My New Record

It was a normal, rather quiet shift at Station 53.  You know these shifts.  The nondescript routine days where you are just minutes away from setting a new and infamous department record.

The call was for a wildland fire, well outside of our service area, for resources.  Station 56 and 54 covered the initial response for requested resources.  But then, as these kinds of days are apt to do, they promptly called us for our tanker.  Stu was my partner for the day, poor guy.  He suffered the role of helpless spectator as events unfolded.  We grabbed our wildland costumes and tossed them aboard Tanker 53.  Have no fear, 53 is on the way.

We'd been driving quite a while, and were now down south in the boonies, just minding our own business, when the air line blew out.  It was pretty loud.  In the cab, it was like a sudden fighter jet cockpit alarm in a movie, as the low pressure alarm came on and a light flashed, adding to the noise.  Funny stuff.  I had about 30 seconds to find a pull-off to avoid blocking the dirt road.  Air pressure went down to just 10psi and held, rising only as high as 15psi when I increased the RPMs.  Not nearly enough to keep the brakes off.  We were done.

How I hate calling the IC and dispatch with that kind of news.  If we had been under cell coverage, that conversation would not have been broadcast.  Oh well.

Three hours later, a very big tow truck arrived.  Gloriously, he had the parts with him to fix us on the spot.

The fire was controlled by then, so we were released to mope back to Station 53.  We had emptied the tank, anticipating being towed, so now needed to refill the tank first.

Long drive back to town.

Pulling away from the hydrant, there was an odd smell.  I know that smell very well.  Mirror check.  Mother of...... we're trailing a plume of coolant steam like an acrobatic airplane at a show.  You have got to be kidding.

We were close to home, so I watched the temperature and limped Tanker 53 back to quarters without further incident.  It was like a cartoon episode when I shut down the engine and we sat in the bay without speaking, the hissing from under the hood, steam blowing out, audible dripping underneath.

Tanker 53 is out of service in quarters.

So, the record?  Yeah.

For the first time in department history, as far as anyone can remember, the Grumpy Dispatcher is the first guy to drive and then break a piece of apparatus, to un-driveable condition, twice, on a single incident.

Sweet.  Where's my commemorative engraved plaque?

Payback

Overheard:

(tones)

Engine 24, Automatic Fire Alarm, 4359 West 88th Ave..... at Station 24. Engine 24, Automatic Fire Alarm, smoke detector activation at Station 24, 4359 West 88th Ave. Time out......

Engine 24 was in quarters at the time.

Radio silence ensues, for about three minutes.

Then dispatch pipes up again.....

Engine 24, getting an authorized cancel. Engine 24, getting an authorized cancel from the alarm company, they report food on the stove.

24 never even came up on the air at all.

This could have been handled by phone, I suppose.

So, will the dispatcher be expecting payback, or was it payback that we were hearing for a previous event we missed?

Gave us a nice chuckle.  Thanks, fire dispatcher.

Surviving Fire Forums

Some great stuff from the Backstep Firefighter, worth a good chuckle, and should be required reading for the new, wet-behind-the-ears young bucks coming online and thinking that the interwebs connection means they made it to the big time.

Certainly some of these elements are true for law enforcement forums.... but I suspect the dynamic is somewhat different on that side, and almost certainly less forgiving.  I don't go there myself.  I'd get pegged.

Snippets from the article reprinted with permission.  Or, you can skip these little previews and go read this gem in its entirety here.

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Forums and Blogs

Nearly every fire website has a forum section. This is supposed to be an area for open discussion, hence the word forum. Unfortunately too many folks use forums as a new version of high school. Here in the internet age you can relive all your adolescent efforts to be the popular person, getting in the right cliques and picking on the nerdy guys. Oh, by the way, you may want to open a new tab and look up satire, sarcasm and humor, just so it doesn’t get ugly. Some of you might not be able to tell that I’m writing in a new font style that makes you read my words as if Jerry Seinfeld was saying them. If I’m coming across like R. Lee Emery, you need to reboot your computer. That’s not true, but check your inner tone of voice while reading this. I’m pretty sure someone will get ticked.

“Did you read what he wrote?”
“No, what was it?”
“He said I was behaving like I was in high school.”
“He said it, or he wrote it?”
“He wrote it, but it was the way he wrote it, sneering. Little twit.”

See?

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Stupid Questions

You see, blogs are for writing, as in paragraphs, and they’re meant to be read, digested, and thought over. Blogs are not for asking where you can find green bulbs for your roto ray. Roto Rays in Virginia, 703-437-3353 by the way. I bet some of you have it in your phone contacts. That’s not a blog subject, that’s a stupid question. They used to say that there was no such thing as stupid questions. Then came search engines. Stupid questions were born because the folks who created search engines didn’t plan on having to account for lazy folks using the internet to find remedies to their conundrums. Yeah, that’s right, conundrum. Look it up. Don’t post it in the forums and ask what it means, but get your lazy butt up and find the dictionary.

“Diction-wha? Is that the game where you draw pictures?”

People complain that the biggest problems with forums are stupid questions. These are questions where the answers come from one or more of the following sources:

1. Your chief
2. Your officer
3. Your senior man
4. Your rookie handbook
5. Your parents
6. Google
7. Khasim at the local 7-11

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Forum Seniors

No, not elderly readers who get the feature spot closest to the top. I’m talking seniors as in class bullies (see, brought you back to that high school reference). Where in the name of everything sensible and just did an insignificant thing as post counts equate expert witness testimony?

“Today, the CDC has announced it has offered ‘fireslayer301’ the position of Chief Investigator in NIOSH’s Firefighter Fatality Prevention Program. Mr. Slayer brings to the position his five years experience on Deuceandahalf.com and 2,764 post counts.”

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Photos and Videos
Everyone loves good firefighting photos and videos, ones that show a working fire or complex extrication, or detailed training. What is disappointing are the ones that make you wonder ‘why bother?’ Seriously, do we need to see five videos of your quint responding, with each video being 15 seconds long?

“Dude, I just uploaded a vid of 33’s new engine responding!”

Lemme guess, they made a right on 202, or a left?

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So there you have it, a basic guide to having a successful fire forum life. For some of you, this means not posting at all.

Ever.

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All right, you know you want to see the whole thing.....

Teamwork Fail

Working together means sharing the credit instead of hogging it all for yourself.

Update @ 14:25: I've been posting periodic fire and EMS "fails" for a while, and figured I had taunted my own ilk enough that I could safely take a good-natured poke at the guys in blue. I swear I had forgotten that MotorCop had just put up a post about Teamwork a few days ago. Really!

I Don't Believe It

That actually went by a lot faster than I thought it would.

I'm not sure I can stand another year of me, though.

Oh well.  Onward.