I think I can answer this question, having actually worked as a professional firefighter in one of my past lives. I never intended to become a firefighter, and I'm not one of those people who dreamed of becoming a firefighter as a kid. My oldest brother took the civil service exam right out of high school and was appointed to the fire department in the town we grew up in. A few years after I graduated from high school, my brother suggested to me that I take the civil service exam. My response was - I don't want to be a firefighter. He told me that I should do it as an option, and I did. Mostly just to get him off my back. I scored very well on the exam, and the next thing you know, they were offering me a job. At the time, (1982) I was working part-time at Radio Shack and attending college part-time nights. The salary and benefits being offered looked like a great opportunity so I took it!
Lady Fuschia stated that the job is not like the shows on television or the movies, and she is quite right. For the first year, a new firefighter is known as a Probie (short for probationary firefighter.) Probies are the brunt of all the jokes, responsible for anything that goes wrong, and have the sole responsibility for any of the crappy jobs that need to be done. I was fortunate, that I spent the first 20 weeks of my Probie period in training at Boston Fire Academy. As a result, I was seperated from the regular firefighters on a daily basis. This kept me (and the firefighter I started with) from being around to get sh*t upon by the senior men. The senior firefigters felt it was their duty to treat the Probies like crap, because that is the way they were treated when they were Probies.
Once we returned to regular duty, we were still on the receiving end of all the bad things. I still vividly recall the first Christmas Eve that we had to work. One of the senior firefighters called in sick, and the Probie that I started with was held over to meet minimum staffing. He was 26 years old with a wife and two young children at home. He was devestated, but had to accept it as a hazard of the job. His wife stopped by the station with their kids, but no sooner had she gotten them out of the car and into the station, when the house gong rang, sending us off to an automobile accident. She left in tears.
I was on the fire department for 5 years. During that period, I responded to numerous fires, auto accidents, medical assistance calls and other emergencies. For three of the five years I was on the job, I was a ladderman. I drove an FMC 100' tower ladder truck. That was pretty good duty. To this day, I'm sure that my brother (who was a Captain by that time) pulled some strings to get me that appointment. Although I haven't been on the department for 18 years now, he still won't admit it! As a ladderman, you respond to all of the auto accidents along with any structure fires. This is because the ladder truck (in departments that don't have a dedicated rescue truck)carries rescue tools such as the Hearst Tool (Jaws of Life.) Laddermen don't get cats out of trees. In three years as a ladderman, the one time I went on a cat resue, was when the fire chief's dog treed his neighbors cat! On one other occasion, I did go out for a pet rescue. We got a call from a man whose $1,200 macaw had escaped through an open window. It had made its way all the way to the top of an 80 foot tall tree in his front yard. Since one of our duties is protection of property, my Captain decided we should respond. (I think he just wanted to see what a $1,200 bird looked like!) When we arrived, the owner stated that the bird had clipped wings and couldn't fly more than a few feet. He said that it was very friendly and would step onto your hand if you get close enough. We extended the ladder up 80 feet next to the tree, and I started to climb. When I got close to the bird, it started getting agitated. I held out my hand, and the bird bit me. Fortunately, I was wearing my gloves, and I only received a nasty bruise. I reached out again, trying to grab the bird to bring it back down, when it spread its wings, and went flying off into the sunset. It was a beautiful sight - a blue crested Macaw with a 3 foot wingspan making for the hills. It was never seen again. So much for clipped wings and only being able to fly a few feet!
The job wasn't all fun, although we did have some good times. There was the time that I responded to a call to find the father of a close friend from high school dead on the floor of a massive heart attack. It then fell on my shoulders to call him and let him know. There was another time where I responded to a nearby town for a mutual aid call for a multiple near-drowning. I performed CPR for 15 minutes on one of the victims while transporting him to a hospital. It wasn't until the next day while reading a news account of the drowning, that I realized it was a person I had known my entire life. Then there was the time we got a call for a car accident right up the street from where I lived. It was a small car that had failed to negotiate a turn and crashed head-on into a large tree. The driver of the car was trapped in the car, unconscious, and not breathing. Being of smaller stature, I was the one who crawled in the back window, intubated her and spent the next 20 minutes bagging her to keep her alive while they cut the roof off with the Hearst Tool to get her out. I swear that I was deaf for the next few days from the sound of metal bending and breaking. Later, when I went back to the scene to retrieve my turnout coat, which I had placed over the driver to keep her from being cut by broken glass, I realized that the car belonged to my sister's roommate.
I have numerous stories along the same line as the ones I have told here. My main reason for leaving the job, wasn't due to those bad experiences. It was due to the constant waiting, waiting, waiting. Way worse than any of those incidents, was sitting in the station, waiting for the house gong or the phone to ring. If you are considering becoming a firefighter, know that you will experience stress like nothing you ever imagined. I still (18 years later) wake up in a cold sweat with my heart going a mile a minute in my chest, if the phone rings while I am sleeping. (I still get it on the first ring though!)
Comments
wow- excellent answer!
by Anonymous on September 19th, 2006
agreed.
by FF in training on March 3rd, 2008
thanks for that, did you go into a less stressful job like air traffic controller or lion tamer?
by Esteban-- Smart ass Pumpkin on March 3rd, 2008
haha no, im traning to be a firefighter
at the moment, actually. I have 4
more years before its legal in my state.
I'm currently doing hours for
ridealongs, now.
Man when that honker goes off,
its like the death scramble.
:]
by FF in training on March 3rd, 2008
I actually work as an accounting manager now. Funny thing is - I'm still spending a lot of my time putting out fires - just financial ones instead of actual ones :-)
by ptrask on March 18th, 2008
usually those fire are set by financial "arsonists".
by Esteban-- Smart ass Pumpkin on March 20th, 2008
I can Answer that in a 5 Min. YouTube Video
Watch this Video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DV1zBYRbebo
by Jmbigpapa on September 1st, 2011