With a great deal of pride, Calgary Fire Department Chief Steve Dongworth introduced the latest graduating class of firefighters to the wider Calgary community on Thursday.

The March 30 graduation of 36 firefighters was one of a four planned classes this year—three to follow in the coming months—with another four classes in 2024 and 2025.

The recruitment and graduation of the latest class is an aberration in North America, as fire departments nationally and internationally are facing difficulty in finding and retaining firefighters.

“I talked to my colleagues from across North America and they’re really struggling in terms of they put out a call for firefighters. They’re seeing unprecedented levels of disinterest,” said Chief Dongworth.

“In November, we opened our doors for a month for applications, and normally we get about 2,000 applicants and we got around 2,000 applicants. So we’re not seeing the same phenomenon in Calgary yet.”

Chief Dongworth said that they are aware of that could change in the city, and that efforts are being made to attract “great people to serve a great city.”

The new graduates will be assigned to one of the city’s fire stations where they will then complete eight months of probationary service and training. All of the graduates completed 12 weeks of training, which included vehicle extrication, live fire exercises, emergency medical response training, and community fire prevention and safety.

“It’s an exciting day for these folks. They put their heart and soul into weeks of hard recruit training,” Dongworth said.

“They deserve to be recognized today. For Calgarians, you may see one of these great people on one of our apparatus if you happen to have an emergency in the next few days—they’ll be going straight to operations.”