Firefighters are a brotherhood, and right now their fraternity is struggling mightily on the heels of the coronavirus pandemic that has struck our nation.

A staple in the community for the past 30-plus years, the Aquashicola Fire Department’s 32nd annual fish fry has been canceled, according to fire department President Rory Koons.

“The coronavirus pandemic has affected many organizations’ fundraising activities, including this very important fundraiser for us,” Koons said. “We rely heavily on this annual event to help meet our financial obligations. As a result of this cancellation we are looking into different types of fundraisers, perhaps in late summer or early fall, so stay tuned.”

Additionally, the fire department said all hall rentals and events scheduled in its social hall have been suspended indefinitely or have been postponed to a later date. The fire department urges people to check with the respective sponsors, or call 610-826-2066 for refunds.

“Once this crisis has subsided we will provide notice through future posts,” he said. “We trust you understand and look forward to your continued support.”

Koons noted the fire department isn’t the only one to feel the sting.

“Economically, it will certainly impact the organization,” he said. “We’re not alone; there’s many organizations that will also be affected, too.”

Koons said other upcoming events face the possibility of being postponed as well.

“We’re not sure; we have to play it pretty much week by week, according to what recommendations are handed down by the state and CDC,” he said. “It’s unfortunate, but life goes on.”

Koons added, “It’s one of those unfortunate evils that we’re all in, but we just have to learn to cope until it passes, until we can all get back to some form of normalcy.

“It’s certainly an unusual circumstance or time in everyone’s life that we never experienced,” he said. “Hopefully, we can look back in years to come and say hopefully it was handled well and appropriately.”

Ray Miller, president of the Kunkletown Volunteer Fire Company, said the board of directors voted Thursday evening to cancel any events until further notice.

Miller said the fire company’s breakfast, along with its 250 Club in April, have been canceled.

“It’s affecting everybody,” Miller said. “It makes it hard on us and other fire companies that do this stuff as a fundraiser.”

Miller added, “That’s what we rely on mostly to raise money for our events to make it through the year. There’s nothing else you can really do about it.”

However, he said they will still keep their drawing next month at the firehouse because there’s no people at the event, as they sell tickets, conduct the drawing at the firehouse, and then notify them.

Michael Spairana Jr. fire chief of the Bowmanstown Volunteer Fire Company, mentioned various ways his department has or will be affected by the pandemic.

“We had to close down our social club, our kitchen; that’s a major fundraiser for us; operating income comes from proceeds from the social club,” Spairana said. “That eliminates our wing nights, stops our pub nights; we just started doing Fire Guys and Fries (burgers and fries), we sold like 100 burgers in like two hours.”

Spairana added, “All the fundraising activities that we normally do, socially, have come to a halt, any kind of social gathering. Drill night, I think our drills are going to be done for awhile only because we don’t want to have a lot of guys.”

Spairana said that fire companies are still responding.

“All of us fire companies in Carbon, we’re all responding to emergencies,” he said. “Our protocols have changed a little bit as far as how we’re handling things, (but) emergencies are all the same, firefighting, house fires, accidents, everything’s still the same.”

Spairana said the public can be rest assured that they will continue to respond to the call of duty.

“The public has to be aware that we are still here, and we do still respond to emergencies, and everything is the same today as it was two weeks ago,” he said. “But our fundraising has almost stopped, and that’s going to affect us down the road.”