IMAGE GALLERY: Fire Department Open House

On Thursday, Oct. 6, the held its annual open house in conjunction with National Fire Prevention Week.

Hundreds of kids and their parents visit the central fire station for their chance to climb in the department's trucks, meet Smokey the Bear and Sparky the dog, watch demonstrations, learn about fire safety and snack on pizza, cupcakes and more.

Three newer businesses in town, , Luna Caprese and Cupcake Conspiracy handed out free samples of chowder, chicken and cupcakes, respectively.

The final demonstration of the nigh was a burn demonstration that taught attendees the importance of installing sprinklers, showing how much faster a room could ignite and how much more dangerous it can be for firefighters without sprinklers.

Prior to that the State Fire Marshal's Office did a demonstration with Andre, a black lab used to help identify suspicious substances at the scene of a fire. His handler, John Southwell, a District Chief and Deputy Marshal showed how Andre could detect trace amounts of substance even in a crowd.

And Officer Greg Walters and the department's K-9 Gunny entertained an audience showing how Gunny can sniff out hidden drugs. They got loads of laughs when the unleashed Gunny on Ryan Thomas, a firefighter who volunteered to don the departments bite suit and let the German shepherd come at him as if he were a criminal.

The fire department will cap of this week with another event, the at on Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. Runners and walkers can still register online today for $20 or at the race for $25. The first 150 runners to register will receive Merrimack Firefighters 5K T-shirts. Visit the 5k website or its Facebook page for more information and to download the registration form.