You might be a tad jealous, when you bring your kids to the second annual Touch A Truck event in Iroquois Falls on Tuesday, July 16th.
It’s a totally free-to-you event in the parking lot at the arena,organized by the EarlyON Child and Family Centre.
Executive director Sonya Hodgins-Wollan says the kids can get up close and personal with an ambulance, firetruck, police cruiser, loaders, and maybe even a transport and a Zamboni.
“They can get in, have a look at the gears, the steering wheel,” she says. “Mom and Dad are usually there taking all kinds of pictures and the kids just have a blast playing around.”
It could plant a seed about a future career. Hodgins-Wollan says it can also demystify the emergency vehicles.
“Definitely. A lot of kids may have seen some of these trucks or have a fear, because they just see them going by at a high rate of speed. So now they have the chance to go up and see what it’s really about.”
And yes, there is likely to be a lot of sirens that day, in the arena parking lot, activated by the kids.
“Last year,” Hodgins-Wollan notes, “I think it was a competition between the OPP and the ambulance and firetruck to see who could do it the loudest.”
The audio of the interview for this story has a lot more detail.