My union was fortunate enough to "pick up" an original truck that belonged to The City many years ago. The truck is a 1938 LaFrance and still has the original wooden ladders on it! The 50' actually has a hand crank to get the fly sections up! Without going off on a long rant... What kind of person did it take to do the job back then? Where are those people today? What happened to all the "men" in this profession? Anyone else think we have been on the road to a more pansified fire service recently? Is Pansy Road a one way, or can we turn around and make it back?
6 comments:
Our grandfathers would turn their faces in shame to see what this job has evolved into. If Kent puts that truck in service can I come ride it and bring an arsonist with me?
Yeah! The truck just got up and running this past week... Its a little rough though! Funny all the guys said theyre going to make it my personal training rig for all the shit I come up with! They said they were going to make up t-shirts that read "I Survived Gary's House of Pain"... from last weeks RIT/self survival 3 days! Too funny. The best part about this post was that I wrote for an hour about some "issues" I have, but ended up deleting it all cuz' it would riled some feathers! Maybe Im the pansy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0JJY25o55w
Try this
http://youtu.be/E0JJY25o55w
Ritt- Ive seen the video from San Francisco... Its great. Nice, smooth and coordinated movements! I dont think anybody would dare say something bad about their Truck Co's abilities! They have to overcome challenges that would cause others to shrivel up in the corner!
First thought is sure we’re all a bunch of pansies. No fires anymore, encapsulating protective gear, and OSHA this and that. My dad (retired) and I have this conversation all the time. He went from being dragged out by his three quarter length boots to Chemox to mask. He started with rubber, then cotton duck, and to Nomex and PBI. Never mind radios, education, and EMS.
When he went to work it was to fight fires. OK, maybe he helped the guys with the “rescue” get a few bodies out of an accident. But they always washed the road down so traffic could get going. He knew how wood burned and when brick and mortar gave up, hydraulics, and maybe a little first aid.
I’m not going to bore you with the laundry list of crap we deal with now. But if you’re not studying and getting out for inspections you’re screwed. We have ten times the worries he had and more education, both hard knocks and book, to absorb than he ever thought about. I think we should be proud of the depth and breadth of our knowledge. Informed risk takers that’s who we are still taking care of someone else’s problems.
Sure it took a lot of muscle, teamwork and knowledge to put up those ladders and we should be in awe of those that set the bar for us, but maybe, just maybe we adjusted to knowledge, teamwork, and muscle.
I think my dad is smiling.
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