A Brotherhood

Figure 1

Firefighters work in fast paced environments, especially in big cities. Every single day and night, fire trucks roll in and out of bay doors with red lights flashing and sirens blaring. Not every town in the country experiences several incidents as big cities, like Detroit and New York does. In fact, seventy percent of firefighters volunteer to serve their communities and do not expect to be paid. Volunteer firefighters go through the same intense, physical training as paid firefighters. In the small township of Stonycreek, firefighters dedicate so much of their time to volunteer. Even though volunteer firefighters do not receive a pay check, they are still dedicated, well trained, and fast paced.

Sitting at the corner of an intersection of four streets, sits the fire hall. The red, white, and gold fire apparatus of all sizes (Figure 1) enter and exit the fire station through three big, brown truck bay doors with three glass windows in each door. On the right side of the fire station, an American flag hanging from a pole waves in the wind. Above the bay doors, there a gold sign with white letters reads, "Engine Company No. 6." A light tan, sandy colored stone wall separates each bay door . At night, A light shines above each bay door onto them (Figure 2) and a light shining onto the flag. To the right, there is a red, brick, two story building attached to the truck bay.

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John Saloka is inside the bay. He is a young, twenty year old man who volunteers actively with the fire company. At the fire station, he dresses in a navy blue fire department t-shirt, blue jeans, and blue and silver New Balance shoes. John reviews the equipment in the compartments of every truck regularly to know where they are when he needs them for a call. As the door opens, he peers his head from out of a compartment to greet the person entering and exclaims, "How may I help you?" He is happy to assist anyone in the community.

Figure 2

"I got involved in the fire company by joining when I was only seventeen years old. I have always had a love for helping people and being good under pressure. In addition to that, my great uncle was a Johnstown City Fire Chief in the 1980s. My grandfather was a volunteer firefighter in Westwood," John explained while smiling and still working.

John will sometimes ask Tom Callihan, the knowledgeable, veteran safety officer about procedures on the fire scene. John can find Tom in the back of the fire station, sitting in his bright, white, rectangular office at a computer doing paperwork. Tom has dark brown hair with a few grays in it. He is wearing a red, "Westmont Hilltop" t-shirt, black gym shorts, and white and black slide on sandals. While sipping from his freshly brewed black coffee every few seconds, Tom reminisces about how he became involved with the fire service. "I joined the fire department after my twin brother, Joe. I at first only joined to be an EMT. At that time, the department had an ambulance that needed staffed by EMT's. I was in college working on my degree in education and thought that being an EMT would help me on my resume as a teacher. I quickly learned to like the fire side of the business also, and after a few years was elected as Fire Chief, where I served for twenty years."

"A volunteer fire company is a fragile ecosystem. The most important thing is that you have to remember it's volunteer. The members have full time jobs or school commitments that we have to honor. We can't pressure them to miss work or class, but we do want them to train and make calls," Tom explains with a rough voice while turning around in his swivel chair to return to work.

Figure 3

Even though John and Tom continue to complete tasks in the building, the fire alarm can sound at any moment, no matter what ongoing tasks are being completed. Suddenly, John and Tom drop everything to answer to a fire call that just came in. When the station receives by the 9-1-1 center, a loud noise comes from the radio that hangs on the wall. The radio beeps about three times with different pitched tones. Each station in the county owns their own pitches of tones, so the firefighters hear it, they know when the 9-1- 1 center requests their specific station to respond to the scene of a fire call. Then, the loud, low pitched fire whistle sounds. This alerts the firemen that live in the area that they're live saving skills are needed. The firemen rush from their neighborhood houses either on foot, in their cars, or on bicycles. The firemen park either in the back of the building in the large, asphalt parking lot or in front of the red, brick building in the front. As the chains clank when the bay doors open, the firemen rush in.

With the bay doors open, the four bright red and gold fire trucks and the firemen putting their gear for the public to see. On the left side of the bay, the firemen's gear hangs on wooden shelves painted black. Each firemen has a plastic, blue name plate drilled on the top shelf, directly above their gear. On the shelves on gear lies white helmets with red letters and words on them. These belong to the officers. These five officers consist of the fire chief, deputy fire chief, assistant fire chief, battalion fire chief, and safety officer (Figure 3).

 The next helmets down the line look blood red with white numbers and letters, which belong to the captains. The final two helmets of the first nine shine bright yellow. These helmets are assaigned to the lieutenants. The rest of the gear have black helmets, which have the title of "Firefighter." The gear looks like a tan, rustic color with bright, reflective orange or green strips on it. The green strips are the newer sets of gear that the firemen have and the orange striped gear are older (Figure 4).

Figure 4

Just like big cities, the firefighters kick their shoes off, some half way across the room and don their gear. The men and women jump on the trucks and prepare to respond to a vehicle accident (Figure 5) for this particular fire call. The trucks are then turned on. When the biggest truck, the engine, is turned on, it sounds like the ignition of a car starting, but with a more aggressive rumble to it. Driving to the scene requires that they drive down a very bumpy road. On the way there, the lights flash red and the loud siren blows. This siren, the loudest in the county, blows for everyone to hear. While the engine is racing down the road, it features a small American flag on each side waving in the air. Meanwhile, the firemen in the cab of the engine finish putting on their gear. They are also pulling the air packs from the back of the seats. They throw it on their backs, pull the straps tighter, and clip the belt. The firemen are required to have their air packs on, but do not need to breath air for vehicle accidents.

Figure 5

On scene, the firemen block the road that the accident scene is on with the fire engine and jump out of it. As the firemen begin to clean up the accident, they start to follow an SOP (Standard Operation Procedure). For any vehicle accident, they have to wear SCBA (Self Contained Breathing Apparatus), which is an air pack. There is a certain, proper way the firefighters need to don their air pack so that it fits and they can breath while in a burning, smoking house properly (video). One long, blue, house line is pulled from the engine and is either charged with foam or water with at least one man on it. One fireman then has to make sure the vehicle is stable, or not moving. The car can not move because it can and will injure the emergency personnel working around it and possibly injury the patient inside of the vehicle even more. The firemen can stabilize the vehicle with wooden cribbing placed behind the tires. Another fireman is tending to the patient in the vehicle if EMS is not on scene yet. If they are, instead of tending to the patient, the firefighters cut the battery lines with wire cutters to shut off the air bag. If they air bag goes off and has not already, it will hurt everyone around it. Then if any leaking fluids, such as oil, antifreeze, or gasoline are on the street, the firefighters who stabilized the vehicle either extricate the victim if needed with the jaws of life. The jaws of life looks like a triangle. The triangle is shoved in the small opening inbetween the two doors and can either pry them open or cut them. If the jaws of life are not needed, the firefighters spread absorbent, also known as kitty litter, over the leaked car fluids to soak them up.

Once the victims are out of the car, the tow truck attaches chains onto the damaged vehicle and tows the car away. Everyone waits until after the car is towed away to spread litter onto the fluids that were underneath of vehicle. The firefighters then wait a few minutes for the fluids to be soaked up and sweep it off the roadway onto the side of the road, where people do not drive. Once the task is complete, all the dirty, used equipment is put away back onto the trucks. Everyone gets in the trucks to go back to the fire hall and clean the equipment. The road is then opened back up for normal traffic by police.



Figure 6

While cleaning the equipment at the fire station after the incident, Tom talks about his favorite firefighting memory: "My most memorable scene is probably my first major incident as chief when Grand Slam caught on fire. The help I received from the older chief officers from other departments was tremendous. It taught me about the brotherhood of firefighting. It was a large commerical fire and noone was hurt." Tom also shared a picture of Grand Slam up in flames with me (Figure 6).

Another aspect of the fire service is the financial aspects. Being that they are a volunteer operation that is not truly funded by the municipality that they serve means that they must live within their budgetary constrictions while making sure they have equipment, such as fire gear and air packs, that are safe to use. To do this, they hold many fundraisers each year, and are very successful in writing grants to help keep their department afloat. Having good fire officers are important, but having a good group of men and women who run the meetings, finances and records is equally important.

"Record keeping is yet another big part of their business. Keeping insurances up and making sure everything they do is documented is important. They work in a very risky business, and the reports that they file are important in making sure what they do is public. If someone's house burns down, they firemen need records for the insurance companies. The firefighters also need to document things in case a member is hurt so his or her workers compensation takes care of things," Tom explains while spitting his chew into a plastic bottle.

Those volunteer firefighters like in the scene previously described above, require to have the same training as paid firefighters and work just as hard, while maintaining a full time job and taking care of their families. Most of the firefighters in this country are volunteer. Next time you see a firefighter, remember that they could be a volunteer.  Remember the brotherhood they possess and appreciate that they come together to save someone in the community whenever the time comes.