The Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue Service is readying to build a new two-storey centre to train the next generation of firefighters.

Members of the fire authority gathered alongside Reading Borough councillors and Yuan Yang, MP for Woodley and Earley at a ‘ground-breaking’ event on Friday, July 26, that provided an overview of the plans for the new training facility.

Attendees got the chance to meet the team and contractors behind the development project as well as some of the trainee firefighters set to benefit from it.

Chris Kendall, group manager at RBFRS and head of the service’s training centre, said: “Ensuring our firefighters are equipped and prepared to deal with the changing risks faced by our communities is vitally important to delivering a high level of service. Critical to this is how we train and develop our firefighters.

“The new training centre will give them a facility befitting of a modern fire and rescue service, allowing us to provide higher quality training to our operational staff in-county.

Demolition work on the existing training centre in Whitley Wood will begin imminently, with plans to open the new building in summer 2025.