MONETA, Va. – The Smith Mountain Lake Marine Volunteer Fire and Rescue Department held its 50th anniversary on Saturday in Moneta.
To celebrate, they held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for their new building while christening their newest fire boat.
“Over the last 20 years and over the last 50 years, we didn’t have home,” said Chief Todd Ohlerich. “We had to borrow places from other organizations to hold our meetings and have our trainings, so now we have a home, we’re real excited.”
The new station has a price tag of around $300,000 and is the result of a 20-year fundraising project.
“We have a nice big training room and meeting room for our meetings,” Chief Ohlerich. “We have some offices for the officers and we have a large garage area that stores one of our fire boats, our five trailers and our air trailer.”
The SML Marine Volunteer Fire and Rescue Department does not use fire trucks and instead opts for fire boats, holding them at docks around the lake. After their latest inclusion, their arsenal includes ten specifically equipped boats.
This newest fire boat costs just over $500,000, and will now allow the department to expand its efforts to help more people.
“We do a lot of patient transport. It’ll allow us to get injured people... off a dock where the stairs up to the house is too steep,” volunteer boat captain Dave Burk said. “It allows us to get them off safely onto the boat and transfer them to a marina where there an ambulance or safety vehicle waiting for them.”
The next goal for the SML Marine Volunteer Fire and Rescue Department is to fundraise for a new dock to keep their boats closer to the new station building.