Speakers

Ken Willette, a 35-year veteran of the fire service, and serves as Executive Director of the North American Fire Training Directors, providing support to the member organizations that train more than 1.1 million volunteer and career emergency responders in the United States and Canada. 

Willette spent more than three decades in emergency services, working as a Department of Defense aircraft rescue firefighter, volunteer firefighter, municipal firefighter, and shift commander before rising to the rank of fire chief in two Massachusetts towns. He then spent eight years leading teams that supported first responder standards development and fire service solutions at the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). While at NFPA he participated in the development of the Responder Safety Training for Electric Vehicles and served on several advisory panels focused on energy storage systems (ESS).

Since 2021, he has been a key contributor to a Department of Energy Grant Project awarded to the National Fire Protection Association developing updated emergency response to electric vehicle incidents curriculum and a game allowing  firefighters to practice their skills in addressing an electric vehicle fire inside a garage.

He is a former president of the Fire Chiefs Association of Massachusetts and a graduate of the National Fire Academy Executive Fire Officers Program and received  a BS in Fire Protection from SUNY Stony Brook.