The Central Detachment, 7th Brigade, Fire Bureau of Taichung City held “Historical Site & Building Fire Scene Command and Control of Incident Operations Rescue Drill” at the Taichung Mayor’s House on the afternoon of February 21st. Taichung Mayor’s House was built in 1929 and was also known as the Miyahara Villa. It was a villa built by Japanese ophthalmologist Miyahara Takeo, taken over by the Taichung City Government after restoration, and was announced and registered as a historical building of Taichung City in 2002. It is the third enlisted historical building in Taiwan and is the most well-preserved Western villa building build during the Japanese Colonial Era in Taichung City.
The Central Detachment held a briefing before the drill and stressed that the three concepts of “self-help”, “mutual-help” and “public-help” are very important in rescuing historical sites and buildings. Therefore, when a fire occurs, besides extinguishing the fire immediately, means should also be utilized to minimize the damage of the cultural heritages in order to preserve these precious cultural heritages of Taichung City to the next generation.
This drill not only lectured on maintenance management disaster prevention methods to historical site and building administrators, but also took reference of CCIO (Command and Control of Incident Operations) from the National Fire Academy of the USA as instruction principals while conducting rescuing drills to ensure the sustainable preservation of the cultural heritages of Taichung City. Historical sites and buildings are the common memory and social value of the people and their preservation rely on the enhanced risk awareness of the people. Taichung City Government expects that through the implementation of everyday risk management and constructing secured environments, alongside with self-help actions and the assistance of the government, we can together preserve and pass on cultural properties.