New changes at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility

The ground breaking for the new fire station at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility took place on Friday. The six million dollar project will replace the temporary fire station built back in 1986. The old station responded to the Antares rocket explosion last October.

Officials say the new station is not a direct response to the explosion last year, but rather a project that has been in the works for six years.

Bill Wrobel, Director of Wallops Life Facility says, “Perhaps what you can say about the event  of last fall was that it kept it from being delayed a little more.”

Officials at Wallops Life Facility have taken the time to find the proper location for this new fire station.

James Atkins, the Fire Chief of the Wallops Fire Department says, “After the Antares the previous station was damaged but it wasn’t destroyed but it was damaged and for each of those launches had to go somewhere else because we were too close to where the launch was.”

This new station will be located in the north side of Wallops Island and further from the launch pad. The reason behind this is to protect not only the firefighters, but civilians as well.

The new fire station is expected to be completed by late summer 2016.