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Am I allowed in here as a non-FF? I've got lots of family and friends (college buddy was a vol, a guy I call "uncle" with no blood relation was a vol, now is fulltime with city FD, a cousin is city FD, another cousin likes to jump out of airplanes, I worked for the local newspaper for ten years and am on good terms with all the officers of city FD, one of my part-time newspaper coworkers is a full-time fireman, and one of my bosses is a Captain of his volunteer squad.)windshipper posted:Absolutely. lovely, lovely hard work though if you're on the line (you probably will be). You just have to get certified first though. That said, in WA this year, the fires were so bad that at one point they were taking people off the street. IronDoge posted:Some department out in Ohio in letting their staff carry weapons My city fire marshal wears a gun. Makes sense, since he's basically a detective, with full powers of arrest, and (hopefully) has taken the same classes as the gun-toting cops. Is that a thing in the rest of the US, or just Texas? The thing I came to post, because I was reminded of it by a post in AI: One late night at the paper I was listening to the scanner, and Fire got called out to the local college's dorm four times in two hours by the automated smoke-detector system because of a party with a fog machine. The first time, as in your experience, was all-hands callout, because the dorms might be on fire. The second, the Captain got there first and told the partygoers to cut that poo poo out. Third, the city fire marshal was sent to cuss them up. The fourth call, Fire called in the police, who threatened to arrest everybody present if there was another false alarm, and Fire confiscated the offending fog machine, took it to the parking lot, and broke out the axes to make sure it wouldn't cause any more trouble. In other news, as a photojournalist, hearing the tones on the scanner makes my ears perk up. When I have to wait a solid minute while the dispatcher calls out every company in the metro area, I'm pretty much drooling over the scanner. When I hear the words "working structure fire," I basically jump out the third-floor window into my car Saints Row-style.    To their credit, that's one of maybe two or three fires I got to before they had it put out -- the majority, I got there to see the firefighters kicking up the ashes. But those are from the time the warehouse of the plastic and fiber recycling plant burned (the first time, rather. It's gone up three more times since then.) Edit: possibly-apocryphal hilarious story from college friend, at the time of the story a freshly-minted volunteer firefighter: He got pulled over for speeding.  : "Where's the fire, son?" : [looks up at firefighter badge clipped to the sunvisor of his truck] : "alright, rear end in a top hat, you get a pass this time."
Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Jan 28, 2016 |
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Jan 28, 2016 01:38
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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Mr. Nice! posted:Feel free to always come in and post cool pictures who gives a gently caress if you're a fireman or not. That's pretty much all the cool pictures I have. My city's FD is pretty good about getting there before I do -- this is what the majority of my photos of them look like:  Another from the recycling warehouse fire:  Well after the fact:  Dude driving the pictured pickup was hell of dead (crossed the median on I-20 into oncoming traffic, took an 18-wheeler to the chest), I'm kinda surprised there isn't more blood on the seat. My first published photo:  She tried to turn left, got hit, rolled over more than once. Since then they've put in concrete curbed medians on that highway to prevent that.
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Jan 28, 2016 02:10
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Actually, this is cute: Local steel mill had slightly more fire than planned, I got there too late, but there was a rainbow. And that time my own attached garage caught fire and the entire FD came out to laugh at me (because I knew all the battalion chiefs and the fire marshal from working for the newspaper) while Engine 4 from literally two blocks up the street put it out with my garden hose:  Was pretty funny when the fire marshal asked who was responsible for the house and I stepped up -- until then everybody thought I was at work, having passed off the hose to the rookie whom I hadn't met and gone back in to get the big Nikon. Edit: The recycling plant fire was on a Sunday, and I didn't hear it on the scanner, I saw the plume of smoke on my way to work, and thought "to hell with the ballgame I'm scheduled to shoot, this is probably more important." As I was driving toward it, I got four phone calls from various editors, all saying "gently caress your schedule, get on that fire!" -- the slot man on the copy desk (who was listening to the scanner and gave me directions to it), the city editor, the managing editor, and The Editor.  It wasn't exactly subtle. To get back on-topic, what's y'alls opinion of the local reporters? Edit again: Mr. Nice! posted:yeah those are all awesome too. They seem mundane and routine to you but that poo poo is great.  I suppose I got more action than the average firefighter; they're all hurry up and wait in their one district, while I was covering the entire metro area.
Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 04:00 on Jan 28, 2016 |
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Jan 28, 2016 02:29
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Minty posted:Pretty much everyone I know tries to hide whenever there is a photographer about. One time I got a picture on the front page of the local rag, and the photographer got the ranks wrong and the recruits I was with wound up outranking me Edit: also the recycling plant fire, I got a double truck inside, but the front page photo was some kid in a Cessna's aerial photo, that still bothers me. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Jan 30, 2016 |
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Jan 30, 2016 19:10
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If any of you guys get called out and there IS an alien riding a unicorn, please call your local newspaper.
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Apr 25, 2016 19:20
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Mr. Nice! posted:firehose through car window is still one of the best. Spring loaded center punches are awesome. You don't use the small end of the fireaxe? I'm a little disappointed. OTOH, go get the heavy-rear end axe off the truck and swing it vs. a pen-sized tool in your pocket, makes sense. And nowadays the axe on the truck is just a regular axe, the Halligan does all the prying jobs. As for photos, my personal archive is a bit lacking (i.e., I've posted everything I have at home and then some already)due to dead/currently-incompatible (I can't find the IDE external HDD box) HDDs over the last 15 years, and the online newspaper archive has javascript bullshit preventing copy-pasting that I'm to lazy to circumvent (basically, I'd have to screencap every low-res image). But you guys are cool and won't dox me if I link to the smugmug page that has my real name and title of the newspaper in the tags, right? Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 22:48 on May 22, 2016 |
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May 22, 2016 22:33
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Any of y'all still rocking proper electromechanical Q sirens? My local FD does, and it'll sure are hell get the traffic out of the way. Cops and ambulances, people stop and think before pulling over, the ol' square-wave air-raid siren on the bumper is much more effective. E.g. 6th Ave, Manhattan during noon rush hour, in April 2007, stereotypical NYC traffic, and then FDNY blew the intersection with air horns and Q siren and all the cars disappeared:  Edit: I may have mentioned it before, but for two years I lived two blocks from (City FD) Engine 4's house. I don't even perk up at the firetruck siren screaming by in the middle of the night anymore. The time I needed a ride in an ambulance it took a damned half-hour to get to me, because Station 4's bus is a reserve medic, so I got the guys from the other side of town. Also lol that one time my own house was on fire and the firefighters were surprised when they asked for the owner/tenant and I stepped up -- they all knew me as the newspaper photog, they thought I was at work. Edit: this last Friday I went to Walmart. The fire alarm went off, and I waited until they made the "Please GTFO" announcement over the PA to leave. Turns out it was a minor electrical fire in the main panel. Saturday I tried again at the other Walmart across town. There was a fire truck (Truck 6, specifically) parked right up front, and I was worried that the gods had it in for me, but the firemen were just shopping and abusing their parking privilege. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 07:07 on Aug 7, 2016 |
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Aug 7, 2016 06:28
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The Gardenator posted:I'm pretty sure you are joking about abusive parking. We always have to park our ladder either along the curb or take up 5 stalls. Along the curb is  though my local FD and presumably yours parks at the outer corner of the red lines. Still illegal for everybody but them and closer than the handicapped spaces, but not actually blocking the fire lane. If Fire is parked right in front of the door, poo poo is going down, if Fire is parked over there, they're just shopping.I don't think I've posted most of these photos in this thread, but I have them handy because AI:  Ladder 1  Engine 7, taking a break. The buckets they're sitting on are the foam additive, hence the unit nickname. Apparently they ran out and got more brought in. Both at that nasty plastic/cardboard recycling fire I know I mentioned before. Y'all are probably just as annoyed by middle management as the rest of us.  Battalion Chief in charge of the scene.  Dude in the red hat is probably a bit annoyed with his boss, who is a block away and only wearing the pants part of the suit. IronDoge posted:We usually block line of sight to grisly stuff or provide patient privacy with tarps, but this guy can just fly right over it. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 09:36 on Jul 1, 2017 |
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Jul 1, 2017 09:27
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