Fire-Rescue 59: My Mid-Life Crisis as a Volunteer Firefighter-EMT

By Alan J. Knoche

Most firefighters join the fire service when they are young-their teens or early twenties. Alan Knoche was an exception in that he joined when he was in his late thirties. He had a lot of catching up to do, but with life experiences in the Navy, the submarine service, and working at a nuclear power facility behind him, he quickly progressed from rookie to assistant fire chief.

A top responder in a volunteer fire department that answered an average of two emergency calls a day, he fought fires, cut people out of crushed automobiles, and rescued victims from everything from a quarry collapse to a gumball machine. As an EMT, he also responded to thousands of medical and trauma calls and helped people who were experiencing the worst day of their lives.

These stories relate some of the emergencies he faced on his "second job." They are gritty, often challenging, and sometimes sad, but actual life-threatening incidents are seldom pleasant. That's not to say it's all serious. The occasional humorous or comical event is what helps emergency responders cope with the catastrophic and tragic sights they see on a daily basis.

The men and women he served with are some of the most dedicated, talented, resourceful, skilled, and sometimes insane people you could ever hope to show up when you're having your worst day. They made these stories possible.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fulton Books, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 23, 2021
• ISBN: 9781637101162

Book preview

We’re in the Bad Day Business

It is a beautiful day. It’s sunny. The temperature is perfect. Good friends are over for a cookout. The chicken on the grill is progressing nicely. There’s laughter, too much food, and good smells in the air. It’s all good.

And then it’s not.

The fire department pager on my belt activates.

Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep. Box 59-5. PA 283 Westbound at the Q Ramp. Accident with injuries. Company 59. 1730.

Visiting friends are starting to learn that the sound of pager tones always results in the immediate disappearance of any volunteer firefighters nearby. It’s rude, but it’s important. I apologize over my shoulder as I sprint for the car. I’m still a new firefighter, and I try to make every call.

The drive to the station is becoming more familiar. As a new firefighter, I drove way too fast to the first couple of calls. The need to manage the adrenaline rush and control my driving is a learned response. I’m still learning. Though not as reckless as my initial responses, I’m probably still driving too fast.

At the station, we throw on our bunker gear and hop aboard the fire engine. I’m in a rear-facing jump seat, and we head toward the scene. I can see where we’ve been but not where we’re going. It’s easy to know when we’re getting close because our speed decreases to allow us to thread our way through the stopped traffic. The slower we go, the closer we get. When people start to line the side of the highway, I know we are there. They are all standing with their arms crossed against their chests. Their faces and the way they are standing indicate insecurity, uncertainty, and discomfort with what they are seeing. I’ve already learned that this pose means something nasty awaits when I get off the rig.

A Ford Ranger pickup truck was traveling at a high rate of speed and failed to make the curve on Ramp Q, connecting Route 283 West with Interstate 283 North. The truck flipped, rolled, and ejected the people in it. I see the truck, right side up with its doors closed, but it’s in the adjacent exit ramp. All sides and the top are smashed in. Several groups of people surround what can only be victims.

I grab a fire extinguisher and stand by as others secure the vehicle. The possibility of fire is remote as only antifreeze is leaking, so I start to look around.

There are three people lying in the road, and EMS crews are attending to two of them. Ed, the assistant chief, picks up the edge of a green tarp thrown from the pickup truck and says, We’ve got another one under here. I take off my self-contained breathing apparatus for more mobility and help him until additional EMS units can arrive.

It is a large bearded white man lying on his right side. He’s wearing a leather vest over his plaid shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots. His hands are badly cut and bleeding freely. I’m still new. If someone isn’t telling me what to do, I try to find something myself. So I hold dressings on his hands to try and slow down the bleeding, being careful not to move his obviously broken wrist. He is conscious, but aside from a twitching leg, he seems content to stay on his right side. He tells us his name is Michael. He had been drinking, and he was driving his motorcycle. I have a feeling he was the driver of the pickup truck as there is no motorcycle. I’m picking glass fragments out of his beard and left ear when additional advanced life support units arrive.

We cut off his clothing to make a patient assessment. He has lacerations, the worst being his hands, but the ALS crew is more concerned about his head trauma. His head and neck are swelling and starting to turn purple. A cervical collar is applied, and we roll him onto MAST trousers positioned on a backboard. After fitting the MAST trousers and securing him to the board, we place him into Ambulance 59B. Removing my firefighter’s gloves for better dexterity to help this guy now seems to be a mistake as my hands are covered with his blood. I get some alcohol preps from one of the ambulances to wipe them clean.

The driver is being worked on in Ambulance 59B, a female patient is already on her way to the hospital, and a third person is being loaded into Ambulance 7A. I notice a fourth person on the ground that I didn’t see earlier. No one is treating him. No one is standing by him. I walk over. He is a handsome young black man, lying loosely on his right side. He has a peaceful look on his face. A large pool of what I assume to be clotting blood surrounds his head and torso. An EMT tells me it is a combination of blood and cerebrospinal fluid, the stuff that surrounds the brain. He was dead upon impact with the highway.

I test myself by looking closely at him. For some reason, it does not upset me like I thought it would. Sure, it’s unpleasant because of the large pool of fluids. Yes, it makes me mad that this young man’s life is over because of a good time. The whiskey bottles lying in the road are too obvious. Maybe it’s the fact that they made the choice. My lack of emotion surprises me. At least they didn’t take some innocent person with them.

It’s hot, so we take off our bunker coats as the state police and coroner are completing their preliminary investigation. A trooper asks if we could hose down the area. It is as much for the blood as it is for the antifreeze and glass.

Back at the station, the usual good-natured kidding takes place as we clean up our equipment. Somehow, it seems more subdued than usual. We did a good job, but the call can’t really be counted as a success. All we can salvage is the satisfaction of knowing we worked well as a team.

But we knew it when we joined. We’re in the bad day business.

Purge

It’s not like it was the first dead guy I’ve seen. I’ve been to viewings and funerals. I’ve come across fatal accidents while driving. Now, as a firefighter, I’m starting to see death more frequently. But the age of the kid on Interstate 283 bothered me. Old people die; that’s just the way it is. But this kid was in his late teens or early twenties. I try to deny I did the same stupid things that got him killed when I was his age. But it was such a waste to throw his life away so he and his friends could drink and drive fast. I felt sorry for him, yet I’m angry at the same time. What a colossal waste.

I talked it over with the assistant fire chief. Ed is as composed and controlled a person as you could ever hope to have standing next to you at an emergency scene. His perspective is always calm, matter-of-fact. He’s been a firefighter for a long time and has resolved issues regarding sudden death long ago. He told me to write it down if it really bothered me. Once committed to paper, it is no longer necessary to remember it. I could save what I’ve written or discard it if I choose. Either way, it’s been purged from the forefront of my memory.

Back at home, I wrote down what I saw and what I felt. It seemed so real again. It was unpleasant and just as frustrating as it was when it happened. I made changes to what I wrote, moved things around, and read and reread it several times.

I put the pen down and sat back. I sighed. Maybe it was just a head game, but I did feel better. I thought about why I joined the fire department. I wrote that down too.

Without conscious thought or planning, this book was started.

Why?

I was young. At least in my mind I was. Only thirty-seven years old. I’d served on a US Navy nuclear submarine. I worked at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Station. I volunteered at an animal shelter, mostly working with birds of prey. That would be enough excitement and interesting stuff for a lot of people, but it wasn’t for me. Nancy was at work many nights until late and on some weekends, and the cats weren’t all that good for thought-provoking discussions. I needed more.

They call it a midlife crisis. Many men buy a sports car and shack up with a drifty twenty-year-old. I lacked the money, looks, charm, and hot car to attract any willing twenty-year-olds, so I needed to find something else.

I grew up in Stratford, Connecticut, on Long Island Sound. It was a fairly large town and would eventually evolve into a city. Stratford had a career fire department with three stations strategically located around the town. Some of the neighboring municipalities had volunteer fire departments, but because Stratford didn’t, the thought of becoming a volunteer never entered my mind. If there was a decent-sized fire, or if a lot of red trucks with lights and sirens flew past our house, my dad and I would go check out the excitement. Later, I did fire stuff in the Navy and had fire brigade training at Three Mile Island. It was so different from my normal full-time job that it was fun. And sure, it was exciting.

So, unable to find any willing and attractive twenty-year-old women, I decided to join the local volunteer fire department.

The Initial Incident

Around 2000 hours, the tones go off. I drive much faster than I mean to, and still it seems to take forever to cover the two miles to the fire station. I hop on Engine 59-1, and I’m so preoccupied with getting on my gear and SCBA that I’m not even aware of which route we take to the scene. My mouth is dry, but I don’t feel nervous. But I am afraid of screwing up and letting the guys down.

A motor vehicle accident occurred at the entrance to Jamesway Plaza. A lady in an eastbound car cut in front of a westbound car. The westbound driver wasn’t wearing a seat belt and punched the windshield with her head. The injuries are minor (but I’d bet she would disagree). I’m not sure if the lady is crying because her head hurts or because the new car she was driving—the one she borrowed from a friend—is wrecked.

I help crib (stabilize) the cars, disconnect the batteries, and load both ladies into the ambulances. It’s nice to have a minor incident like this to get my bearings and break into the routine.

Reported Structure Fire

Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep. Box 59-8. Structure fire. 123 Ebenezer Road. Company 59, Truck 456. 1540.

I’m still the new kid, so this dispatch sounds like it could be exciting. The incident is around the block from my house, but I need to go all the way to the fire station to get my gear and hop on a rig to come back almost to where I started.

I make it to the station before the first engine leaves, and I climb into the back of Engine 59-1. We have a full crew, and pretty much everyone has more experience than I do.

As we’re responding, Chief 59-2 arrives on the scene to report light smoke inside and directs Engine 59-1 to lay in from the hydrant at Ebenezer Road and Old Reliance Road. The guy on the other side of the engine hops out, wraps the hydrant with the five-inch, and we continue down the length of the road to the address. We lay a thousand feet of five-inch large diameter hose in the street and stop in front of the ranch house. As we jump down from the rig, we notice a fire hydrant literally right in front of the home.

The chief says there is light smoke inside the house, but the source isn’t known. I’m assigned to the attic.

I find the pull-down stairs in the garage and pull the rope. No smoke comes down, so I climb up into the attic. It’s hot up there, not from a fire but from the sun baking down on the roof. I can’t see anything bad happening, so I yell down my report to the firefighters in the garage. Not thinking of anything better to do, I start to make my way toward the far end of the attic. When I get there, it’s much hotter and maybe a little smoky, but no fire. With nothing electrical or mechanical down that end, I work my way back to the stairs and climb down to tell what I found. Or more like what I didn’t.

Other members of the crew are searching the structure, and we join them as they reach a bedroom at the far end of the house, where it was hottest in the attic. Pulling back the sliding door to the bedroom closet, we find a very hot and smoking heater unit. We turn it off, throw the breaker, and wait until it is cooled down.

We go back outside to reload a thousand feet of large-diameter hose, an hour-long job at best. One of the veterans calls the chief over. Pointing to the hydrant in front of the house, he asks, What’s the matter, Chief? Isn’t there any water in this one?

The Rookie

It’s not easy being a rookie. You’re not expected to know anything, and the crap jobs are reserved for you. Roll up the five-inch hose. Clean the bathroom. Stay longer and work harder. But it’s not so bad and much easier to accept because all of the other firefighters have done the same.

Usually, firefighters get involved when they are young—late teens or early twenties. I’m in my late thirties and get the feeling some of the younger guys are uncomfortable that I’m doing the rookie tasks. I go out of my way to do what is expected from any rookie and more. Learning the routine and the skills is a major goal, but so is acceptance.

Bunker gear is provided. As a rookie, I am assigned beat-up crappy hand-me-downs. The protective clothing stinks. When Nancy’s not looking, I sneak it through our clothes washer at home. At least I won’t smell so bad.

The department has training every Thursday evening. Fire suppression, attack, and safety at dumpster fires, natural cover fires, car fires, truck fires, house fires, office complex fires, and warehouse fires are all the same, and all very different. Vehicle rescue, rope rescue, water rescue, machinery rescue, aircraft incident response, and building collapse are learned and practiced. Hazardous materials incidents, firefighter health and safety, and building construction are covered. You can be a firefighter for a lifetime and never come close to knowing it all.

Thankfully, there are many sources of training. There are a million books and training manuals. Weekly department training is one of the best sources of practice and a good way to build your confidence. Fire training, both classroom and hands-on, is available at the local community college and at the state fire academy. Once you are incorporated into the fire service mailing lists, you receive a never-ending supply of offers for talks, presentations, and seminars to learn more.

Rig checks are performed on each piece of fire apparatus each week. Every self-contained breathing apparatus is tested and checked. Every air, hydraulic, and electric tool is test run and serviced. Each hand tool is checked. Every light and every radio is tested. This is a major time commitment. Performing these checks with a veteran firefighter is a great way to learn where everything is and how everything works on the fire engines, rescue truck, tanker, and attack unit. Getting familiar with these tools for the first time on an emergency scene is not an option.

The training, practice, and preparation will make me a better firefighter. But there is only one way to become competent and trusted by your peers. You need to feel the heat.

Feeling Some Heat

Mom calls to wish me a happy birthday. The pager goes off at 1930 hours. I excuse myself from the phone call and sprint out the door. The dispatch is for a vehicle fire at the Highspire Plaza on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Halfway to the station, the scanner says a woman on the scene reported the fire out. Chief 55 cancels all units, but I continue to the station to sign up for the call.

As we are filling out the paperwork, one of our EMTs comes in and says, That sucker’s rockin’. We tell him we were canceled, but he insists, I don’t care. That sucker’s rockin’. We start to gear up when the tones sound again.

I ride Engine 59 with a full crew, and I’m first to have an SCBA on. The crew agrees to Let Knoche have the knob. As we crest the hill by Twin Dell Curve, I look across the field to the Plaza. We can see a thick black cloud of smoke, and someone shouts over the engine noise, We’ve got fire!

We are first in. I grab the nozzle and set up near the left front side of the vehicle. The engineer lines up the pump, and the crew stretches out the remaining hose. A new Jeep Cherokee with many extras and options is heavily involved in fire. I kick away a fire extinguisher lying by the front tire to eliminate a possible missile hazard as I wait for water. The owner is yelling that he just filled the gas tank. I watch the water slowly snake through the hose on its way to the nozzle. The pump operator is doing his job.

Opening the nozzle, I knock down the fire outside the engine compartment first. This allows the crew to pry the hood open. The water takes out the fire on top, but the hose has to be aimed under the vehicle to get it all. The closest tire explodes about eighteen inches from my face. It’s sudden and it’s loud, but it’s over so fast that I don’t have time to get scared. We relocate to the side door. As the door is opened, I hit the fire in the passenger compartment. We are enveloped in a cloud of steam. It isn’t all that hot because of our full protective clothing, but visibility decreases to zero. I continue to hit it until the orange glow in the steam cloud disappears. Then I hit it some more.

The inch and three-quarter hose that seemed so unwieldy during practice is not as cumbersome in the excitement of the moment. But now that the fire is out, it’s getting heavy again. It’s also hot. Not from the fire but from within the bunker gear. As I remove the SCBA mask, one of the straps and buckles removes a patch of skin from my forehead. I think, Something to remember the moment by.

Back at the station, the crew is in good spirits—high-fives, back slapping, and information on firehouse traditions. It is my cherry fire, and I now owe the crew a beer.

Destiny

Maybe I was destined to be a firefighter all along.

When I was five, my family was in the process of moving from Bridgeport to the north end of Stratford, Connecticut. As my mother and I waited at the traffic light at Main Street and Barnum Avenue, we heard the howl of a siren growing behind us. The traffic dutifully pulled out of the lane of travel (folks did polite things like that back then) as the source of the noise approached. A shiny bright red B Model Mack fire engine with firefighters in coats and helmets riding on the engine’s tailboard wove through traffic with emergency lights and siren going. It was speeding to an emergency scene somewhere, and everyone yielded to the firefighters and their mission. Like it would for any young boy, the scene stayed with me, and my fantasy play world included fire engines from then on. It was my first memory of the fire service.

***

I was ten. There was a foot of snow on the ground one winter evening. Mom and Dad had gone to visit a relative in the hospital, and even though my sister, Judy, and I were certain we were too old for a babysitter, Mom asked our neighbor, Mrs. Gruler, to stay with us. For a short time until she arrived, we were home alone.

Cartoons were on the television when the TV screen started to get harder to see. My sister yelled, The house is on fire! before I realized the TV was getting hard to see because of the smoke. I probably wasn’t the brightest kid.

I grabbed Judy and told her to go to Mr. Wilson’s house next door, and we ran out of the house together. Once outside though, I remembered my pets. As Judy continued to the Wilson’s, I went back into the house for the dog and parakeet. Our dog, Queenie, was not too thrilled about being dragged across the kitchen floor by an excited ten-year-old, but she was tied to her chain in the yard before she could protest too much. I went back in, grabbed the parakeet, and was coming out the door when Mr. Wilson arrived. He told me to wait at his house. Yeah, right. I put the parakeet on his kitchen table and went back to watch the action.

The sirens could be heard for a long time before the apparatus arrived. They came, four of them, down the long driveway single file, just clearing the piles of snow on either side. I watched as firemen ran into the house, and one grabbed an ax and went to the cellar door. He reared back with the ax, prepared to strike a mighty blow, when Mr. Wilson shouted, Wait! He leaned around the firefighter and opened the unlocked door. I remember the fireman giving him a dirty look.

It was really over before it started. The source of the smoke was only a furnace malfunction. There was no real fire. The fire department used fans to exhaust the smoke, and they were starting to pack up their equipment when Mrs. Gruler got to the end of our driveway. To her horror, it was filled with fire trucks with their emergency lights flashing! We could only imagine how she felt not knowing if the children she was responsible for were safe. In her excitement, she tried to run through the snowdrifts. She fell several times but eventually reached the house, very out of breath and covered with snow. Everyone thought this was hilarious.

Everyone except Mrs. Gruler.

***

I enlisted in the Navy when I was eighteen. My first opportunity to actually become a firefighter came in boot camp. Fire is a mortal enemy of a ship at sea, and great emphasis is placed on preparedness and training to combat the threat. Firefighting skills and techniques are taught and practiced in boot camp, and frequent drills and refresher courses are held on each ship and base.

I wasn’t too fond of the schedule for my yearly training and testing in damage control and firefighting. We would practice plugging and sealing leaks in the flooding trainer in January with forty-degree water, and we would extinguish training fires in a metal mockup of a submarine in August in the ninety-five-degree heat.

While serving on a nuclear-powered submarine, I used my firefighting skills on a number of occasions. We had the usual clothes dryer fires, some electrical equipment fires, but we also had some more significant and serious events. We fought some fires that most landlubber firefighters could never experience, and a couple that we cannot talk about. Firefighting on a submarine is unique because there is no retreat. Unlike a civilian firefighter, you can’t bail out of the building to escape the heat or smoke. Unlike a surface sailor, you can’t go out onto the deck to get a breath of fresh air. In a submarine, there is extra incentive to continue an aggressive attack. If you lose, there is nowhere else to go.

***

I had faced some danger and found it to be exciting. But after my separation from the Navy, something seemed to be missing from my life. So I volunteered for a number of organizations. Sports and nature were good things to pass the time, and they were fun, but they really didn’t challenge me. My life had become stable. It was too predictable.

I decided to do something crazy. I joined the fire department.

This Job Stinks

We were dispatched to a vehicle accident right at bedtime on a workday. At least it didn’t wake us up. It was for a large tractor trailer hauling garbage. Not rubbish or trash. Garbage. Stinky garbage. The driver escaped injury but would undoubtedly be looking for a new job in the morning. He managed to roll the tractor and trailer on the curve—the Q Ramp—between PA 283 Westbound and I-283 Northbound. There wasn’t much we could do, and the state police released us after a humane length of time so we could go home and get some sleep before the alarm clock went off.

Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep. Box 59-5. Interstate 283 at Ramp Q. A trash fire. 0130.

Okay. This one does wake us up. I’m still fairly new and looking for excitement and glory, so I get dressed and head to the fire station. It’s a full station response—two engines, the rescue, and the tanker. Only enough dedicated (or insane) people show up for one full crew, so we split it and respond with an engine and the tanker.

It sure is dark at night. And there isn’t anyone on the road. We get on PA 283 West and roll to a stop on the Q Ramp to find the same tractor trailer on its side as last night, and the same garbage spilled in the grass area between ramps. Only this time it’s on fire.

I suppose this call was when I learned that not all incidents are exciting. Not all of them are challenging. Not all of them are fun. The senior guys are on a handline. Senior in this case means longevity with the fire department and not senior in age. That means my job is overhaul. That’s a nice way of saying the guy with the rake. I get to wade through a pile of stinking, rotting garbage to pull it apart so the hose stream can get to the fire.

Ever smell rotting garbage? The kind that sat in trash cans for a week, then went into a garbage truck to mix with other people’s garbage, then got dumped at some facility where they scooped it up and put it into an open tractor trailer. I’m pretty sure it’s New Jersey garbage that is trucked to a landfill north of Harrisburg. It’s pretty bad when even New Jersey doesn’t want it, so they ship it to Pennsylvania. And it’s summer. Hot, humid summer to help it ripen. This load never made it to the landfill, and it’s now distributed along Interstate 283, and it’s on fire.

It is sickeningly sweet, but not in a good sweet way. Think of rotting fish mixed with dog shit, limburger cheese, and vomit. It’s a little bit worse than that.

And I get to wander through the stuff. When I should be sleeping. And I’m doing it for free.

What was I thinking?

My First Death

Engine 59 is tapped out for a medical assist on Shirley Drive at 1700 hours. Past medical assists have proven to be one of two types. Either the ambulance crew needed help carrying an obese four-hundred-pound patient down a flight of stairs, or it could be something serious. As we roll to a stop in front of the house, the look on the chief’s face definitely shows the latter.

A man in his late fifties or early sixties suffered a cardiac arrest while eating supper. The table with the unfinished meal is pushed back to allow the EMS crew to perform CPR, and the medic is administering drugs. The patient’s wife is standing close by, crying on the shoulder of a friend or neighbor. My insides shift when I see the man. Geez, he looks like my dad.

I’m pretty sure how this will end. To watch the wife seeing her husband, who for all intents and purposes is dead, is heartbreaking.

I’m still learning to separate emotion from productivity. We are there to help, not watch, and there are things to do. I help set up the stretcher and remove the kitchen door so the stretcher and crew won’t get hung up on the door closer or a door knob. The EMS crew can continue CPR while transporting the man from the floor to the ambulance. We load him into 59B and transfer several bags of equipment from the medic unit into the ambulance. The guys look good and are as professional in appearance as anyone can be under the circumstances. The man is dead, but not for lack of effort by any of the emergency responders on the scene.

After the ambulance is on its way to the hospital, we replace the door, pick up the medical debris and wrappers from the floor, and wipe up the fluids where the battle was fought. We reposition the furniture as it was before this family changed forever. We even do the dishes. It will be one less thing for the widow to worry about when she returns, alone, from the hospital.

On the way back to the station, I ask one of our EMTs about the chances this man would beat the odds and survive. He says they would not stop CPR and life support activities until the patient is declared dead at the hospital. But this man wasn’t coming home.

It bothers me to think of the sadness of the situation and the anguish of the wife. The look on her face could tear your heart out. The EMT reminds me that people die every day. We can try to prevent the inevitable, and occasionally we will win. But even when everyone does their best, some battles can’t and won’t be won.

The Fire Engine

Every little boy loves a fire engine. Usually we won’t admit it, but there’s a little boy in every grown man who still loves a fire engine. We have to act all tough and brave because we’re men. But the little boy is still in there somewhere.

I drive my first fire engine in the Memorial Day parade. Engine 59-1 is a big 1978 Model CF Mack. It sounds like power, and it’s hard to hold it back at the slow parade speed. The Mack is sighing through its air brakes, like it would rather accelerate and go someplace exciting. The oversized and nearly horizontal steering wheel adds to the effect of something big and powerful. I’m not disappointed when some acquaintance sees me driving the big pumper. I’m pretty sure they would love to be doing what I am doing.

After the parade, we drive to a brief ceremony at Station 54. Chief 59-1 accuses me of being willing to drive to St. Louis for additional parades provided I could drive. He is right.

But there is one more test. The whole company stands around to critique the rookie drivers on their ability to back the big rig into the station. It’s a tight fit, and if not lined up, each additional approach attempt is met with jeers and catcalls. No mercy is expected. None is given. Imagine my satisfaction when I back Engine 59-1 into the bay, perfectly lined up, on the first try. I receive a standing ovation. Harder than backing the Mack into the narrow bay is the necessity to remain nonchalant and pretend it is nothing.

But inside me, the little boy is jumping up and down.

Working Fire

The pager wakes me from a sound sleep.

Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep. Engine 59, relocate to Station 50. 0505.

A relocation. Pretty boring stuff. You relocate to some other municipality’s station, sitting there, waiting for another fire that never comes. If you’re decent, you help the host fire company clean up their equipment when they return before you head home. I hear Nancy in the shower, but my alarm clock hasn’t gone off yet. Too bad. I’ll have to miss this one. Must be time for me to get ready for work.

Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep. Engine 59, relocate to Station 50. 0508.

No firefighter of good conscience should ignore being tapped out twice. Or once for that matter. I check the clock. It’s 0509. Nancy must be going in early. I’ve got two hours to sit in Station 50 before I have to be at work.

"Nancy we’ve got a call only a relocation no big deal I love you bye."

The drive to the station is relatively relaxed. No reason to hurry; it’s only a transfer assignment. But it’s always disappointing to drive to the firehouse and arrive just as the engine is pulling away without you.

At the station, only two other die-hards show up, Earl and Mike. I’m calmly getting into my gear when Earl runs back from the cab. Hurry up! We’re going to the scene!

Engine 59 travels at a good clip down Route 230. It is early, and the traffic is still light. The siren isn’t bad, but the air horns are getting to be annoying. Rolling through Steelton, I can see a good column of smoke lit up from below. We’ve got smoke! I shout.

Yup is all that comes back.

We stop near Lincoln and Bailey Streets. The buildings are primarily two-story duplexes in good repair. In spite of the early hour and light rain, the neighbors line the sidewalks in the classic pose—arms crossed tightly across their chests with worried looks on their faces. It could have been their home.

The three of us pack up and report to the Steelton Chief for an assignment. Earl and a firefighter from Engine 55 are assigned to the attic of the home attached to the main fire building. Mike and I are to pull the ceiling in the rear bedroom. Flames are still visible, but the first arriving companies have the fire pretty much knocked down.

On the porch, we put on our masks, hoods, and helmets, and grab a handline. It’s difficult advancing it to the second floor as the hose is already charged, and other lines clog the stairs. The door straight ahead is ours.

Everything is so black—ceilings, walls, and floors. The bed and dresser are identifiable, but everything has the same texture and color. The blackness seems to absorb the light from my hand lantern. I can’t help but think about whoever used to live in this room and all they’ve lost.

Mike has a pike pole and I have a pick head ax, and we proceed to pull down the ceiling. It is plaster and lath, and it comes easily. Some embers are found, and we take turns cooling them with the handline.

A chief enters the room as our SCBA bells start ringing.

Can I borrow your handline? We need it down the hall.

Go ahead, Chief. We’re not finding much, and we’re going out for more air anyway.

We help him back the line out of the room, and then we continue down to the street. For August, it suddenly seems cold outside. We help each other change out our air cylinders and head back in.

Back in the room, we continue overhaul. A check of the closet reveals clothes hangers with only a few inches of charred black fabric left on them. I try to open a drawer on the dresser, and the front of the drawer comes off in my hand. It still feels awfully hot in the room, so I take off one glove and feel the wall against the original fire building.

Mike, this one’s definitely hot.

Okay, Al. Open ’er up.

I hit the wall separating the two homes with the ax, and the wall shatters. Plaster and lath again. It surprises me that there is no fire wall. I look into the hole and see a lot of orange.

The adjacent building has been cleared of personnel because the fire damage weakened the floors and walls to the point of being a collapse hazard. I look into the neighboring second floor bedroom, and it is full of fire.

Hey, Mike. Lots of orange. Lots of fire.

Yup.

I’m closest to the door, so I holler down the hall to the chief. Hey, Chief, can you come in here? He enters and looks through the hole. I say, I think we’ll be needing that handline back.

He agrees and turns to walk out of the room. Suddenly, something doesn’t look right, even through the smoke and a fogged-over SCBA face mask with debris all over it. The chief is now only two feet tall. In a second, it registers that he’s fallen through the floor up to his armpits. At the same time, he starts shouting, I’m stuck! I’m stuck! We pull him out and then go get our line back.

Mike takes the knob as I open the wall. The room is lit up until the water hits the flames. Mike varies the stream pattern to complete the knockdown. It’s hot. It’s damp. It’s dark again.

When I make the hole in the wall bigger, we look through to the next room. It, too, is starting to flare up. Mike hits it with the stream and adds a little hydraulic overhaul.

Our air is low, and our SCBA bells begin to ring again. We tell the chief the back rooms are secure, and we head outside for air and a break.

It’s daybreak outside but overcast. We look like hell. Covered with black grit, ash, and plaster debris, we are wetter inside our gear than outside. The bunker coat and pants designed to keep the heat of the fire out also keeps the heat of exertion in, and we were working hard.

We can now see the full effect of the fire. One home is destroyed, another one is gutted, and all of the siding has melted off the houses across the street. Two alarms plus special requests.

It was a big one.

Noise

Firefighting is a very noisy business.

Every respectable volunteer firefighter has a scanner turned on while at home. If your station is dispatched, an irritating tone emanates from your pager, which launches you toward the door. If you happen to be asleep when the pager activates, it’s a very rude awakening.

At the station, constant talk is broadcast from the radios and scanners. When a call for our station is dispatched, an obnoxious klaxon sounds, propelling the members toward their bunker gear.

Responding is the noisiest facet of the fire service by far. The big diesel power plant driving tons of fire engine is loud enough by itself to limit or eliminate conversation. Most of our rigs have two sirens. One is an electronic siren, a hundred watts of wail, yelp, or hi-lo tones blasted through a speaker. The other is the ultimate noisemaker. The Federal Q is housed in a large chrome-plated assembly and mounted on the front bumper. Think of it as