Arkansas State University hosted fire safety day to help students prepare for the unexpected as part of National Preparedness Month. 

Fire safety day, originally scheduled for Sept. 12, brought the Jonesboro Fire Department to the Heritage Plaza Lawn.

Wyatt Reed, emergency operations and occupational safety specialist, said the goal of fire safety day is for students to learn how to keep their residences safe and to stop and think about the importance of being prepared.

“With preparedness we each individually play such an important role in making sure we’re ready to prevent and respond to something in our own individual lives,” Reed said. “We get very complacent with things so we don’t think about all the different hazards that we face on a daily basis, especially when it comes to something like fire.”

Jason Wills, the Jonesboro Fire Department division chief and fire marshall, said the most important thing for people to remember during a fire is to stay calm. 

“If the fire has grown, get out of that situation. Call 911 as quickly as possible. Have an escape plan,” Wills said. 

Wills reminded students to check their smoke alarms, have a fire safety plan and talk about fire safety with those they live with to hopefully save lives. 

The fire department drew students to the event by having a firetruck in the lawn and a Bullex machine creating a digital version of a fire that students could use to practice extinguishing a flame with a fire extinguisher. 

Wills said it is important for students to know how to use a fire extinguisher. 

“It’s the first line of defense. The fire extinguisher is a tool for the general public to be able to stop a fire in the incipient phase,” Willis said, “So we want to stop fires while they’re nice and small and they don’t get out of hand,”

Jacob Copeland, a senior computer science major from St. Louis, tried out the fire extinguisher and said it is much harder to use a fire extinguisher than he originally believed.

“Basically, I did not know side to side. Like, from everything I saw, I thought you just pointed at it and sprayed it. You actually have to go side to side to douse the fire,” Copeland said.

Copeland said he feels much more prepared than before should there be a fire nearby.

The next event scheduled for National Preparedness Month is a  CPR Awareness Course Sept. 26. 

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