I spent about one year on the membership committee on our department. I was responsible for accepting,processing applications for prospective volunteer members into our department.
For some reason, in the last few months I have received quite a bit of traffic here (a couple hundred hits a day) for people searching for info on bringing in more volunteers to their department. So, I figure I would write about some of the things that have been done in my department and some of the techniques used that I am familiar with. Failures and successes. I am not an expert on this by any means. But I'll share what I have learned.
Some of these ideas are not going to work everywhere. Factors like population,call, volume, and the economy will have a big impact on your efforts.So you will need to adjust some of these tactics to fit your own area.
Step 1 - Getting your name out there
You have to let people know you exist. Just because you have a firehouse, some firetrucks and are seen out in public. Does not mean that the public knows or cares that's your a volunteer fire department. In general, when you roll up on a call, all the caller cares about is that you take care of the reason they called. This is especially true in larger communities, where everyone doesn't know everyone else like they do in a small town.
Theres always the basics, that are tried and true. Sign boards in front of the station, parades, fundraisers, public education events. I've never been a fan of the whole signboard out front of the station with some cheesy saying on it. I saw one the other day one county over that said " Save a life, become a volunteer". The one the week before said " Become a hero, join as a volunteer". In my opinion, not only is that a cheesy ass slogan to use. Its misleading. You cant make people think that as soon as they join, they are going to be running into burning buildings every day and pulling out babies, or running 10 car pileups every week. Because, that's just not how it is in most departments. If your using the signboard, try something simple like " We need your help, call XXX-XXXX or visit www.blahblahvfd.com. If the public doesn't know you need MORE volunteers, then they cant help you.
Everyone has a computer now and has access to the Internet. This is probably one of the most cost efficient tools you can use besides going door to door. Not only are YOU controlling the content, you can gain valuable data as to who, from where, how and when someone checked out your website, you can use all that data to your advantage. If you have a resident computer nerd (we have several on my FD )set up a website, and let people know about it. If you already have a site, update it, make your recruiting link the most prominent thing on the site. My Chief who runs our website www.leesburgfire.org has ours right at the very top of the site. One of the things I hate to see is a department who sets up a website, and then doesn't update it ever again. If Joe Public comes across your site, and sees it hasn't been updated since 2002, chances are they wont find the information they are looking for and may leave or not contact you because the information may no longer be accurate. I have even seen some department websites where they don't even have any contact information listed. If the point is to get the word out and they cant contact you, then whats the point? There are companies out there that will build AND UPDATE your site for you. If you don't have the time or manpower to build and update a site your self, and you have a little bit of money in the budget, this is great way to go. You will get a professional looking site for somewhere between $300 and $500 initial setup, plus a monthly fee depending on what you are looking for. By far the most successful company that offers this service is FireCompanies.com .
Now.. we have a new social networking tool Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ which isnt going to fade off into the sunset like myspace.com is. Right now, a little bit over 5% of all the time spent online is spent on Facebook. The average user on facebook is 30 something and older. Compared to myspace.com which was quickly deemed only suitable for the " Tween" crowd and left people fleeing and coming over to facebook.
As an example, I set up a facebook FAN page a few weeks ago for our department, in that short period of time, we now have over 600 fans. Your probably asking yourself, So what? Well, we now have 600 people, that we can update on fundraisers, membership campaigns, tell them about calls or anything else with very little effort. Cost is $0
Not only does setting up a facebook fan page show you WHO is looking at your page, it has what it calls " insight" data that allows you to see more in depth information like how many times certain pictures or videos or articles have been viewed. This is invaluable data, find what people like and seem to respond to, and do it again.
The county I volunteer in, and most of the adjoining counties are combination system, with a mix of volunteer and career staff. As you head farther south, towards Fairfax county , you see less and less volunteers for a variety of reasons.
The economy, people have less time to dedicate, less fires or calls are all things are working against you.
Step 2 - Application Process
This is something that varies widely from department to department. In our department, you fill out the application online at the website or in person. The application goes to the membership committee, who does the orientation, follow ups, background checks etc. If you are not doing background checks on your applicants, your only putting yourself, your department and the community your protecting at risk. We all see people from all walks of life who have nothing but the best intentions to serve their community. But you will occasionally run into someone who has no business being in Fire/Rescue. Its your job to find that out before its too late. Check their references!
Once that's completed, the potential member has to have his or her application read at 2 of our monthly membership meetings. The first reading is just to familiarize the membership that this person is interested in joining and put a face with a name, and gives us time to complete the required paperwork for background checks. The second reading the following month is where the membership votes yes or no to allow this person into the department or not. Once they are in, they get their physical completed, get assigned to a crew and start training for fire school if they aren't already certified.
Some departments leave the decision to accept someone up to the Board of Directors, others the decision is solely up to the Chief. Just depends on the by-laws of your corporation.
NOTE: You need to check your local laws or FRG's,SOP's and ensure you are following them in regard to any required paperwork, background checks etc. Just like a regular job, you cant deny someone membership based on race, age, sex etc.
We have been lucky enough to be bringing in around 4 to 6 new members a month over the last 6-9 months or so. The other departments on the east end of our county have been having similar success lately as well. All of the volunteer companies in Loudoun County get help with recruiting from the website http://www.answerthecall.info/ which is run by our countywide volunteer coordinator.
Step 3- Follow up
When someone contacts you with an interest in joining, they should be treated as a potential valuable asset to your department. You should have readily available literature or handouts for people to read with information on what they can expect when they join. This information should be truthful, don't mislead people about the time they will need to spend in training, duty, fundraisers etc. But.. you also need to keep your potential member interested, motivated and wanting to join. Pictures of calls, maybe a short blurb from the Chief or a firefighter. If your department allows it, set them up for a ride along or have them come to a training to watch and see why once people join, many stay in the fire service for life. Career or Volunteer.
A website, or a pamphlet wont make up for actually meeting a potential member in person. Your accomplishing several things here. Your getting your general impression of the potential member, they are getting an impression of you and the department. I would like to stress the importance of representing your department in a professional manner when you have this first face to face interaction with a potential member. If I roll up, and I meet a 400lb guy, in a torn, stretched out "I fight what you fear" T-shirt, with a big wad of chew in his mouth, and a cup full of spit.. I'm out. <--- this actually happened. Hopefully, you don't want your department represented in that way to a member or the public. Alot of the volunteer departments in this area (Northern Virginia) have a one night a month orientation where potential members watch a video or PowerPoint, meet some of the officers and firefighters and tour the station. Usually conducted by a senior firefighter or officer, the goal is to knock out all those things I touched on earlier in one shot. The tour, the impressions, expectations etc. Time is valuable to everyone, if you can do it this way I would recommend it.
Step 4- Don't make this mistake!
Don't drop the ball! FOLLOW UP FOLLOW UP FOLLOW UP. Assuming all has gone well at this point and you think this person might be a good fit for the department. If you don't hear back from someone who submitted an application in a week or so. CALL THEM! Find out what their intentions are and move forward. Maybe they still have some more questions they didn't get to ask, maybe they have been busy. Or maybe, they decided against it, if you can, find out why and see if you can address it. If you cant, then move on to someone who is interested.
Hopefully you will gain someone who can help contribute to your department for years to come.
If you have a question or idea you can always drop me an email at BrianDuddy@gmail.com
Here are some great resources:
http://www.volunteerfd.org/
http://www.nvfc.org/
http://www.firehouse.com/topic/funding-and-grants
http://firechief.com/volunteers/
http://www.iafc.org/
Does your Department do background checks?
Thursday, November 05, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Laid up.. or down.. whatever
First, I passed my Instructor 1 class. I'm not gonna lie. I was pretty worried about the written test there for a bit. I studied all the wrong crap. But I guess I paid enough attention. I know several of the guys in class read this, so check vafire.com and you'll know if you passed. Thanks Addrerall! LOL
Well, I made it exactly 1 day back at work since I hurt my back. It appears I have a herniated disk or a very severe muscle sprain in my lower back from the drill 2 Saturdays ago. I cant sit for very long at all without pretty severe pain. So.. I'm sitting in bed typing this since really.. I don't have a whole lot else I could be doing. Standing isn't bad, but once I sit and the weight is on my lumbar.. game over. Of course I am also out of pain medication now. So I am taking the anti inflammatory. I sound like an old lady. I go see Dr. Santini on Thursday. Word is she is a cutter.. I'm not down with that. When I first hurt my back, in 03, they wanted to do surgery on my back. I decided to go the chiropractor route and have never regretted that decision. Overall health was better and I could walk with no pain.. and didn't have to have someone poking around in my spine.
I can't just sit or lay around (well, that's dependent on the size of my honey do list) Its absolutely killing me not being able to run duty or calls. I actually do enjoy my day job too for the most part, mainly because the people I work with are a bunch of nut jobs so we all work well together for 10 hours a day. But my team I am a part of is known as the " Dysfunctional Family" in our little NOC.
I did manage to put together a video from a drill we did Saturday. Which also killed me because my back is jacked up, I couldn't participate in it. I was the "Exterior Safety Officer" which is the equivalent of walking around and trying to find something to do.. or unsafe. Which didn't happen. But hey, I'm certified to by the state to walk around look for unsafe crap.
I have written about this before and I'm not going to spell it all out on here again. I talked about the difference in how Leesburg Fire qualifies its firefighters in comparison to some of the other stations in the county, in an article the now defunct LoudounExtra did on me a while back you can read it here .
Plain and simple of it is, in our department you don't automatically become a released firefighter when you are done with fire school. You have to go through at least one additional "burn" where your evaluated by your officers and they decide if you lose the red helmet and get a black one which means you are a released firefighter. Anyway, here's the video from Saturday. Its one of my favorites I've done so far.
Heres the link to the big version of it on FB since blogger doesnt seem to want to show embedded videos today for some reason. Big ass FB version of Video
When I started in the FD, the burn building at the training center didn't count as your burn. You HAD to burn in an actual house before you could get your black hat. But back then, we used to get 2 or 3 houses donated to us a year to burn. I cant even remember the last one we burned now. It was a win-win since the homeowner or developer saved a huge amount on demolition. The biggest plus for us was that we got to burn in a true to life environment and not a building we have drilled in countless times and could probably walk through in our sleep. I remember many nights drilling with Paul and John Earley and Tina, AJ and Jaime A and Holmberg. They were completely relentless on me and the other probies and pushed me WAY past anything I ever thought I could do. It didn't matter how tired or sore or cold I was. We always kept going. I wanted to quit so many times, but it just was simply not presented to me as an option.
One night, I was pretty sure AJ was going to kill me. It was dark as shit, freezing cold and we were doing search drills. I think I was searching with Wendy or Kathleen. I cant remember. But I was leading the search in 0 visibility, AJ was playing the downed firefighter. I found him in some kind of closet or entry to the basement stairs. I was positioning myself over his head to grab his straps on his airpack ( yes, same way I hurt my back the other night) and I didn't have my chin strap tight. My helmet came off my head and the eagle on my helmet nailed him square on the bridge of the nose. There was some blood, ALOT of swear words and me feeling like shit for hurting AJ. Of course he sucked it up and moved on. I think he said something along the lines of " Are you just gonna leave me here with a broken nose? you still have to get me out". Apparently that particular scenario took a long time, I thought we had done pretty well on time up until AJ's nose incident. Paul and Justin and Bones took me outside and said " Ok, were going to show you how a real search is done, forget all the shit you learned in fire school, this is how you do it".
Did we use the front door to go in? Uhh no. We used some random bedroom window that was semi high off the ground to gain entry. That was fun, hauling my fat ass in full gear up a few extra feet into a window. Justin said " follow me" and hauled ass down the hallway. We probably searched that entire house in 2 mins along with the other crew. I learned more in that drill than any of the search drills we did in fire school. That's how I learned how to search. I think it was either Paul or Tina that said if your knees aren't bleeding or bruised after a search, you didn't do it right.
This was the house that was donated we drilled in. Randomly found this pic today
I think back so many times in fire school, standing there in the freezing ass cold, getting screamed at (I don't think they are allowed to yell now) inches from my face by Lt. Hummer or Kiser. Because I threw a ladder incorrectly or I didn't turn on my PASS device (yeah, the old yellow ones you had to turn on yourself).I remember thinking "Why in the Mother F am I doing this, for free? This isn't fun, this friggin sucks". I'd always come home, clean up and go at it another day.
As time went on, it did become fun, and it became a huge part of me and something I dedicate a large portion of my life to. You will usually hear people call the crews they run with their second family. The truth behind that statement is so true. Of course wherever you go or any job, you will run into the department asshole (usually more than one) but your core group of friends at the firehouse you can always rely on for anything. Whatever it is. I know the sacrifices I have made in my personal life as a result of the FD have been tremendous but have also shaped me as a person. I see so many others who make the sacrifices as well, all the time away from your family or friends for calls, trainings, duty or whatever sometimes can even affect your job. But we come back for more. Because we love it, its important work. I think everyone has their own personal motivation for doing it. None of this is limited in any way to just the volunteer side. A career firefighter makes the exact same sacrifices. They work the weird ass schedule, come home late from a call or have to go to a training. Same deal.
If being a firefighter wasn't something that people enjoyed doing? Why have people been volunteering to do it for free for centuries and still do today? Or make a lifelong career out of it? I don't think many people step up to their job at the register at Wal Mart and say " I want to spend the rest of my working years here and retire from here".
When I was in the ER the other night, I was obviously in excruciating pain as they were pushing more and more pain meds. One of the nurses said to me as she was sticking me with a needle " My god, why would you put yourself through all this and not get paid"? I wanted to tell her about all the nurses that I know that are volunteer firefighters, EMT' and Medics. Who do it for free.
But that just takes us into Volunteer FF vs. Career FF territory. Which usually only gets discussed in anonymous Internet forums where people can hide behind a username and just sling shit and insults at each other and compare penis sizes and fight about who's is bigger. I don't have the energy for that one today though.
In closing:
Stay safe and enjoy this fall weather..
B
P.S. Quote from an attorney I was talking to the other day " I just had a client call me and wants to sue the Redskins to get out of his season tickets". hehehe
Well, I made it exactly 1 day back at work since I hurt my back. It appears I have a herniated disk or a very severe muscle sprain in my lower back from the drill 2 Saturdays ago. I cant sit for very long at all without pretty severe pain. So.. I'm sitting in bed typing this since really.. I don't have a whole lot else I could be doing. Standing isn't bad, but once I sit and the weight is on my lumbar.. game over. Of course I am also out of pain medication now. So I am taking the anti inflammatory. I sound like an old lady. I go see Dr. Santini on Thursday. Word is she is a cutter.. I'm not down with that. When I first hurt my back, in 03, they wanted to do surgery on my back. I decided to go the chiropractor route and have never regretted that decision. Overall health was better and I could walk with no pain.. and didn't have to have someone poking around in my spine.
I can't just sit or lay around (well, that's dependent on the size of my honey do list) Its absolutely killing me not being able to run duty or calls. I actually do enjoy my day job too for the most part, mainly because the people I work with are a bunch of nut jobs so we all work well together for 10 hours a day. But my team I am a part of is known as the " Dysfunctional Family" in our little NOC.
I did manage to put together a video from a drill we did Saturday. Which also killed me because my back is jacked up, I couldn't participate in it. I was the "Exterior Safety Officer" which is the equivalent of walking around and trying to find something to do.. or unsafe. Which didn't happen. But hey, I'm certified to by the state to walk around look for unsafe crap.
I have written about this before and I'm not going to spell it all out on here again. I talked about the difference in how Leesburg Fire qualifies its firefighters in comparison to some of the other stations in the county, in an article the now defunct LoudounExtra did on me a while back you can read it here .
Plain and simple of it is, in our department you don't automatically become a released firefighter when you are done with fire school. You have to go through at least one additional "burn" where your evaluated by your officers and they decide if you lose the red helmet and get a black one which means you are a released firefighter. Anyway, here's the video from Saturday. Its one of my favorites I've done so far.
Heres the link to the big version of it on FB since blogger doesnt seem to want to show embedded videos today for some reason. Big ass FB version of Video
When I started in the FD, the burn building at the training center didn't count as your burn. You HAD to burn in an actual house before you could get your black hat. But back then, we used to get 2 or 3 houses donated to us a year to burn. I cant even remember the last one we burned now. It was a win-win since the homeowner or developer saved a huge amount on demolition. The biggest plus for us was that we got to burn in a true to life environment and not a building we have drilled in countless times and could probably walk through in our sleep. I remember many nights drilling with Paul and John Earley and Tina, AJ and Jaime A and Holmberg. They were completely relentless on me and the other probies and pushed me WAY past anything I ever thought I could do. It didn't matter how tired or sore or cold I was. We always kept going. I wanted to quit so many times, but it just was simply not presented to me as an option.
One night, I was pretty sure AJ was going to kill me. It was dark as shit, freezing cold and we were doing search drills. I think I was searching with Wendy or Kathleen. I cant remember. But I was leading the search in 0 visibility, AJ was playing the downed firefighter. I found him in some kind of closet or entry to the basement stairs. I was positioning myself over his head to grab his straps on his airpack ( yes, same way I hurt my back the other night) and I didn't have my chin strap tight. My helmet came off my head and the eagle on my helmet nailed him square on the bridge of the nose. There was some blood, ALOT of swear words and me feeling like shit for hurting AJ. Of course he sucked it up and moved on. I think he said something along the lines of " Are you just gonna leave me here with a broken nose? you still have to get me out". Apparently that particular scenario took a long time, I thought we had done pretty well on time up until AJ's nose incident. Paul and Justin and Bones took me outside and said " Ok, were going to show you how a real search is done, forget all the shit you learned in fire school, this is how you do it".
Did we use the front door to go in? Uhh no. We used some random bedroom window that was semi high off the ground to gain entry. That was fun, hauling my fat ass in full gear up a few extra feet into a window. Justin said " follow me" and hauled ass down the hallway. We probably searched that entire house in 2 mins along with the other crew. I learned more in that drill than any of the search drills we did in fire school. That's how I learned how to search. I think it was either Paul or Tina that said if your knees aren't bleeding or bruised after a search, you didn't do it right.
This was the house that was donated we drilled in. Randomly found this pic today
I think back so many times in fire school, standing there in the freezing ass cold, getting screamed at (I don't think they are allowed to yell now) inches from my face by Lt. Hummer or Kiser. Because I threw a ladder incorrectly or I didn't turn on my PASS device (yeah, the old yellow ones you had to turn on yourself).I remember thinking "Why in the Mother F am I doing this, for free? This isn't fun, this friggin sucks". I'd always come home, clean up and go at it another day.
As time went on, it did become fun, and it became a huge part of me and something I dedicate a large portion of my life to. You will usually hear people call the crews they run with their second family. The truth behind that statement is so true. Of course wherever you go or any job, you will run into the department asshole (usually more than one) but your core group of friends at the firehouse you can always rely on for anything. Whatever it is. I know the sacrifices I have made in my personal life as a result of the FD have been tremendous but have also shaped me as a person. I see so many others who make the sacrifices as well, all the time away from your family or friends for calls, trainings, duty or whatever sometimes can even affect your job. But we come back for more. Because we love it, its important work. I think everyone has their own personal motivation for doing it. None of this is limited in any way to just the volunteer side. A career firefighter makes the exact same sacrifices. They work the weird ass schedule, come home late from a call or have to go to a training. Same deal.
If being a firefighter wasn't something that people enjoyed doing? Why have people been volunteering to do it for free for centuries and still do today? Or make a lifelong career out of it? I don't think many people step up to their job at the register at Wal Mart and say " I want to spend the rest of my working years here and retire from here".
When I was in the ER the other night, I was obviously in excruciating pain as they were pushing more and more pain meds. One of the nurses said to me as she was sticking me with a needle " My god, why would you put yourself through all this and not get paid"? I wanted to tell her about all the nurses that I know that are volunteer firefighters, EMT' and Medics. Who do it for free.
But that just takes us into Volunteer FF vs. Career FF territory. Which usually only gets discussed in anonymous Internet forums where people can hide behind a username and just sling shit and insults at each other and compare penis sizes and fight about who's is bigger. I don't have the energy for that one today though.
In closing:
Stay safe and enjoy this fall weather..
B
P.S. Quote from an attorney I was talking to the other day " I just had a client call me and wants to sue the Redskins to get out of his season tickets". hehehe
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Owww Damn!
First, I finally finished my Instructor 1 class (NFPA 1041) this past Saturday after almost 2 months of class. I think I did pretty well on my final 20 minute presentation. Not so sure about the written test part though. It seems the parts I studied the hardest for weren't on the test. But I should find out shortly if I passed it or not. Although it sounds like a boring class, I actually learned a great deal from it and enjoyed taking it. Most of the focus was on the different learning styles of students and the adaptation you can make as an instructor to those students. Along with a whole mess of other information that will be useful to me down the road.
We had a good class with a great mix of experience levels from different departments in the NOVA region including Arlington and Fairfax counties. I found our instructors throughout the class to be outstanding and kept us engaged during class. If you have a few years in and you help teach the rookies at your station, or you just want educate yourself further. I would highly recommend this class to anyone who is in that kind of role.
After class on Saturday it was off to duty crew for the night where things went downhill pretty quick for me. We did our apparatus checks and grabbed some dinner. Headed over to the training center for just a few quick drills on victim and firefighter removal/carry's. Its always a great drill to do and helps you keep those skills fresh in the event you need to use them. Myself along with Lt. D-Rob were demonstrating how to lift a firefighter up the stairs just using his Scott Pack. As soon as I hit the first stair after grabbing the fake downed firefighter straps, I felt a sharp pain in my lower back. In an area of my back I am very familiar with. I ended up at the ER for a few hours Sat night. After they gave me some IV pain meds they sent me on my way.
Must have been 5 or 6 years ago now we had a house fire, one of my first fires ever, over in Tavistock Farms. It was cold and icy that night and generally miserable. I ended up on a 2 1/2 inch attack line with one of the other FF's and that night started a whole chain reaction of injuries to that same area of my back. Same thing happened to the other FF who was with me on the line that night. We found out years later that the line was being pumped at a much, much higher pressure than it should have been due to an equipment malfunction.
Anyway, I haven't been to work at all this week and have basically been in bed the whole time. It hurts to sit for more than a few minutes at a time, since my day job is in a chair for 10 hours, not an option at this point. Looks like I will be getting an MRI tomorrow to check whats wrong since the general consensus is that I should be feeling better by now.
Prior to me hurting myself. I cant really think of any overly exciting calls that standout in my mind. Food on the stove, fire alarms etc. The usual stuff. I did make a new video last week just kinda having fun with the camera. The first video I have listed below is one that the Purcellville Volunteer Fire Department is putting together with some people from their department. I think its very well put together from a production perspective and obviously done with some high end equipment that I sure would love to have.
In our boredom after training last week, we did our own parody of it below. Which is hilarious. ;)
I think that's about it for now. A few weeks off of class and then to Officer 1. I have an article I am working on that hopefully I will publish this weekend on leadership in the fire service I have been working on for a few weeks.
Stay safe and dont hurt your back,
B
Monday, September 07, 2009
Lots of Firehouse, My Birthday and getting pulled over.. kinda
With probably over 60 hours at the firehouse in the last week. I have a noticeable lack of anything very exciting to report. Probably ran a total of 8 or 9 calls. A few inside gas leaks.. all at the same place. A wreck or two and some ems assists. That's about it. Its been pretty damn quiet.
Last night ended up on an Inside gas leak for several hours at the same place we have been a few times in the last 3 weeks. It took awhile to track down the leak. After some very nice and clean forcible entry work by Capt. Martin (not to be confused with LPD Golf Cart Cop) getting into a locked apartment. Eventually, the gas company, Fire Marshall and the HOA President showed up, and the leak was eventually located and fixed.
On to a different subject. The nature of our job brings us into peoples homes under all kinds of circumstances. Sometimes its the middle of the night for a beeping detector, or maybe some kind of medical emergency or whatever. The one thing that never ceases to amaze me, is what goes on behind closed doors. When I first joined, I always figured.. Nice house, must be nice on the inside. Some of the stuff I have seen inside peoples houses amazes me. Years ago I remember a call we were on, I think I might have still been a red hat. It was for an oven fire or something like that. There were 4 or 5 cats in the house. I went in to check one of the upstairs bedrooms, and almost fell over when I opened the door. The entire carpet floor, was covered in kitty litter, with cat urine and feces everywhere. The entire room was being used as one giant litter box. There was some exercise equipment in there and a few other odds and ends. The other rooms, were packed almost to the ceiling with newspapers, magazines and what appeared to be junk. There are certainly plenty of " Hoarders" in our area as I am sure there are everywhere. That in itself for the most part isn't a hazard, unless of course there is a fire or an emergency and crews need to get into an area quickly. The term "Collyer Mansion" conditions is actually a used and accepted term in the fire service used to describe these types of conditions and the hazards they present. The reason behind the name is here Collyer brothers - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia based on two brothers in NY who had amassed almost 103 tons of junk in their home.
I was in a home recently, where the owner was obviously a very heavy smoker. Evidenced by the 5 or so overflowing ashtrays through out the structure. Not sure of the correlation here, but for some reason a lot of the " cluttered" or dirty houses we go into the owner or at least one of the occupants is a smoker. Anyway, this call was for a gas leak in an adjacent structure. So I had one of our meters with me that measures explosive or dangerous gasses in the air. There was so much cigarette smoke built up in the rooms, that it actually registered as almost 15 PPM ( parts per million) CO on the meter. Carbon Monoxide is the product of incomplete combustion and causes numerous health problems and even death at varying levels of exposure.
I remember a call last year, middle of the night for an investigation of smoke. I went into one of the first floor apartments after finally getting someone to come to the door. 2 bedroom apartment, must have been at least 5 children and two adults in the apartment. I walked inside with my partner and he checked the rear bedrooms and I checked the living room and kitchen. All the lights were off so I could not see very well. I walked into the kitchen, and switched on the lights. The counters and sink were completely covered in dirty dishes and pots and pans. The sink was overflowing with dirty water. There were hundreds of cockroaches scurrying all over the place when I turned the light on.
The guy with the stripper pole in his house. ;)
Anyway, I left the station this morning and was on my way to work. Going with the flow of the little bit of traffic on Loudoun County Parkway at 6am, I passed a Sheriff going the opposite direction. Saw the brake lights come on and the lights fire up and the signature U Turn to come and get me. I was half asleep and really didn't give a crap if I was getting pulled over. He sped up and got right on my bumper for a second, sped up and came up next to me and said to roll my window down. Obviously, I had slowed down at this point. I rolled my window down and looked over at him while we were going probably 30 MPH. He just said " Its 25 back there, slow down" and sped off, made another U turn. I was surprised he was pulling me over at shift change, which I probably why I got the drive by warning. Either way.. No ticket. Gracias LCSO. I cant say the same however for LPD Golf Cart guy downtown who keeps writing us parking tickets for parking next to our apartment. Oh well.
Steph is back from vacation. Sunburned.. but back. She's house sitting for a friend the next few weeks so we are not seeing very much of each other. I'm working today getting some holiday pay which is nice. Fairly quiet at work. My Birthday is tomorrow, I have been so busy lately spending it relaxing somewhere sounds pretty good to me. Back to the firehouse tonight and then off tomorrow.
Stay Safe,
B
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Post 325!
This has pretty much been a week from hell. I've been running on almost no sleep. Between working extra shifts, the firehouse, studying for class and all kinds of other crap. It seems I have managed to get myself sick. I am at work today and as the hours are going by I can feel my head becoming congested and pressure building. I think a stop at Dr. Harrigans is in order on the way home to get adjusted and see if I can stop it before it gets worse. As I was writing this, I just had a Co-Worker come by and tell me he had H1N1 last week. Huh..
Had duty the last two nights. Ended up on a late call on Tuesday night for an inside gas leak at a local apartment complex. Apt buildings take a little more time for those type of calls, more people to evacuate and apartments to check and ventilate if needed. My crew on the truck found the leak in the rear of one of the buildings and we secured it. Spent awhile ventilating the buildings and headed home. Didn't run any calls last night. We went to the training center to check out our new probies that are in Fire 1. Everyone seems to be doing fine and the class is HUGE. Which is always a great thing to see.
I have a few things going on this weekend. I have class all day on Saturday and then working at the Belmont Concert series on Saturday night parking cars for the America concert. Hopefully it doesn't rain again. My other plans include, sleeping the entire day tomorrow. Im working the overnight shift on Sunday night and then my regular shift. I head in at 9pm on Sunday night and leave at 4:30 pm on Monday. Steph is heading out of town on Saturday and I haven't even had a chance to see her this week really. I think the most time we have spent together this week was on the inside gas leak the other night.
As you can see, I made some changes to my blog this week. I added the link so you can subscribe via email whenever I update it. I also added the whole Twitter thing. I haven't quite figured that whole thing out yet but I'm working on it. I have the link to my YouTube videos up there but I am slowly moving away from You Tube since they keep pulling the audio from my videos. They kill the audio track to the video and make you use some pre decided audio track. No thanks. I guess I can start posting some of the ones I don't have on You Tube here.
I think that's 3 entries in a week for me! This makes my 325th entry. Dont know if I have posted this video or not on here. Here it is anyway.
Stay Safe,
B
Had duty the last two nights. Ended up on a late call on Tuesday night for an inside gas leak at a local apartment complex. Apt buildings take a little more time for those type of calls, more people to evacuate and apartments to check and ventilate if needed. My crew on the truck found the leak in the rear of one of the buildings and we secured it. Spent awhile ventilating the buildings and headed home. Didn't run any calls last night. We went to the training center to check out our new probies that are in Fire 1. Everyone seems to be doing fine and the class is HUGE. Which is always a great thing to see.
I have a few things going on this weekend. I have class all day on Saturday and then working at the Belmont Concert series on Saturday night parking cars for the America concert. Hopefully it doesn't rain again. My other plans include, sleeping the entire day tomorrow. Im working the overnight shift on Sunday night and then my regular shift. I head in at 9pm on Sunday night and leave at 4:30 pm on Monday. Steph is heading out of town on Saturday and I haven't even had a chance to see her this week really. I think the most time we have spent together this week was on the inside gas leak the other night.
As you can see, I made some changes to my blog this week. I added the link so you can subscribe via email whenever I update it. I also added the whole Twitter thing. I haven't quite figured that whole thing out yet but I'm working on it. I have the link to my YouTube videos up there but I am slowly moving away from You Tube since they keep pulling the audio from my videos. They kill the audio track to the video and make you use some pre decided audio track. No thanks. I guess I can start posting some of the ones I don't have on You Tube here.
I think that's 3 entries in a week for me! This makes my 325th entry. Dont know if I have posted this video or not on here. Here it is anyway.
Stay Safe,
B
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Women in the fire service? Anyone?
I started writing this probably about 2 months ago but I never got around to finishing it the way that I wanted to. First, let me say a few things. The first being, this entry is going to piss off men, and women equally depending on where you stand on the issue. There is going to be offensive quotes or links to other sites talking about the issue. I'm sure nasty comments will be left etc. So, just be forewarned on that one.
Most firehouses you go into, its a relatively heated subject with people on both sides of the fence. The question is not a simple one.
Should women be able to work in the Fire Service? Either volunteer or career?
Since my time in the fire service, I think I have had a woman on just about every crew I have been on. Most of the time, it was my ex-wife who was on my crew with me for the first few years. Now, I'm on duty with Stephanie whenever I get the chance. I have Ali on my current crew. So in that regard, I know a little bit about this subject. Before I joined the FD, I had the usual stereotype mind set that no woman should be able to ride a fire truck or be a fireman. They would never be able to pull me out of a fire if something went wrong, they would never be able to drive a fire truck or pull a hose up a stairwell. Of course, what the hell did I know about anything that had to do with the fire service back then? Pretty much not a damn thing.
My first female firefighter experience was on my first crew. That's where I met Tina. To this day, is just about one of the baddest ass firemen you could hope to meet. Yeah, I said fireman, for several reasons. One, there sure as hell isn't anything a man can do on the fire ground, that she cant do. Two, if you called her fire chick, firewoman or some other such nomenclature, there's a good possibility that you would end up flat on your ass. Tina can drive the shit out of an engine, and pump the hell out of it once you get there. No water? Not a problem, you can bet your ass, she will get you water from somewhere without skipping a beat. Ladder Truck operations, not a thing she cant do. Tiller? That's her paying job. I remember several times coming into the firehouse and seeing her on TV doing a rescue in the Potomac or at a fire scene somewhere. Does that make her better than a majority of her male counterparts on the job? No it doesn't. But it does mean that she can excel at doing the job as a woman, and doesn't have to prove shit to anyone. Right? Wrong.
Because no matter what you do, it will never be good enough for some, simply based on the fact that you are a woman. You can outshine, train harder, work faster till your blue in the face. While you may have proved yourself to some, you will always run into someone like this guy.
The fire service, is a different kind of beast when it comes to who can do the job. Regardless of your gender. Just because you get hired or voted in, doesn't mean you can do the job. You have to be able to physically do the job, yeah. But from my experience, your mental stamina and makeup plays a bigger role than your physical prowess. You have to prove yourself to your crew. Whether its in recruit school on the career side, or in training on the volunteer side (at most stations anyway, at some of them, your just magically a firefighter because you went through fire school). You have to earn the respect of your peers. I know people had their doubts about me when I joined, Im sure some still do.
Everyone has their own reasons for wanting to be a firefighter, help the community, ride trucks, whatever. There's countless negative, or just generally demeaning connotations used by others in the fire service to describe why women join. A " badge bunny" or the thought that " She just joined to sleep around". Which in reality, is true in some cases. But its not a general rule by any means. The women, who are dedicated and understand the job, and the FD culture, aren't bothered by it.
The flip side is, I have also worked with women in the FD who have absolutely no business at all being on a fire truck. Its painfully apparent they are simply there to try and prove something to themselves, or others at all costs regardless of the fact they can not do the job. They can't perform physically or mentally and are a danger to themselves, and without a doubt an absolute danger to others. But this last paragraph is not just limited to women by any means. I have seen, and still see men that fit in that exact same category. But, somehow they manage to squeeze by. They hang back at fires, find some excuse they aren't ready or cant go in. They disappear when its time to rack hose or do some hard work. You wont ever see them at a training because they are " Busy" or " Already know how to do that" but haven't demonstrated the ability. I am sure that most any firefighter anywhere will agree, these type of people are everywhere. Man or Woman.
I certainly don't agree with the notion that some have put out there, that women should be held to a different standard than men when it comes to testing, training or advancing in the ranks. If your going to do it, you need to be held to the exact same standards as everyone else. A firefighter, is a firefighter. Absolutely regardless of your sex or race. It's so incredibly simple, if you score higher on a physical or written test. You win. You should not receive extra points because your a minority or a woman.
I want to take orders from the person who studied the hardest to pass the test and has the skill and experience needed to effectively do the job and do it well and not kill themselves, me or my crew in the process. I want my partner in a fire to be someone who has proven to me and everyone else that they have the skill and the balls to go inside (yep, women have balls in the fire service), not screwing around on the front steps with their helmet or trying to put their gloves on while someones house is burning, because they decided not to train or they freeze up when its time to go in.
The two active women in my department, one is my fiance, who is a career firefighter and a volunteer at my station with me. The other is a close friend who I helped train. I've been in fires with Steph and hell no I never gave it a second thought. She trains hard when its time and runs circles around alot of guys when it comes to getting it done. The other one is getting some experience slowly and has the common sense to do the job and continues to train.
I would go in with either of these two women in a heartbeat. Way before I would go in with the guy who hasn't put his gear on in six years and still thinks its the
60's and that women belong in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant and hasnt been to a training in years.
Stay Safe,
B
Most firehouses you go into, its a relatively heated subject with people on both sides of the fence. The question is not a simple one.
Should women be able to work in the Fire Service? Either volunteer or career?
Since my time in the fire service, I think I have had a woman on just about every crew I have been on. Most of the time, it was my ex-wife who was on my crew with me for the first few years. Now, I'm on duty with Stephanie whenever I get the chance. I have Ali on my current crew. So in that regard, I know a little bit about this subject. Before I joined the FD, I had the usual stereotype mind set that no woman should be able to ride a fire truck or be a fireman. They would never be able to pull me out of a fire if something went wrong, they would never be able to drive a fire truck or pull a hose up a stairwell. Of course, what the hell did I know about anything that had to do with the fire service back then? Pretty much not a damn thing.
My first female firefighter experience was on my first crew. That's where I met Tina. To this day, is just about one of the baddest ass firemen you could hope to meet. Yeah, I said fireman, for several reasons. One, there sure as hell isn't anything a man can do on the fire ground, that she cant do. Two, if you called her fire chick, firewoman or some other such nomenclature, there's a good possibility that you would end up flat on your ass. Tina can drive the shit out of an engine, and pump the hell out of it once you get there. No water? Not a problem, you can bet your ass, she will get you water from somewhere without skipping a beat. Ladder Truck operations, not a thing she cant do. Tiller? That's her paying job. I remember several times coming into the firehouse and seeing her on TV doing a rescue in the Potomac or at a fire scene somewhere. Does that make her better than a majority of her male counterparts on the job? No it doesn't. But it does mean that she can excel at doing the job as a woman, and doesn't have to prove shit to anyone. Right? Wrong.
Because no matter what you do, it will never be good enough for some, simply based on the fact that you are a woman. You can outshine, train harder, work faster till your blue in the face. While you may have proved yourself to some, you will always run into someone like this guy.
The fire service, is a different kind of beast when it comes to who can do the job. Regardless of your gender. Just because you get hired or voted in, doesn't mean you can do the job. You have to be able to physically do the job, yeah. But from my experience, your mental stamina and makeup plays a bigger role than your physical prowess. You have to prove yourself to your crew. Whether its in recruit school on the career side, or in training on the volunteer side (at most stations anyway, at some of them, your just magically a firefighter because you went through fire school). You have to earn the respect of your peers. I know people had their doubts about me when I joined, Im sure some still do.
Everyone has their own reasons for wanting to be a firefighter, help the community, ride trucks, whatever. There's countless negative, or just generally demeaning connotations used by others in the fire service to describe why women join. A " badge bunny" or the thought that " She just joined to sleep around". Which in reality, is true in some cases. But its not a general rule by any means. The women, who are dedicated and understand the job, and the FD culture, aren't bothered by it.
The flip side is, I have also worked with women in the FD who have absolutely no business at all being on a fire truck. Its painfully apparent they are simply there to try and prove something to themselves, or others at all costs regardless of the fact they can not do the job. They can't perform physically or mentally and are a danger to themselves, and without a doubt an absolute danger to others. But this last paragraph is not just limited to women by any means. I have seen, and still see men that fit in that exact same category. But, somehow they manage to squeeze by. They hang back at fires, find some excuse they aren't ready or cant go in. They disappear when its time to rack hose or do some hard work. You wont ever see them at a training because they are " Busy" or " Already know how to do that" but haven't demonstrated the ability. I am sure that most any firefighter anywhere will agree, these type of people are everywhere. Man or Woman.
I certainly don't agree with the notion that some have put out there, that women should be held to a different standard than men when it comes to testing, training or advancing in the ranks. If your going to do it, you need to be held to the exact same standards as everyone else. A firefighter, is a firefighter. Absolutely regardless of your sex or race. It's so incredibly simple, if you score higher on a physical or written test. You win. You should not receive extra points because your a minority or a woman.
I want to take orders from the person who studied the hardest to pass the test and has the skill and experience needed to effectively do the job and do it well and not kill themselves, me or my crew in the process. I want my partner in a fire to be someone who has proven to me and everyone else that they have the skill and the balls to go inside (yep, women have balls in the fire service), not screwing around on the front steps with their helmet or trying to put their gloves on while someones house is burning, because they decided not to train or they freeze up when its time to go in.
The two active women in my department, one is my fiance, who is a career firefighter and a volunteer at my station with me. The other is a close friend who I helped train. I've been in fires with Steph and hell no I never gave it a second thought. She trains hard when its time and runs circles around alot of guys when it comes to getting it done. The other one is getting some experience slowly and has the common sense to do the job and continues to train.
I would go in with either of these two women in a heartbeat. Way before I would go in with the guy who hasn't put his gear on in six years and still thinks its the
60's and that women belong in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant and hasnt been to a training in years.
Stay Safe,
B
Monday, August 24, 2009
New Layout
I've been so busy I haven't time to update for almost a month. Im working an incredibly long shift today at work doing some OT. Wont be off until 4:30pm tomorrow.
Before I write about anything else this morning, it appears two firefighters were killed this morning in Buffalo, NY fighting an early morning fire in a Deli. The story is here. Heres a quick clip that's on Dave's site.
Rest in Peace brothers. Prayers and Thoughts are with the family's and the department.
It's such a terrible tragedy when something like this happens. Sometimes, I think about how you just never know when it will be your last call. All the men and women that I know that are in the fire service, love what they do and couldn't imagine not being able to do it. The bells go off, Putting your hood on, sliding on your boots, throwing your coat on and grabbing your helmet. Hearing that engine start and rolling out. Its something that sometimes gets taken for granted. The feeling of it, is not something that can be easily understood by someone who has never done it.
For me personally, being part of my department, and being a volunteer firefighter defines a huge portion of who I am. But, at some point, everyone will run that last call. Whether its moving to a different job, retiring, getting injured, or you just weren't meant to make it home from that call. I know when Steph kisses me goodbye in the morning, there's always that slim chance that was the last time. My close friends, who are almost all firemen, career and volunteer, that last drink or the last " C-ya tommorow" could happen anytime. We all know it, we don't really talk about it. Its not paramount in our minds, but it does sit in the back of our minds. Well, thats depressing enough news for a Monday morning.
Moving on..
On top of working alot of overtime at my day job, and running countless hours of duty crew this month. I have been taking Instructor 1 class up at the training center. I realized the other day, I have been in a class just about every month since March. All kinds of crap, Safety Officer, First Responder, Integrated Officer etc. I have really enjoyed the Instructor 1 class so far. Although parts of it are repetitive, I have learned a great deal. As part of the class, we are required to 3 presentations to the class, each one progressively more involved than the last. My first one was on Saturday, we were allowed to use a prop. But no power point or anything like that. I did mine on PPE, namely helmets. Brought mine in for a prop. I started the presentation asking everyone in the room that if they were to leave the department and take 1 thing with them home, what would it be? Just about everyone said " My helmet". Went on about the importance of wearing the helmet and chin strap etc. I found everyone Else's presentations to be interesting and engaging. One dude pretty much bombed his but recovered well.
Its mostly been BS calls the last few weeks. Probably ran 35 or so calls in the last few weeks. Fire alarms and the usual calls. We did have a wreck a few weeks ago on the bypass right near Sycolin with 1 vehicle on its roof. Krueger and I hopped out of the ladder truck and found 1 occupant left in the vehicle hanging upside down trapped by her seatbelt. A little preperation and we undid the seatbelt and the patient was good to go. Had a guy get hit riding his moped downtown the other night during a storm.
As you can see, I have a new layout on the blog. I haven't quite figured out the whole twitter thing yet.. But I added it to this site and will do more once I figure it all out.
That's all I can think of for now. Let me know what you think of the new layout.
Stay safe,
B
Before I write about anything else this morning, it appears two firefighters were killed this morning in Buffalo, NY fighting an early morning fire in a Deli. The story is here. Heres a quick clip that's on Dave's site.
Rest in Peace brothers. Prayers and Thoughts are with the family's and the department.
It's such a terrible tragedy when something like this happens. Sometimes, I think about how you just never know when it will be your last call. All the men and women that I know that are in the fire service, love what they do and couldn't imagine not being able to do it. The bells go off, Putting your hood on, sliding on your boots, throwing your coat on and grabbing your helmet. Hearing that engine start and rolling out. Its something that sometimes gets taken for granted. The feeling of it, is not something that can be easily understood by someone who has never done it.
For me personally, being part of my department, and being a volunteer firefighter defines a huge portion of who I am. But, at some point, everyone will run that last call. Whether its moving to a different job, retiring, getting injured, or you just weren't meant to make it home from that call. I know when Steph kisses me goodbye in the morning, there's always that slim chance that was the last time. My close friends, who are almost all firemen, career and volunteer, that last drink or the last " C-ya tommorow" could happen anytime. We all know it, we don't really talk about it. Its not paramount in our minds, but it does sit in the back of our minds. Well, thats depressing enough news for a Monday morning.
Moving on..
On top of working alot of overtime at my day job, and running countless hours of duty crew this month. I have been taking Instructor 1 class up at the training center. I realized the other day, I have been in a class just about every month since March. All kinds of crap, Safety Officer, First Responder, Integrated Officer etc. I have really enjoyed the Instructor 1 class so far. Although parts of it are repetitive, I have learned a great deal. As part of the class, we are required to 3 presentations to the class, each one progressively more involved than the last. My first one was on Saturday, we were allowed to use a prop. But no power point or anything like that. I did mine on PPE, namely helmets. Brought mine in for a prop. I started the presentation asking everyone in the room that if they were to leave the department and take 1 thing with them home, what would it be? Just about everyone said " My helmet". Went on about the importance of wearing the helmet and chin strap etc. I found everyone Else's presentations to be interesting and engaging. One dude pretty much bombed his but recovered well.
Its mostly been BS calls the last few weeks. Probably ran 35 or so calls in the last few weeks. Fire alarms and the usual calls. We did have a wreck a few weeks ago on the bypass right near Sycolin with 1 vehicle on its roof. Krueger and I hopped out of the ladder truck and found 1 occupant left in the vehicle hanging upside down trapped by her seatbelt. A little preperation and we undid the seatbelt and the patient was good to go. Had a guy get hit riding his moped downtown the other night during a storm.
As you can see, I have a new layout on the blog. I haven't quite figured out the whole twitter thing yet.. But I added it to this site and will do more once I figure it all out.
That's all I can think of for now. Let me know what you think of the new layout.
Stay safe,
B
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