The emergency medical technician (EMT) certification requirements for new Mattoon firefighters will be temporarily reduced to expedite hiring. During a meeting Tuesday night, the Mattoon City Council voted unanimously without additional discussion to approve a memorandum of understanding with Mattoon Firefighters Local 691 to reduce the minimum certification requirement for newly hired firefighters from EMT-paramedic to EMT-basic. The union has called for the city to bring staffing back up to 30 firefighters as required by the current contract, which was set to expire in 2018 but is still in place until a new contract is reached. The Mattoon Fire Department currently has approximately 22 firefighters on staff. City officials have said that they are having trouble finding candidates who have paramedic certification.  

Fire crews rescued a 3-year-old boy from a house fire Monday on the 500 block of 27th Street, East Moline. Three people were at home when the fire started about 5:45 p.m. Crews arrived to see heavy smoke coming from the second floor. A woman in the home shut the bedroom when she saw the blaze, and that slowed down the spread of the fire and allowed crews time to get to the scene and put out the fire, a firefighter said. Firefighters learned a little boy still was inside. Crews began to battle the blaze while other firefighters searched the house and found the boy wrapped in blankets in a first-floor bedroom. He was taken to a local hospital to be checked, and is believed to be OK, a firefighter at the scene said. There was significant damage on the second floor. The cause of the fire remains under investigation. The Red Cross is assisting the family.  

Glenn Vanek was a 27-year-old firefighter in 1993 when his station received a call: a home was on fire and a family was trapped inside. When Vanek arrived at the fire, he saw a woman pointing frantically at a burning home. "She kept saying her husband and children were inside," he said. Immediately, Vanek entered the burning home and began battling the blaze. Despite their efforts, Vanek and his team were unable to save the woman's husband or children. He said the incident stuck with him for a long time afterward. Vanek participated in a critical incident stress debriefing and talked with his co-workers to help ease his pain. However, he didn't feel like the support system in place was adequate. "A lot of those discussions were around a bottle of beer," Vanek said. "It's not the healthiest thing. But it got me through."  

There was an outpouring of support for the family of a suburban firefighter who died during training last week. On Tuesday, firefighters around the Chicago area and community members gathered to honor his sacrifice. Dylan Cunningham was looking forward to marrying the love of his life and anxiously awaiting his newborn baby due in December. Sadly, he lost his life doing what he loved. "He had the enthusiasm and drive to be one of our star firefighters. He was always seeking other training opportunities," said Bryant Krizik, Deputy Fire Chief in South Holland. That is what 29-year-old Dylan Cunningham was doing last Thursday. The firefighter-paramedic with the South Holland Fire Department was doing scuba training when something went wrong at a quarry in Kankakee.  

A charred car is all that's left in one garage after a string of arsons in one Chicago neighborhood. But there's a new clue that could help track down who's starting them. CBS 2's Jeremy Ross reports from Logan Square where video of an arsonist at work has surfaced and neighbors said this past weekend, a man set a series of fires walking down an alley. The person responsible may have been caught in the act. Logan Square neighbors are sharing surveillance of an alley showing a man apparently starting a fire then walking away from a trash bin. A fire starter believed to have played a role in a blaze Sunday. The fire burned hot and quick. One garage was engulphed. Dangerous temperatures threating more then the possessions inside. Matt Denny said he's fortunate that what the fire took can be replaced. His garage partially grizzled and withering in the wind. The vehicle inside was burned so badly, the paint job was turned to char.  

Police arrested five people from Switzerland County Monday on numerous theft-related charges after a six-month Indiana State Police investigation into theft from the Patriot Volunteer Fire Department that allegedly included a secret meeting and filing fake state paperwork to take over department accounts. State police said the investigation began in March, after they were notified that a group of people was attempting "to fraudulently gain control of the equipment and assets of the fire department," which had closed in 2017. Investigators said on March 16, 37-year-old Christopher See filed fraudulent paperwork with the state to take control of the fire department. Then See, along with Christopher Miller, 32, Caitlyn Staat, 19, Jacob Parker, 35, and Lewis Fritter, 42, held a meeting without giving proper public notice and without telling the remaining members of the Patriot Volunteer Fire Department.  

The Mattoon City Council and the firefighters union may temporarily reduce the emergency medical technician (EMT) certification requirements for new firefighters to expedite hiring. The council will consider approving a memorandum of understanding with Mattoon Firefighters Local 691 during the council meeting at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday. The council also will consider allocating more than $90,000 in midtown tax increment financing fund grants for exterior improvements to three buildings in this business district. Regarding the memorandum, this proposed document will temporarily reduce the minimum certification requirement for newly hired firefighters from EMT-paramedic to EMT-basic. The union has called for the city to bring staffing back up to 30 firefighters as required by the current contract, which was set to expire in 2018 but is still in place until a new contract is reached.  

In May, doctors announced they were seeing a new and rare coronavirus complication in children. Now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta warns, it's appearing in adults, too. Called MIS-C, which stands for Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children, the complication manifests roughly two to four weeks after a coronavirus infection. Experts suspect that children who develop this syndrome were exposed to the virus and that their bodies mounted an exaggerated immune response, the AJC's Helena Oliviero wrote. Symptoms are similar to toxic shock and Kawasaki disease: fever, rashes, swollen glands and, in severe cases, heart inflammation. Since June, several case reports have described a similar syndrome in adults. The CDC's review describes 27 patients who had cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, dermatologic and neurologic symptoms without severe respiratory illness and who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.  

VIDEO: Crews are at the old Royal Coach building in Hastings Wednesday morning battling a massive fire. Due to the fire, thousands in the Hastings area are without power. According to Lt. Lani Forbes with the Freeport Fire Department, Barry County Central Dispatch alerted authorities around 3:30 a.m. that an odor and smoke were coming from the building, located on N. Hanover Street and the former E.W. Bliss Landfill near Bliss Riverfront Park. When law enforcement arrived on scene, they found flames, Lt. Forbes explained on the scene. The Hastings Fire Department is on scene, but additional help from Freeport, Woodland, and Thornapple townships were called to the fire as well. "We could see the glow, as we were coming out of Freeport," Forbes explained. "It's a very large, intense fire."