roads and adapt to climate change faces an uncertain fate in Congress, a new report finds much of the country's infrastructure is already at risk of being shut down by flooding. And as the planet heats up, the threat is expected to grow. Today, one-in-four pieces of all critical infrastructure in the US — including police and fire stations, hospitals, airports and wastewater treatment facilities — face substantial risk of being rendered inoperable by flooding, according to a new report released today by the First Street Foundation, a nonprofit research and technology group that assesses the threat posed by flooding across the country. The report also found nearly 2 million miles of road — 23% of US roadways — are already at risk of becoming impassable due to flooding.