The Firefighter Academy--Day 2

Today was the first full day of the academy. 8:00am to 5:00pm or as we say this in the fire service, 0800 hours to 1700 hours. Whatever notation you want to use, it was a long day. By the end of the drills, I was cramping up in my hands and arms, as well as my calves. Oddly, the amount of energy put into just trying to get those infernal gloves on, especially when they were wet with sweat, was the toughest part of the drills. Yet, I get ahead of myself.

Yesterday, we began learning about how to put our "turn-outs" on and how to set them up so that they can go on quickly with the least amount of movements. Today, we built on that base by adding the SCBA unit. Before I get too far down the description here, let me describe these two pieces of equipment. "Turn-outs" are the outfit that is worn by a firefighter for going to structure fires and things like auto accidents. This outfit includes steel-toes and steel-shanked boots, heavy quilted pants with substantial suspenders, a heavy quilted coat similar to what you see on those police attack dogs shows, a Nomex hood, helmet and heavy gloves. The SCBA or Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus is an air tank on a back-pack frame and a mask that the air regulator fits onto to connect the air to the mask. These two pieces of equipment weigh about 50-60 pounds combined.

The process of donning this equipment goes something like this. You'd think after as many times we donned (put on) and doffed (took off) this stuff, that I could tell you exactly how to do it. That may be the case at the end of three weeks, but for now we're just going to go with "something like this." As I'm kicking off my shoes, I'm putting on the Nomex hood. Moving as efficiently as I can, I'm stepping into my boots. The pants are already pre-loaded over the boots. As soon as I get into my boots, I'm pulling up my pants, which are large enough to fit over my jeans without any issue. The suspenders hold up the pants until I can get them buckled with the big plastic buckle. My jacket is laid out to be easily thrown on. I'm still struggling to get the zipper zipped up without getting caught in the velcro flap, flashlight, neck cuff, etc. This cost me time in the donning process. Once the jacket is on and zipped with the neck cuff velcro'd with the sad, worn-out velcro, I roll down the Nomex hood off my head and over the collar of the jacket. This is the basic "turn-out" donning.

Next is getting the air pack or SCBA on and working. First, check to make sure that there is air in the tank. Makes sense. Then, turn the valve to make air available to the regulator. This causes all kinds of lights and sounds to go off. The regulator vibrates loudly. The secondary gauge should show the same pressure as on the tank. The lights on the heads-up display light up. The PASS--Personal Accountability Safety System??--beeps a couple of times. Once all that is checked, I can swing the pack onto my back and tighten the shoulder straps and waist strap. That done, I have to keep moving to keep the PASS thingy from making all kinds of racket and pissing everyone else off. Moving directly to the mask, I put it over my face and hold it there while tightening five separate straps to hold the thing to my face. Remember the Nomex hood? I now roll it back over my head and make sure that it's fitted around the mask. Now, my helmet and making sure to cinch down the strap. Finally, the regulator. Red up and rotate left one quarter turn. I'm now breathing from the air in the tank.

Now comes the most difficult part of the whole assembly--those infernal gloves. I have to pull so hard on these damn things that my forearms ached by the end of the day.

By the end of the academy, I will be able to do this whole process in under two minutes.

Interspersed in this donning and doffing routine was getting a feel for how breathing on bottled air works and what happens when you begin to run out of air and then what it feels like when there is no more air. Because this is a team activity, there are parts of the SCBA that facilitate getting really close to your team. In one exercise, we were all running out of air and linked together through our buddy-breathing dongles--all of us breathing on the last remaining good bottle of air. Then, it too ran out.

Towards the end of the day, we got into knot-tying and rescue drag techniques. That was a great way to end the day.

Before they let us go, I was called up to the front of the class and awarded the "Screwed on Right" award for trying hard all day and helping other members of the team. This twisted wrench below is my award for the night. I get to return it tomorrow so that someone else may have the honor.