The Fire Academy provides quality training to enable firefighters to perform their jobs in a manner that will result in the reduction of death, injury, and property loss from fire, hazardous situations, medical emergencies and other disasters.
While in the academy, recruits attend classes Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with occasional evenings and weekends, as deemed necessary by training instructors.
Training includes fire science classroom instruction and practicum and emergency medical technician-basic training including classroom instruction and practicum. Virginia Beach firefighter recruits will receive a salary and benefits while attending the six-month Fire Academy.
In addition to classroom instruction, recruits will participate in daily physical training. It is a well-known fact that firefighters perform physically demanding job functions in various intense environments.
Therefore, the Virginia Beach Fire Department makes physical fitness a priority in order for our firefighters to perform their job safely and successfully.
Firefighter recruits are expected to maintain physical expectations with the goal of gradually increasing their physical conditioning during the training period.
The number one reason firefighter recruits do not successfully complete the Academy is their inability to meet the required physical expectations.
Below is a list of exercises firefighter recruits are expected to complete on their first day in the Academy.
Firefighter Recruits are expected to:
The expectations listed above are the minimum requirements to score points in each category of the recruit physical assessment. Firefighter recruits undergo the recruit physical assessment several times while attending our Fire Academy.
Recruits will work up to running five miles, perform various functional fitness exercises related to fire activities, as well as complete exercises for strength training while attending the Virginia Beach Fire Academy.
