World's Youngest Firefighters Graduate in Cape Town

Photo Credit: Video Screengrab

Tiny firefighters, and perhaps the world’s youngest firefighters ‘graduated’ from their learning experience in a wholesome clip that’s had Cape Town feeling confident in the next generation of fire heroes:

Cape Town, South Africa (09 June 2024)—The world’s youngest firefighters have earned their chops in Cape Town as Alderman JP Smith recently shared.

A cohort of kiddies got to learn the ins and outs of what goes into firefighting while learning what to do in an emergency as well as what to do and, of course, the good old “stop, drop and roll” drill.

Now before any alarm bells go off, no these toddlers are not actually going to be the force you’re met with if you call a City of Cape Town fire department. Instead, the firefighting learning programme is an initiative that helps little ones be a little more prepared in case of a fire; while igniting sparks of curiosity toward the heroic career path.

To date, the City has done over 400 of these safety presentations across the 32 fire stations, where pre-schools, organisations and aftercare communities have all been enlightened with firefighting 101.

But, there were some official adult graduates from the City’s learner firefighting troops; a cohort of 26 who have been training for an entire year after being selected from around 7,500 applications.

They have been equipped with Wildland firefighting NFPA skills, advanced first response, and respiratory training, among other firefighting skills (and real-life incidents), and graduated in Constantia earlier this week!

Now, they enter the Fire & Rescue Service Training Academy and progress steps closer to being the City’s trusted boots on the ground.