It’s
hard to believe that this time last year we were in a heatwave,
looking out there at a damp and dull morning in South Devon, but,
this time last year was stunning, and true to it’s nickname, it was
a ‘flaming June’ in more ways than one.
June
brought with it my first ‘double shout day.’ I’ve had many
since, but both of these were long and trying.
The
first was an Incident Command Unit (ICU) shout to a large
garage/workshop fire in Torquay.
Totnes is an ICU Station, so we get
to go out a lot further than our boundaries more because of this. CM
Hodge was in charge of the ICU, and I was under the watchful eye of
‘Rabbit’ inside the unit, learning on the job how to write the
decision log and also communicate radio messages to control.
Totnes
prides itself on how well we operate the unit, and I could see why,
everything ran smoothly,both inside and outside, and even though I
wasn’t there fighting fires, the job we do with the ICU is so
important, and Rabbit was a good teacher.
CM
Hodge gave me an extremely long radio message to send to control, and
I was congratulated after sending it without a hitch. The support
from your team mates in the fire service is unlike any I’ve ever
had whilst working, encouragement and praise are always there, the
same also goes when you mess up, but that’s essential for
self-improvement, so you don’t make those mistakes again!
We
were out for around six hours in total, which basically meant that I
had absolutely no sleep that night, and a matter of hours later, the
beeper went again.
This
was by far, the hottest day of the year, it’s not the kind of day
you want to be outside in full sun in full fire PPE, but there you
go, you make our choices!
I cycled down to the station and off we
went to a property out in the countryside that had an extremely out
of hand bonfire! Now, what else would you do on the hottest day of
the year, but have a bonfire, right? Wrong! I guess that’s why we
do what we do, because not everyone makes the right decisions at the
right times.
I
was with Harvey, we are both at a similar stage in development, so
there were a couple of firsts for us, using beaters to help control
fire spread, and using work restraint equipment, due to the nature of
the landscape.
We
had Simon (Harvey’s mentor) and Raif with us, who shared their
knowledge and experience. Every day, every shout we learn
more.
A
lot of water was drunk that afternoon, and I slept like a baby that
night, but there was more to come, the summer of 2018 was a busy one!
