Practically...field trips are hard. 9 kids under 15. Great big helpers in the form of my 2 oldest girls, but with a baby in tow and an insane toddler, field trips are hard. I'm also slightly freaked out with finding new places so there is always low level stress that I'm going to get lost. I do have intentions of getting a GPS of some kind in the near future, but right now I'm dependent on mapquest.
We visited a fire station a few years ago and it was strenuous. However, our big girls needed to talk to a firefighter/paramedic for part of their Emergency Preparedness badge for American Heritage Girls (AHG) so I girded up my loins (figuratively speaking) and arranged to go on a field trip to a local fire station.
And really, it was awesome. The fire station in question is only about 7 minutes drive from us, and the 2 firefighter/paramedics who hosted us were incredibly friendly and helpful.
One of the first things they did was to take us into their TV room and then turn on the emergency lights/sound alerts. The whole station is rigged up with these, so when a call comes in the lights go red and a voice tells them that they need to run off to a fire or medical emergency. Incidentally, only 15% of calls are fires nowadays; the vast majority of calls are for medical issues.
The firefighters work 1 full 24 hour shift, then have 2 full days off. During their 24 hours ON they often get almost no sleep. I joked that it was like having a little baby and they agreed, except of course they keep up this grueling schedule for years on end. But they do have 2 days to recover each time unless they get called back in for a larger emergency.
They took us up this training tower. It goes up several stories and has an outdoor balcony. They can and do flood it with smoke and do training exercises where they go in through the balcony (via a ladder) in full gear, and creep around in the smoke looking for a hidden dummy. Have I mentioned I don't like heights? At all? And you can see the stairs are those wonderful mesh horrors where you can look down between your feet and see the floor a LONG way below. It really was not my favorite thing to go up those stairs, but the 8 older kids were going up so I needed to go with them. Do I get a medal? My big girls' AHG troop leader came with her kids and kindly looked after Rose so I WAS able to go up the tower. It would have been impossible without her.
The firefighters very kindly let us feel the hose. Here Naomi is helping Daniel. He loves water.
It wasn't a huge hose but it still had quite a bit of power. I've read that the really big hoses need a couple of STRONG men holding them because if they break loose, they can hurt people thrashing around (the hoses can hurt people, I mean.)
This is the big fire truck. It has a host of equipment for various situations. In between chasing kids, I thought a lot about the logistics of a fire station like this. They have to keep the vehicles stocked at all time. They need to keep good track of their staffing so they aren't spending too much BUT they also have enough people to do what needs done. The personnel explained that they work in conjunction with departments within about a 30 mile radius, so if there is an emergency in a nearby town, they can and will be called.
The big rig has an appallingly tall ladder. I think they said 110 feet long. Ugh. We talked a fair amount about fear of heights. The staff said everyone has their "thing" -- some don't like heights, others don't like blood, or small spaces, etc. They have to learn to overcome their particular fears and stressors to do their jobs well. Training tends to weed out people who just can't cut this job, which is a challenging one.
Daniel was more or less a nut through most of the field trip, so the big girls and I spent a fair amount of time chasing him.
We also got to walk through the "ambulance" -- the smaller vehicle they send on medical runs. It is, of course, scrupulously neat and clean, and has a host of medical supplies for a variety of purposes. Kevin actually visited this fire station 7 years ago when he had some worrisome symptoms which signaled a possible stroke. It turned out to be nothing to worry about, but having a local place like this fire station IS reassuring when something scary happens physically.
So...thoughts. Profound thoughts.
I truly admire firefighters/paramedics. They are on the front lines of emergency preparedness. They deal with WAY more than fires. They are there for car crashes and heart attacks and yes, fires. They have to stay physically strong so they can carry people up and down ladders.
There is no way I could physically do their job. There are a few women who staff this station (though our 2 hosts were men) and they learn to compensate plus, hey, they are strong women!
I don't think I could mentally/emotionally do this job either. Sometimes, these folks are the heroes. They go to the heart attack victim's house and pull him or her back from the dead using CPR and an AED. They treat asthma attack victims or deal with serious head trauma. They pull people from burning buildings. That is amazing and awesome.
Sometimes, they can't save someone. And that's where the job has to get tough. I wonder how they do it? How do they deal with a situation where they go and it is too late to save someone? I have a sweet online friend (who will no doubt read this blog entry) who lost her husband more than a year ago due to an epileptic seizure. It is heart breaking that the medical emergency personnel couldn't save him, but they couldn't. Sometimes the seizure is catastrophic, sometimes the heart attack is too severe, sometimes the fire is too entrenched and someone dies of smoke inhalation or burns.
So I think this job requires more than just physical strength and expertise. It requires a special type of mind and soul. I hope and pray these folks still have compassion for those they help. I am sure they do -- you don't go into firefighting/paramedic work for the money. The hours are lousy and the pay isn't amazing. I would guess, though, that fire station personnel need to separate enough from a tragic situation so that they CAN do their jobs. Maybe it is a natural part of who they are, maybe it is part of their training, maybe it is a combination.
Anyway, amazing field trip. Thought provoking. I'm thankful for these folks.
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