War stories:

This is a war story of a sort and is about an event that happened about 2 months ago.
It was a Tuesday evening and I was on duty as a volunteer at my fire station. The station I volunteer with is a Special Service Unit, meaning we provide a support services to the Engine Companies that make up the bulk of most if not all fire departments. Our unit is a Truck, a Tractor Drawn Arial unit to be technical. When I am there, or any other volunteer for that matter, the unit is up staffed to a crew of 4 Driver, Officer, Tillerman and Firefighter (me).

We had already run one call earlier that evening for an automatic alarm at a local manufacturing facility. It was as usually is a malfunctioning alarm…a smells and bells as some old timers call it. The neighboring unit was out front getting their cascade system refilled and was just pulling away when the alarm came in for another Automatic Alarm. “Engine 3, Truck 4 due, for an Automatic Alarm ….” We donned our protective gear, climbed into our positions and pulled out of the station. Two minutes later we were pulling up in front of the 3 story apartment/condo, while the single Engine on the call went to the side of the building. The residents were standing out front and water was rushing out the front door. None of the residents seemed excited and in fact they all thought it was rather humorous that water was coming out of the wall in the stairwell. I got off the truck and met Daniel and Jeff, we continued to grab our gear and then we walked into the building. Someone said it’s coming from the 3rd floor so off we went to the stairs. It was about 80 degrees that evening so I was sweating by the time we made it to the third floor carrying my hook and can and wearing my turnout gear and air pack.

We pulled open the door to the 3rd floor and could hear the sound of the sprinkler in the apartment to the left, flowing a lot of water. Randy from the Engine Company, who had entered the building before us had already, forced the door to the apartment. When he saw us come through the door he looked at us and said, “Hey I have fire in here.” Looking into the apartment the smoke had already banked down about a foot from the ceiling and the sound of the sprinkler was very loud. Jeff looked at Daniel and told him to get on the radio and let dispatch know of the fire. While Daniel did that we entered the apartment. The sound of water was coming from the room to our left so looking in we could see a man sitting in a chair beneath the working sprinkler and it looked like he was actually smoldering some. Jeff and Randy got to him and asked him what was going on, it was then that we could see that his legs from his knees down and most of the lower part of the chair he was sitting in had been on fire. The sprinkler had done its job though controlling and extinguishing the fire, confining it to this one room. We got the man up out of his chair and removed him from the apartment. Daniel and I then began a search of the rest of the apartment, only finding one very scared Golden Retriever. By then the man’s wife had returned and we turned her dog over to her while Jeff and Bobbie worked on treating the victim, in the hallway. When Jeff and Randy removed the man they called down for an aid bag and Bobbie had brought it up.

By then the full assignment was arriving bringing another Truck, two more Engine Companies and an Ambulance as well as a boat load of white shirts, staff-officers. The newly arriving crews took over other tasks, controlled the water flow and secured the utilities. We continued treating our patient and then carried him down the stairs to the waiting Ambulance crew. He was eventually Med Evac’d to a burn center. 2 hours later…we backed into our quarters, put the unit back into service, and got ready to do it all again when the next call came in.