The fire departments from Osceola County and the cities of Kissimmee and St. Cloud have joined forces to become part of a statewide effort to assist with the brush fires in East Central Florida.

Each fire department provided one fire engine staffed with four or five personnel. The local governments received the request to form a strike team Tuesday morning.. The three local units met with two other engines from Seminole County to form the completed five-engine strike team. Fire personnel reported to a staging area in Mims for their specific task assignments.

“We received the call from the emergency response coordinator for an engine,” St. Cloud Fire Rescue Chief Bill Johnston said. “The extreme conditions required neighboring fire departments to assist in any way possible. When you have roads shut down, residents evacuated from hundreds of homes and thick smoke visible for miles, you know local emergency personnel will need to work together to ensure the public’s safety.”

“No one agency can handle incidents that are this large and complex,’” Osceola County Fire Rescue Chief Richard Collins said. “Working through the State Emergency Response System, many departments are coming from across the area to help Brevard County. In times of disaster, this system ensures all of our abilities to respond effectively to citizens, and we are glad to help.”

“The Kissimmee Fire Department does not hesitate to answer calls of this nature as we realize the importance of providing assistance to other communities in their time of need,” Kissimmee Deputy Fire Chief Jeremy Donovan said.

The multi-agency strike team is assisting in attacking the fires, dousing several flare-ups to avoid larger fires, and protecting structures in the Brevard and Volusia areas. Despite recent rains and a shift in wind direction that would normally help crews get the upper-hand on this type of emergency, the weather forecast is for low humidity and windy conditions during the next several days. These atmospheric conditions could prove challenging and with so many houses potentially in danger, the state emergency response plan was implemented, fire officials said.

Strike team deployment is part of the Statewide Emergency Response Plan, which provides for the systematic mobilization, deployment, organization, and management of emergency resources throughout Florida, and the nation, in assisting local agencies in mitigating the effects of any large scale disaster.