Firefighting

[breakingtime91]

So, a lot of you know I am a teacher. I love it but the current political climate, quarantining, and stress has made this career a completely different beast for me. I come from a long line of fire fighters, including both of my grandfathers being Chiefs. I just emailed the recruiter today.. any info or good luck wishes are welcome. This is a big move for me because I am 30, just bought a house, and have four kids to support. I am good with money so that isn't a huge deal but a huge weight has just been lifted off my chest.

[45dotACP]

Best of luck to you!

(in before all the police officers start busting your balls)

;)

[rd62]

Good luck!

[blues]

Do it! I know you'll do it well.

[JCS]

I’m in the fire service. I’m happy to help. You can hit me up via PM or I have no problem putting it out in public. I’ve sat on interview boards and I think that’s where people get tripped up the most. It’s not like interviewing for a Fortune 500 or probably even teacher. Having family in the service helps to know the culture.

[Lon]

If you’re AO is like mine, fire is hurting for quality people just like the po-po. Squared away people in good shape with a good work ethic and don’t have a shady background shouldn’t have any issues. Unless they require you to have a certain level of training to get hired. Our FD has had to start looking at people with zero training because they can’t find quality people who actually have training. It’s crazy. Use to be hundreds of people competing for jobs. Now it’s dozens of agencies trying to poach good candidates from each other.

Good luck. And even though I’m a cop I won’t bust yours balls. I did both for 5 or 6 years. Volunteer fire and full time cop. It’s a good gig, so long as you know what you’re getting into. Most places aren’t like Backdraft. Fires around here are few and far between. Most of our FD runs are medic runs.

[BehindBlueI's]

Best of luck to you!

(in before all the police officers start busting your balls)

;)

For what? Being smarter than us? If he wants to get together with a bunch of other men and tug hoses together, who are we to stand in the way of his dreams? Filthy as they may be...

Best of luck!

[HCM]

So, a lot of you know I am a teacher. I love it but the current political climate, quarantining, and stress has made this career a completely different beast for me. I come from a long line of fire fighters, including both of my grandfathers being Chiefs. I just emailed the recruiter today.. any info or good luck wishes are welcome. This is a big move for me because I am 30, just bought a house, and have four kids to support. I am good with money so that isn't a huge deal but a huge weight has just been lifted off my chest.

All fireman need a side gig. It's a law or something.

So, what's it going to be: auto mechanic, roofer, electrician, plumber, carpentry ? 30 is old for a moving business. maybe a sandwich shop ?

Maybe tutoring ?

Seriously good luck.

It's kind of a shame about politics being a factor as teachers who are actual male role models are both necessary and increasingly rare but I certainly understand.

One of the best things about catholic high school was an high percentage of "2nd career" teachers who were retired cops and firefighters, many of whom were also vets.

The pipeline was: Graduate HS, Military, come home and get on the PD/FD at 22/23/24 - Night school - retire at 42/43/44 - teach and get summers off while the pension check made the teacher's salary viable.

[UncleGabby]

I got hired at 36 (had volunteered for 6 years before that) and it has been the best seven years of my life since then. People occasionally come up to us while we’re out shopping, or whatever, and want to thank us for what we do. It’s embarrassing, and I want to say (and sometimes do) “I can’t believe you people pay us to do this. If you knew how much we loved this job, you wouldn’t.”

My department only runs EMS calls as first responders, no ambulances for us, thank god. I did paid EMS for two and a half years and that is a grind. Actual fires are few and far between. Much more common, and dangerous, is moving the morbidly obese. You will see and smell some disgusting things. Hopefully you have a strong stomach and a sick sense of humor. If you need anything, feel free to PM me.

[CSW]

I was a firefighter for 28 years in northern NJ.
Started in '88, twelve years as a line officer, 8 years as Chief. Did another 5 down there as a driver/ex-chief.
We were able to complete many 'upgrades' to the department and the town. It was very rewarding.

Moved up here and was Assistant Chief for 3 years in a very rural department before I retired from the whole thing.

Good luck with your endeavor, and as others have stated, if I can help in any way...




Stay safe.

[MGW]

Being a firefighter and substitute teaching on days off would be a good gig. Not sure what it’s like where you’re at but subs around here make about $120 or so a day. Not bad for about 6 hours work.

[BehindBlueI's]

Much more common, and dangerous, is moving the morbidly obese. You will see and smell some disgusting things.

When my son was little I taught him that a fire truck with its lights/sirens on meant a fat woman had fallen out of bed. It's still a running joke with us today.

[Le Français]

Possibly of interest, especially since breakingtime91 is in the West: The infrastructure bill that's making its way through Congress includes several provisions aimed at making the pay and conditions better for the federal firefighting workforce. Full-time federal firefighters also qualify for the enhanced LEO/firefighter/air traffic controller retirement (12d), which is a lot better than the normal federal retirement system (in terms of money and how long you have to work), although not as good as some state and local retirements.

Where I was on a local PD, the police (when not tied up) were dispatched to every FD & EMS call, just in case they could help. Some of the most common calls our firefighters had were people falling and needing help getting up (as noted upthread), vehicle crashes, odor investigations, and fire alarms. Actual fires were infrequent and invariably involved a mutual aid response from a handful of other departments.

A fire department that pays well (that may be the catch) has always seemed to me like a pretty good option for work/life balance, camaraderie, physical activity, and some excitement/action.

[Crazy Dane]

I have been in the fire service since 93 and on my current job for 17 years. I hope to retire in 10 more years when I hit 60 YOA. Me and my guys have helped a few candidates prep for the interview, ask me anything.

[TQP]

If your area is anything like mine, you shouldn't have any trouble getting hired. We're hurting for candidates here.

I don't have much to add to what the others have already said.

Anything I can do to help, let me know.

[Borderland]

I was trained as a fire fighter and crash rescue in the Navy. Not for everyone because some days aren't going to be like a bad day at the office. It will be worse than that, a lot worse. Not trying to deter you however because some people would rather do the difficult physical jobs and take their chances.

For me an office job would have killed me so I found something I could make a living with working outside. A friend of mine who I went through training with stayed with it. He became the fire chief for Boeing at their Everett plant. He did pretty well with being a fire fighter.

Best of luck.

[NEPAKevin]

Much more common, and dangerous, is moving the morbidly obese.


We once got called to send a rollback to assist the coroner moving a body that was, IIRC, over six hundred pounds. They had to remove part of a wall from the house to get him out. I believe the PC term they use is "lifting assistance."

[CSW]

We had a 5 - 600 lb man die in his home.
He was so big that he was not going to fit thru the door.
Ended up taking out the picture window and using the aerial to lift him out of the house.

[t1tan]

Do it if you can depending on how it works where you are located. I worked for 3 small departments over 4 years in IL and suddenly had to stop working in 2014, relocated to FL in 2019 and now attending an academy to start working again. FL wouldn’t accept my IL certs telling me because my department academy wasn’t an “accredited school”, so it massively sucks having to do it again at 35 but I think it’s worth it in the end.

[Andy in NH]

So, a lot of you know I am a teacher. I love it but the current political climate, quarantining, and stress has made this career a completely different beast for me. I come from a long line of fire fighters, including both of my grandfathers being Chiefs. I just emailed the recruiter today.. any info or good luck wishes are welcome. This is a big move for me because I am 30, just bought a house, and have four kids to support. I am good with money so that isn't a huge deal but a huge weight has just been lifted off my chest.

Do it!
Two of the guys from my on-call FD went full-time recently.
They are both in their early/mid '30s.
One needed a career change and the other hadn't quite settled down in what he wanted to do.
There is definitely a need;
- those two guys just got off probation and are scoring tons of OT; the dept. is still five guys short!
- another one of my buddies is a Lt. in NH's second largest FD; they just hired 14 guys and expect to do the same thing in the spring.
- a dept in SE NH is expecting to open a new station and that means 20 more guys to hire!

I passed CPAT at 48 years old (as a gut check) so you've still got plenty of youth in 'ya!