The Midwestern New Hampshire Hazardous Materials Response District is a mutual aid association of fire departments in the Dartmouth & Lake Sunapee Region of west-central New Hampshire. Member communities of the district are Lebanon, Hanover, Lyme, Springfield, Sutton, Newport, New London, Newbury, Canaan, Enfield, Plainfield, Sunapee, Meriden, and Grantham. The district was formed to pool resources and supports the member departments in the event of a hazardous material spill or release, as well as other hazards or chemical emergencies occurring.

Over the last several years, the district has applied for and received grants from the State of New Hampshire and various federal agencies to purchase equipment, vehicles, and supplies and to provide training for the member communities.

District equipment includes a decontamination trailer, box truck used for equipment transport and a tow vehicle for the decontamination trailer, two supply trailers and a pick-up tow vehicle. The vehicles are equipped with various types of spill containment and clean-up materials, personal protective equipment and diagnostic testing meters. Each member community also has metering equipment provided by the district.

The district members meet on a monthly basis to train and conduct business meetings. Half and full day training sessions are held several times during the year. Members also attend training classes and conferences conducted by various hazardous material training organizations.

The district provides a support role to the community members, not duplicating the hazardous material response capabilities of the cities and towns, but supporting the departments with additional equipment supplies and manpower when needed. The decontamination trailer and trained decon technicians are available to the member communities if the need arises. District members are trained and available to respond to spills and for decontamination 24 hours a day at the request of the local fire chief.

Several member towns recently had a few members get certified as hazardous material technicians and the District is working on being able to provided technical level assistance to a member fire department in the event of a spill or release. In the event of a serious incident, the district would coordinate the response teams of hazardous material technicians from other HazMat districts in the state. To have a sufficient number of technicians available a program to train additional hazardous material technicians from member fire departments is currently being finalized for response within the Midwestern New Hampshire Hazardous Materials Response District.