Juniors, your first time out?

[djbacon93]

Tell me about your first time out and what was it like..
Well, i joined a year ago, when i was 14, I ran a few calls, but then some laws/guidelines in Pennsylvania got changed and we weren't allowed to ride the apparatus anymore until we were 16. We still train, which is the most important thing right now. (I turn 16 in april) Anyway, -
When i was 14, I had joined, got my pager and my turnout gear, went home, went to sleep. When i got up the next morning, i grabbed the pager out of my charger and put it on my belt, and went outside to ride bike, i turned the corner, and had been riding right in front of the firehouse when the tones played. And than the notorious, beepbeepbeepbeep. Which being a newbie, I listened to the dispatch first. And i was on the ground with my bike trying to unclip my pager and at the same time trying to drag my bike out back of the firehouse. I ran in through the bay door got my gear down and got it on in about, eh, 50 seconds, and i waited. My buddy who joined with me the day before was right there with me aswell. We were both assigned to the rescue. When we got on scene we found out the accident was only 30 seconds down the road (what a first call, eh?). The car jumped down a hill on an overpass and basically kissed the road (hard).

[ATFDFF]

Please note, I am COMPLETELY pro-explorers on calls...but...they let you roll with 0, no, not even a hint of experience.

THAT I feel is asking for trouble.

[svfd930]

Man the first night I joined the FD I went to the station got my pager and fire gear,and went home.My little sister had a ball game(her school is right in front of the main station).The tones dropped and I went to the station got my gear down opened the bay doors and waited for a driver..we pulled up on-scene to the structure and had her out in an hour.We had about 33 firefighters/first responders on-scene.

[zackman1801]

The first call i went on was a few weeks ago. A fully involved structure fire that was called in at 10:30pm. I was awaken since i was asleep for school the next day. I was told to wait at the station until a lieutenant showed up later on and i was going to be given a ride to the incident. From then on i was with him at all times. I ran air bottles from the engine down to the portable cascade system and had them filled for the guys with SCBA's on. Aside from that i learned about the joys of rolling multiple hundreds of feet of hose back at the station, and the fun of being covered in water in sub zero temps while having to wear a forestry jacket.
I will say that i had very little training but had been told what i can and can not do on the fire grounds, i was showed where things were on the truck and the procedures on how to do things while on scene. Everything else was a learning experience. There was little chance of injury for me though as i was well out of the hot zone at most times, slipping on the ice that was forming form the tankers splashing water out of the dump tanks was the number 1 concern. we were out all night long and i didnt get to sleep untill the next morning. fun night. Dont get me wrong though, i did learn lots from being on scene and seeing things done first hand, probably more learning done then than being told what things are like.

and before anyone asks, Yes i am on a very small volunteer fire department in a rural area so everyone gets to respond, juniors too.

[bharer75]

Please note, I am COMPLETELY pro-explorers on calls...but...they let you roll with 0, no, not even a hint of experience.

THAT I feel is asking for trouble.

big big big trouble.. and having the pager at 14 to respond to the firehouse not during a ridealong? unheard of around here.

but going on my first call is to much to put in words..

[backsteprescue123]

My first call on a ride along (not as an explorer being called to the scene of an incident already in progress or doing a school job shadow) was a rollover MVA on the interstate. Two pinned. Both transported to the local trauma center. It was a decent first call The weather was horrible that day and surprisingly it was all we got the whole day. Until, of course, after I left when they proceeded to get another 4 or 5 mvas.



Today was a good day though ( now that I am a firefighter), as since I missed drill Tues. night so I had to drill with the Full Timers today and we caught a structure fire.

[kott3670]

my first call was an smoke filled building about 3 months after i joined, on my birthday, at the place i was supposed to eat dinner at that night, ended up being a chimney that had a vent pipe that went down instead of up (apparently never took physics....) they just vented the building while i watched haha. Ended up being a good meal that night....

but yeah no training and going on calls i disagree with..... i still didnt feel comfortable even after 3 months of training......

[Iceeman02]

It was a decent first call The weather was horrible that day and surprisingly it was all we got the whole day. Until, of course, after I left when they proceeded to get another 4 or 5 mvas.

haha sounds like you were a victim of the "ride along curse!"

I remember my first ride along was with La County FD in good old P-Town (Pomona, CA). Call came in as a "Full Arrest", and once we got there we found an older gentleman already DOA laid out in his front yard. Turns out he had overdosed on heroin. Fun part though was the medics let me get my hands dirty, by letting me start some chest compressions and bagging the victim while they started there ALS procedures

[djbacon93]

All we were allowed to do was watch on that first call,
we spent 3 hours the night we joined going over some basic's,
but my department feels the best way to learn is to be there and observe.
I'm a year in now with much more training than when i first went out
(Although, not nearly enough yet)

[NWOhio157]

I was 14 on my first ride along. We got 4 runs back to back. 3 of the 4 were EMS runs (2 chest pains and 1 person passed out) and the 4th was an MVA with no-injuries.

[AndrewR]

I was 14 when i went to my first call was not during a ride along our town did not do that we had pagers but thats besides the point first call i went out on was 10 minutes before our explorer drill was to begin bunch of us standing around at the station with the station Lt that was doing the drill and the MVA came in and ya i got to ride out with the Lt on the engine that night.

[backsteprescue123]

I was 14 when i went to my first call was not during a ride along our town did not do that we had pagers but thats besides the point first call i went out on was 10 minutes before our explorer drill was to begin bunch of us standing around at the station with the station Lt that was doing the drill and the MVA came in and ya i got to ride out with the Lt on the engine that night.

If you could, please use proper grammar/English and punctuation. Your post was harder to read than an Egyptian hieroglyphic.

Thanks.

[FIREPUP2007]

lets see my first was was not that long ago. about 5 months ago in sept we had very strong winds. We was getting ready to have our meeting at 10 am and our tones dropped so we had our capt in his vehicle and we started out with brush truck their was 2 of them and i asked our assistant chief if i could ride.he asked if i had my gear and i said ya. he said get it and go...
it was a power line across the rode we was there for about 15 mins. and then the tones went off again for another line down, so we turned around and left two guys with their pov's there. On the way across our coverage area to the next call we had to stop and cut a tree out of the way that was hanging across the bridge... when we got their this power line was still hot and the wind was still blowing....... about 1 hr later the fuse box behind us blew and two trees fell less than 50 ft away......more later......

[KB1OEV]

I was 14 when i went to my first call was not during a ride along our town did not do that we had pagers but thats besides the point first call i went out on was 10 minutes before our explorer drill was to begin bunch of us standing around at the station with the station Lt that was doing the drill and the MVA came in and ya i got to ride out with the Lt on the engine that night.

holy crap. Take the extra 10 seconds to type that out in 5 sentences instead of one. As it reads, your post is extremely difficult to understand.

[bharer75]

I was 14 when i went to my first call was not during a ride along our town did not do that we had pagers but thats besides the point first call i went out on was 10 minutes before our explorer drill was to begin bunch of us standing around at the station with the station Lt that was doing the drill and the MVA came in and ya i got to ride out with the Lt on the engine that night.

this just further scares me that an untrained 14 year old with little comprehension is allowed to go on an emergency call in a code 3 engine with real victims hurt. sounds like a lawsuit up the A**

[Rush ff-132]

This was my frist time out. 2 skiers got stuck in an pond in the next town over from mine. In our battalion we have a water rescue team where if at any time a dept. in the battalion is dispatched for any water/ice/ special rescue the incident commander will have the water rescue team dispatched to the scene. My dad is the battalion coordnatior for our battalion and he is the team officer so i got to ride with him to the scene. I assisted the team and my department in getting equipment staged. This was a great experience for me and plus i made it on all the TV stations and newspapers. If you department does do anything with water rescue i really encourage to attend and observe the drills. It is a great experience. I have been attending for the last 6 years part during as a explorer and part as just being a spectator.

[bharer75]

. This was a great experience for me and plus i made it on all the TV stations and newspapers. .

hope you know that everyone who sees that you have to buy them ice cream right?

[NWOhio157]

this just further scares me that an untrained 14 year old with little comprehension is allowed to go on an emergency call in a code 3 engine with real victims hurt. sounds like a lawsuit up the A**

........................And you'd sure be the one to talk.
If a call came in that was something big in nature (whether it be a structure fire, an MVA with multiple patients pinned, ect) and you had the chance to go because there's an empty seat/you were on a ride along, you can't tell me you're staying behind because you have bad English comprehension skills. And if you did, I'd be throwing a BULL***** flag - like the NFL refs do on lots of occasions.

[bharer75]

........................And you'd sure be the one to talk.
If a call came in that was something big in nature (whether it be a structure fire, an MVA with multiple patients pinned, ect) and you had the chance to go because there's an empty seat/you were on a ride along, you can't tell me you're staying behind because you have bad English comprehension skills. And if you did, I'd be throwing a BULL***** flag - like the NFL refs do on lots of occasions.

woah there a little defensive are we today?

[firedept6789]

i had a working fire with 3 people inside 2 died and 1 lived i workd on the rehab truck helping refill SCBA/SCOTT bottles and passing out food and water