Thanks to the Fulton Professional Firefighters' third annual golf tournament, the Fulton Fire Department now has a life-saving piece of technology primed and ready at both stations in town.
The firefighters' union has donated an approximately $1,600 new automated external defibrillator (AED) for the Tennyson Road Fire Station, using funds earned from their Oct. 5 fundraiser at Tanglewood Golf Course.
Fulton firefighter Todd Gray said the equipment was much needed, but budgetary restraints made it too difficult for the fire department to purchase. The department already had one such machine at their Westminster Avenue station.
"We have used (the Westminster AED) in the past and there are people that are still around because of it; it saved their lives," said Gray. "We felt that it was important to have it at the station on Tennyson for the community on the south end of town."
AEDs are portable devices able to automatically diagnose heart problems such as cardiac arrest or arrhythmias, and advise whether to continue using CPR or to use the device to administer a shock. Gray said he could think of at least three cases where the fire department's AED saved lives, two of which were in the past year.