Duped

I was making plans on going to Colfax for training tonight, but I heard about HazMat training. I did not know what it was, but I decided that I would go when I told Erik on the phone that he would see me there.

I was responding down to the station through out the day for day time calls. Of course no one else was showing up. Finally around two in the afternoon a call for a structure fire goes out. I knew people would show up. I was right. We went en route and about half way there we heard the fire was out. I debated on downgrading our response. I guess I should have been more decisive and done it.

Heston heard us coming and asked us to downgrade. Then on scene he asked me if I had heard the fire was out. I said “yes.” He asked how come we did not downgrade. I said I thought IC would have us downgrade if that is what they wanted. He said many times IC will forget about that stuff and we need to listen in and downgrade when it sounds like we should.

That sort of put a black cloud on the call. I am a brand new crew leader and as small of an issue that is, I still hate making mistakes public like that. I can also say that I am happy I have the crew that I have. I think overall they are the best guys around. They want to do this job. They try hard. I saw some of the other side, and right now knowing what I did, I cannot say I am perfect, but some of the real elementary things my crew does right, even the new guys, some of the guys who have been around longer are not doing right.

I showed up to station one for training at six. I found out we were taking the rigs out to Andrew’s hanger and moving stuff from one rig to another getting some of the stuff in service. I spent a lot of the time out there removing old decals from the ambulance because it is not an ambulance anymore. That was some crappy work.