Pittsylvania commission endorses modular container training facilities, asks supervisors for code exemption

The Pittsylvania County Fire and Rescue Commission voted Thursday to ask the Board of Supervisors to adopt an ordinance treating modular, container-based training structures as temporary mobile training facilities and to exempt those units from certain local building-code requirements.

Chiefs and training officers told the commission the containers would allow realistic, reusable scenario-based drills without damaging station interiors or depending on short-term "acquired" structures slated for demolition. Chief Fowler and others outlined locations and training capabilities and said departments and donors would supply the project’s funding; they said they were not asking the county for operational funds.

Commissioners heard that the containerized facilities would be built from intermodal shipping containers fitted with movable walls and props to simulate forcible entry, search-and-rescue, hose…