National Fire Prevention week takes place from Sunday, Oct. 6th through Saturday, Oct. 12th. The theme is “Not Every Hero Wears a Cape. Plan and Practice Your Escape!” Locally the Atlantic Fire Department will kick-off the activities beginning Sunday, with their annual free-will Fireman’s Donation Breakfast. The event takes place at the fire station on West 7th Street (Highway 6), in Atlantic. Atlantic Fire Dept. Captain Tom Cappel says they’re serving-up some great food…Pancakes, eggs, sausage and bacon. In addition if you ask, you can get a tour of the fire station.

There’s also juice and coffee, and a fly-in by Midwest Med-Air will take place sometime between 9-and 10-a.m. Your donation helps the Fire Dept. purchases batteries for smoke detectors and the purchase of detectors for homes that don’t have them. Cappel says smoke detectors are especially important in older homes, or those with additions. Those additions have spaces where electrical and other fires can smolder unnoticed unless picked-up through a smoke detector’s sensors.

Other activities coming up this next week, involve firefighters educating children in local schools on fire safety and the importance of functioning smoke detectors. Cappel says their fire prevention efforts this past year, may have helped reduce the number of calls for service, where fires are concerned. Fire Prevention Week culminates next Saturday, Oct. 12th, with the Atlantic Fireman’s Parade that begins at 6-p.m. He said the Oscar Meyer Weiner-Mobile will be in the parade, and also at the Atlantic Hy-Vee from 2-to 5-p.m., prior to the parade.

Line-up for parade participants starts at 4-p.m., near 2nd Street and Sunnyside Lane and proceeding to Poplar Street before turning right and south to 6th Street. From there, the participants will make their way to Chestnut Street and north to 2nd Street, where the parade ends.

Midwest Med-Air will be landing in-town at around 5-p.m., next Saturday, Oct. 12th. There are also three well-known marching bands, bagpipes and more.