After the FIRE...

You went to sleep near midnight after calls to two wrecks and one heart attack. You’d been asleep for about an hour when the alarm sounded. You jumped into your turnout gear and climbed on the back of the fire truck.
You could see the flames a block away. You jumped off the truck and pulled a hose and connected it to the hydrant. When the signal came, you turned on the water and then ran down the street to join your crew in attacking the blaze.
You’re wearing 45 pounds of gear plus an airpack weighing 25 pounds more. You help advance a heavy hose into the living room and begin to spray the flames, with the room immediately filling with hot steam and smoke.
You’re here. You’re there. All of you are everywhere inside and outside. Battling. Fighting. Giving it your all to try to save anything and everything you can in this home, as well as the home itself.
Hours later, it’s over. Or is it? In most jobs, a rough day means going home and saving some of the work for tomorrow. But not for firefighters.
After the fire, another job begins and lasts for several hours more. You’re probably not going to get to go back to sleep. But you’re used to that.
The dirty turnout gear your chief made you put in bags and had carried back to the station in the compartments of the fire truck is brought out and washed. And dried afterwards. Your other set of clean turnout gear is laid out ready to go.
The air packs are cleaned and decontaminated. The air bottles are refilled. The face masks are cleaned and put up to dry.
All of the hoses used at the fire scene are thoroughly rinsed and cleaned and then hung up on racks to dry. You and your crew then take extra rolled hoses and begin to load them onto the trucks.
You do a lot of this in teams. It takes quite some time. Many of the tasks are being done simultaneously. You’re beyond exhaustion. Everyone is tired. But not so strangely, no one is ill. No one is cranky. No one snaps at anyone else. This is just another part of the job. You’ve been through the fire together. You are family.
In fact, as dawn approaches and you steadily help load the hoses onto the bed of the truck in the accordion fold—so they come off quickly and easily without kinking—you all begin to joke around.
If there’s a rookie on the crew, they’re going to get some extra heat. This is bonding time. This is working by muscle memory, when you’re so drained and dead on your feet, you can’t even think.
Now, you wash all the fire trucks that answered the call hours before. You wash them like they’re a Corvette. Because it matters. Because they’re expensive vehicles. And because, to you, they are beautiful.
Everything is finally back in place. Everything is ready for the next call and the next shift, which starts coming in as you pack your gear to go.
You say goodbye. And then... Who wants to grab some breakfast?
(Editor’s note: More than quite a few years ago, Chazz was a firefighter/paramedic in another city. She was inspired by this photo and her interview of retiring fire chief Tim Rye to write this editorial. She still misses her firefighting family. And she greatly appreciates any opportunity she has to work with firefighters, police officers or other first responders in her role as a journalist.)