Cats, Bats, and Stubbed Toes

We’ve all heard the stories of people visiting Emergency Rooms for stubbed toes—this is real—I have personally responded on an ambulance call for a person with a stubbed toe.  The fire department equivalent, again real, is the stereotypical cat stuck in the tree.  My father had the best response I’ve ever heard when the dispatcher would call with a report from a citizen of a feline atop a sapling.  “Tell the caller we’ve never seen a cat skeleton in a tree yet.  When the kitty gets hungry enough, it’ll come down.”  End of discussion.  Other animal control calls for squirrels or bats in houses get filed in this miscellaneous category. 

Less amusing was a recent incident I heard about where a citizen broke a fire truck windshield; literally beat a spider web of cracks in it with his bare hands, because the fire department couldn’t make his power come back on after a storm. 

What some members of the public fail to remember at times is that it costs money every time a fire truck turns a wheel.  Fuel, wear and tear, and indirect costs like insurance are all part of the equation every time a piece of apparatus moves.  That’s the mechanical side; more importantly there is wear and tear on people too.  Ill maintained and malfunctioning alarm systems are the bane of our existence.  No fine or penalty seems sufficient after the third straight night of a false alarm at the same place at 3:00 AM. 

The unnecessary, abusive, and downright strange calls continue to make up more than their fair share of any department’s call volume.  You have to go, though, ‘cause that’s what we do. 

1st Responder Broadcast Network News Review of "Fire Men"

By John Malecky

This is a soft cover book measuring 5 ½ inches by 8 ½ inches and has 279 pages. It is the stories of three generations of firefighters spanning a 30 year period of service. The author is the second generation. He served in three states, New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania. Currently he is a fire protection engineer. These stories, which take up 20 chapters take place in the volunteer ranks, although for a time, while attending the University of Maryland, he rode with career firefighters in a “live-In” program. The stories begin with the author being young and tagging along with his father who was a volunteer fire chief in New York State. I must say he is a man of my own heart because it was at the ago of 10 that I had decided I wanted to be a fireman. It came from reading a merit badge book on the Firemanship merit badge and successful testing to achieve it. The author had the advantage of being able to respond with his father. My father was not a firefighter although my uncle was but we both lived in cities with career firefighters and riding with my uncle to fires was not possible. Anyway I identify with the author and throughout his 20 chapters he writes with a professional technique that even though they were volunteers, you would think that he was reminiscing on fires and emergency calls in big cities with career departments (although as mentioned earlier he did ride with career firefighters in Maryland.) The imagery of his writing puts you there with him especially if you are in emergency services. While many of the incidents are fires, many others are vehicle accidents including where life is lost. Having been a battalion chief and knowing what has to be assessed on the fireground, he leaves no question in my mind that he’s “on the money” when it comes to incident command. Of course, not every call goes well. Mistakes are made and things happen when we have no control over them. But the author write in a honest way and points these things out when stuff goes bad, making this book realistic, not portraying the players as heroes that always win! It has been said that volunteers do not always enter burning buildings, some say because they are not being paid to do it, but in this book they do and the details of their operating under adverse conditions leaves little to the imagination! From structure fires to rural tanker shuttles to operating the Jaws at a car accident, there isn’t a moment of “ho hum” when reading this book! The chapters are generally 10 to 15 pages long and the rapidity in which you go through this book is strictly based on how much time you have to spend reading. In some incidents you have what the news media would describe as “graphic” but as emergency workers we know that these things are always a possibility when we answer a call. When we wear the uniform of helping others we must condition ourselves to keep calm so we can plan strategy and tactics. This is what is expected of us!

Available at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble as well.

Article on "Fire Men"

A great new article on "Fire Men: Stories From Three Generations of a Firefighting Family" appears in the November issue of Connections Magazine.