Goodbye Coach Akey

I am saddened by the news that Coach Akey is leaving WSU for the Idaho Vandals. I hope nothing but the best for him and hope that someday he will come back as the Washington State Head coach.

We had the Colfax Fire Christmas party tonight. I went down to that. I bought one raffle ticket and ended up winning the main prize which was a quilt that Angela made. It is pretty neat and I was hoping to win that. People were giving me a hard time that I had only bought one ticket, then when I won they could not believe it.

We are still without power at work so I have been unable to get any work done. I hope that I can kick some butt on bugs when the power does come back on, I feel like I am getting way behind.

I went to the fire station in Pullman earlier in the day for fire training. We were doing stuff on setting up staging and rehab.

Chirstmas Shopping for Toys

I went down to Lewiston with Colfax Fire to buy toys for our toy give away each year. We went to Shopko and spent a couple hours there buying thousands of dollars worth of toys.

Just before we went to Lewiston Colfax got an echo call for CPR in progress. It turned out the person died and I knew I would be getting a call from Pete. Sure enough I got a call, but I was already en route to Lewiston.

After shopping we went to Old Country Buffett for dinner. I had more than I should have. After getting back I did not stay up too later because I had to get up at seven in the morning for ICS training at the fire station.

Final B&B of the year

Tonight was the final Board and Business meeting in Colfax. I made my way down there around six o’clock this evening. After the meeting was done I went to the SO and printed off my reports and photos from my two cases this weekend.

While I was waiting for the photos I walked two miles and watched House. Not much of a day to report on.

Short Work Day

My plan was to go into the office in the morning and work on some stuff with the people there before I headed to Pullman. I was going to take half a day off but my boss said not to worry about it. So I did not turn in a time off slip.

I left around one in the afternoon and got over to Colfax for fire training. I was there early so I hung out and talked with the guys until training started. It was OTEP training. We were doing extrication and immobilizing.

Following the training I went to Whitcom and got the recordings from the car accident. I was able to listen to them and get an idea about how I did on the car accident. After listening to it I thought I did okay. There were some stuff I could have done better when I first got on scene and I should have verbalized more stuff but over all for my first real big scene I thought I did well.

The Office is Gone

After years of renting office space on Nye Street in Pullman, I have closed the office and turned in the key. I will take the money I was spending on the office and put it towards my new house payments. I also will cancel my phone and DSL service. It is cheaper for me to use cable and it will work out okay, as far as I can tell at this point.

I got my cable installed today. Because of the savings of not having the telephone bill, and the offer that cable has at this point, it is going to be the same price to have cable TV and internet service. So I will have both for six months. Who knows I may keep cable TV, with just the basic channels, but then again, I am so unproductive when I have TV calling my name. I will decide soon. It probably was a bad idea to get TV.

I would like to hook up a computer to the cable system so I can record shows and watch them when the time is good for me rather than being locked down to watching the show when it comes on the air.

I went to my OTEP training tonight, but then I got a call about a CISD about the car accident from the other night, so I opted to go to that instead. That went about four hours. I got home as it was snowing and ugly. I only have three hours until I have to get up again.

Incident Commander

When I woke up this morning, if you had told me what I would have been doing today I would not have believed it. I started out as expected. John came over and helped me load up all my trash from the boxes that I have been going through the last few nights. I have been getting rid of a lot of things that I don’t need, but I have held onto over the years. Anyway, John and I went to the dump and threw everything away. Then we went to my office and he helped me get a couple more items from there and dropped them off at the house.

We went inside and just hung out for a while we were talking about Pullman fire and the divide between the reserves and career guys. We talked about the union and their position on things as well as how Moscow Ambulance covers Pullman when there are no career guys left to cover the city. I told John that I thought it is strange the union would argue that a reserve cannot run the ambulance but at the same time allow a volunteer from a different state cover the city. John argued that the volunteers have experience running the ambulance but the reserves don’t. That I would be one of the only reserves who would be able to do what is necessary to run the ambulance and only because of my experience from Colfax. John said he felt I was experienced.

After John left I headed to Colfax to work on my coroner’s report and printing the photos from the case I had on Thanksgiving night. I was in the Coroner’s Office printing the photos and typing up the report for about an hour and a half. I got everything completed and was starting to gather up all the case files for this case and organize it when Pete showed up. I went through the photos with him and he agreed with me about my findings. I took off and went to Rosauers to get some pop and my plan was to go to Colfax Fire and hang out for a few hours because I wanted to relax from all the moving stuff I have been doing over the last two weeks.

Jim was working and we just were talking about the weather, with the snow coming, plus the case I had on Thanksgiving, as he was a responder to that case. It had been a little over an hour when a call came in for a roll-over accident. I was shotgun with Carl driving. We got on scene and pretty much were cancelled by Squad Eleven-Thirty-Five who was first on scene. We went back to the station.

Carl left, David, Craig, and I hung out with Jim. We were there for about twenty minutes or more. We were watching some TV and talking about the call. Plus we were listening in to WSP and Colfax PD going to slide off after slide off in the S-Curves outside of Colfax. The snow was not falling too much, but it was cold and things were getting slick. Then Craig mentioned that we should get some food before we get too busy. I said that if you eat, go to the bathroom and are totally ready for the call they will not happen.

I said that as I sat on the couch thinking about how bad I needed to go to the bathroom. But no sooner than that we hear tones. A two car injury accident the S-Curves south of Colfax. David jumped in the drivers seat, I took shotgun and Craig got in the back. I was going to wait for Carl to show up, but then I hear someone was unconscious so we hit the road.

As we were en route I thought about the number of patients and what we would see. I told Whitcom to make sure Rescue Eleven was going to be responding, so they toned out Rescue Eleven. When we were getting closer we were told it was near Huber. We could see the car accident as we rounded the last corner. I had been thinking about my size up and what to do when we got close to the scene. Dispatch advised us that we had something and one code black. I cannot even remember what the “something” was because when the words code black were thrown at me I did not have time to think about it more than someone died. I had to get on the air and give a size up. I could see a big suburban and a small car. I Suburban had eating the small car. I could see the deceased in the front seat of the small car. I saw people gathered around the backseat of the small car. I saw someone in the front seat of the Suburban. I gave my size up, but I lost my train of thought with all the things I was thinking about at once. I cannot even remember my whole size up. I had a nearly impossible time saying who I was and what I was naming command.

I went to the car at first and tried to open the door of the back seat. It was jammed. I wanted to make sure it was unlocked. David could not get to it from the front because of the deceased. The EMT who happened on the scene was not able to get the door unlocked. We needed extrication.

The small car was handled by the people there so I went to the suburban and started to talk to the people there. Seeing they were not really badly injured I knew they were green. I went back to the small car briefly. In that time the people had moved around in the Suburban. I went to the passenger side where the driver was now sitting. I spoke with him briefly. I told him that someone would be coming to do patient care. Ambulance Eleven-Two was coming on scene. I took Milt with me to a truck where the others from the Suburban were sitting. I had the others go to the guy in the Suburban.

With my nerves jumping and the cold weather I has shivering really badly. My teeth were chattering and I was trying to see what was wrong with the patient, if anything. I talked to them and they seemed okay for the most part. I went back to the Suburban. The guy agreed to go to the hospital, but he did not want to go by ambulance. The driver of the Suburban agreed to go to the hospital. When I was explaining that to the driver of the Suburban, Jenny, who was holding C-Spine was shaking her head “no” because of the mechanism of injury she felt they had to go by ambulance. I went back towards the truck. During this part I was not really thinking I was command even though I initiated command. Then Milt sort of inadvertently got me into command-mode. He started to ask me about what resources we had and what I should call for. I knew that if all the patients were to be transported we would have two red, and three green. Which would mean four ambulances. One red would have a prolonged extrication and the green were ready to go if we could convince them to go.

While I was thinking about resources I knew I needed another ambulance. I asked Whitcom in Albion Ambulance was en route. They told me it was. One red was already en route to the hospital. I soon got word Whitman Community was putting us on divert. So all additional patients needed to go to Pullman. I contacted the people with the car and tried to find out about the patient who was still in the car. I was told the patient appeared to be in bad shape. I knew we needed MedStar but I was not sure if it could fly. I contacted Whitcom and asked them MedStar’s status. I was told they could fly. I said to launch them and have them go to Whitman Community hospital for the LZ. I told Albion Ambulance when they arrived where to park. We got two patients with Albion and one in Ambulance Eleven-Two. Now I only had one patient. I also had Paul-Sixty-Five put on alert. About two minutes later I got a call from Whitcom. I saw the number and knew what they were doing. I answered the phone and they were putting me on stand by. I informed them I was IC and that they needed to put Patti on stand by.

Rescue Eleven’s crew and some of the others who were on scene were working on getting the Suburban lifted and the patient extricated. I got called on the radio by Scott to see if we needed him up at the scene. I told him we needed ILS and had him come. He came POV. He started an IV and did patient care. We were trying to find out where MedStar was and they were getting close, but extrication was taking a long time. The Suburban had T-boned the car at a slight angle. The drivers wheel was on top of the patient in the back seat. It was ge
tting dark and we were still working on everything. I was not cold anymore. I was quite comfortable in an odd way because it was cold outside, but I still needed to go to the bathroom really bad.

Ambulance Eleven-One was back and Ambulance Eleven-Three out of Steptoe had been called to assist on another accident that happened. It turned out to be non-injury so they asked if we needed them at the scene. We had all the people we needed and had no ambulance in the city. I told them to go to Colfax Fire and stand by for additional calls.

We had the Suburban cribbed and using airbags to get it lifted high enough, but we were starting to run out of cribbing. Carl asked me if we could remove the deceased. That is not something that is done unless there is a good reason. I asked if it was necessary for the rescue operation. He said it was. I told him the living that priority. So I said that we could remove the deceased. I took a bunch of photos for the coroner as the deceased was removed. All of a sudden a loud noise happened and I saw the Suburban break some cibbing and the airbags came out and the Suburban fall back into its original position. We called for a tow truck to help. When it got on scene we had it lift the Suburban.

MedStar then wanted to know if we were nearly ready for them because they wanted to transport the first red patient. I contact the people doing the extrication and they said they were close. I was then told they wanted to know in minutes how long. I asked Scott and he said if they need to leave send a second bird. I told that to Whitcom. Within about seven or eight minutes the second patient was free and I told Whitcom we were transporting the patient to hold the bird if it had not left.

We were finally in clean up mode. We were done. Chief Krause pulled me aside for a moment. He said that he did not take command from me because he thought I was doing a good job. He let me know I had done a good job. I had been asked by State Patrol how long the coroner would take. I said she was coming from Garfield. They asked if we could have the coroner coming. That was a while back and I had the coroner en route. She arrived just after we got the last patient free. I told her what happened and she started her investigation. We cleared the scene and I terminated command. It had been nearly an hour and a half since the incident started that we had the final patient freed.

I went to Colfax fire and took the camera to the coroners office to download the photos for Patti. I went back to Colfax fire and spoke with the people there for a few minutes. Scott said that I had done a good job. Then I went to the funeral home to work with Patti there. The deceased had massive injuries. Following the time at the funeral home Patti and I went to the coroners office to print photos and she wrote her report.

I finally left the coroners office around nine-thirty at night. I took a body bag to the ambulance to replace the one we had used from there. Then I went to Pullman. But as I got to Colfax Body I saw the cars and state patrol there. I stopped in and spoke to the trooper. I got a copy of the drivers license and looked at the car some more. It was amazing, a miracle that the patient in the back passenger side even lived.

I went to Pullman and then to Whitcom. I showed Jamie the photos from the wreck. We talked about it and how the whole scene went. I spoke to the other dispatchers who were also there for part of the wreck. I stayed at Whitcom for a couple hours unwinding and talking with them about various calls and learning more about how they dispatch things.

That was my first time being command through out a major incident. Normally I can stay command on Pullman calls if it turns out to be a small call, like a fire alarm. Many times I initiate command but it is taken from me as soon as someone else arrives. I have been thinking about all the things I did not do that I probably should have done. Nothing affected the outcome that I did “wrong”. It wasn’t necessarily bad, it would have been better form if I had done certain things. When Scott got there I should have put him incharge of a patient care group. And I should have put Carl or Krause in charge of the extrication group. That is pretty much what had happened anyway, but I did not verbalize those things. I just wish I had verbalized them. I should have had someone on safety detail as well. I was doing that job myself. I made sure that I mitigated the things that I saw that needed to be done for safety. It was a great experience. I had five patients, two car, extrication, cops, the coroner, and multiple agencies and rigs that I was dealing with. Everything happened that needed to happen and things went pretty smooth considering what we were working with.

Actually doing some moving

This is day two and I hoped to get some moving done. I went to my house and got my boat out of the garage. I then unloaded my truck cab as Brian from Hillards worked on my heater. I am thinking about upgrading to a programmable thermostat. That will be about eighty bucks.

I went to the office and started to clean out some of the thing and shred stuff. I also started to pack things for a while. But around five I decided to head to Colfax for fire training and hope for a call while I was there. It was board and business tonight. We had nearly a two hour meeting.

I went to the SO and watched House before heading back to Pullman. I got a full load into my truck of many of the boxes and things that had not been unpacked since moving to the apartment. I had four laundry baskets full of clothes as well as a huge duffel bag. I sorted the items. I have a huge pile of stuff I was getting rid of because it was either way to used or too small. I also set aside nice stuff to donate. Finally of the stuff I was keeping I sorted it so I could wash it. Some of the things were covered in cat hair.

I ended my night by putting the washing machine through an empty load to get everyone cleaned before I start to use it.

Quiet On Call Day

With all the car accidents killing people it was nice to have a quiet day being on call for the coroner. With my upcoming move I started to think about what items I needed to get moved and making plans for the actual move.

The Rodeo

The highschool rodeo was being held at the fairgrounds in Colfax. I went with Colfax Ambulance to stand by out there in case someone got hurt. It was pretty uneventful over all. No real injuries. I wish there had been more of the bronco and bull riding and a lot less of the barrels and poles. Those seemed to drag on and on and on. But over all I had a good time out there.

I left from there to go straight to Pullman for rig checks. I got some dinner on the way and then to the station. Brian was already there. We took Engine Thirty-One up to the tower and gave him some time on the pump. I went over the relief value with him and explained how it worked. We sprayed water for a while, but he has pumped before so a lot of this is not new to him. We were there until nearly seven o’clock. We got back to the station and worked on rig checks and going on calls in the middle of the rig checks.

It was turning out to be quiet most of the night, then we got the three in the morning and five-thirty-in the morning calls. That sucked.

OTEP

Today’s OTEP training was about doing trauma assessments. It was a good training and it was pretty short overall. We also got the new fire engine in at Colfax. I spent some time looking around the rig. It was a nice rig! It will replace the first out city engine.

Colfax Computer Fixing

I went to fire training in Colfax today to do training. Today it was testing hydrants. I got pulled off of that and went to work on getting the computer in Scott’s office to work with the new printer. They have been having issues with it since putting on the new printer.

I spent the next couple hours dealing with the old and slow computer. I was able to get some stuff fixed on it, but the computer has some spyware issues that even SpyBot cannot fix. Scott said he is going to order some RAM and then we are going to reformat the computer.

After that was done I went to the Coroner’s office and got the new CD of photos to Pete and turned in an invoice for my work.

I went into the jail for a couple hours and talked with Dale and Perry about everything and anything under the sun, but mostly we were telling war stories.

Tender Man Again

I told Ralph that I could take the Tender out to the fire again today. I planned on being down at Colfax around eight in the morning to take it out. I was going out with a new Colfax guy. We got on scene and pulled a couple one-inch lines form the Tender. We spend over an hour spraying the water on hot spots as Gelespie was stirring around the grain and we would cool it with the water. When the truck ran out of water we went back to the station and filled it up and headed back to the scene. We were there for what seemed like a shorter period of time. Once that one was empty I had to call it a day because I had to get to Pullman.

I putted around at the office. I called my insurance company about getting the prescription for the medicine that the doctor had prescribed for me last week when I saw him. They said they still needed to hear from the doctor. I called them and had them contact the insurance company. I had an appointment to help Jay with his wireless Internet at his house. I got his wireless working and made him very happy about it.

I went to Rite Aid to see if I could get my pills. Sure enough it worked and I was able to get my prescription for Provigil filled.

I went back to the office and called Russell. We talked on the phone for about thirty minutes when he suggested I sleep a little because of how tired I was. I told him it was only six in the afternoon, too early to sleep. But I was on my big comfy chair and I reclined back. Within no time I was asleep. I slept until around ten o’clock. I got up and started to play on the Internet until almost one-thirty in the morning. I finally went to my apartment to go to sleep.

Driving the Tender

This morning while getting ready for work I heard the pager go off looking for someone from Albion, Diamond, Steptoe, or Colfax that could drive a rig to the grain bin that burnt in the fire last month. I called and asked if I could help. I asked what rig I would be driving. I was told Eleven-Zero-Three. With is the big twenty-seven hundred gallon water tender. I have not driven that one before. Ralph asked if I have had EVAP. I told him I had. I also said I have driven some larger rigs as well, just not that one.

I went to the station. He gave me a quick tour and I went to work. I drove out to the grain bin. They were using a backhoe to stir up the grain and get it cooled to the point where it could be transported away. We got to work spraying water and the grain was moved. When the railroad track, that had been covered by about one foot of grain over the last few weeks, was exposed it was so hot that when putting water on it, it would boil off and dry immediately. I reapplied water for a little bit until it did not do that anymore. That was a good indication of what we would find through out the rest of the morning.

I was talking to the guy running the backhoe and he had mentioned that he was a volunteer in Pullman for twenty something years. I ask him his name and he told me it was Jim Gelespie. I have heard of him. I told him I work there as well.

After that tank of water was done we took the rig back to the station and filled it up. I had to get going after that so I zoomed back to Pullman. I had some new bugs assigned to me and I wanted to work on some of them. I got underway with one that was opened to undo something we did in this current release. Then I lost a lot of steam to get going on the bug. I actually did a build on my box and got the new Capella build going.

I went home and got into my Pullman fire uniform and make my way to the station around four in the afternoon. I started to read my ICS stuff that I missed due to the calls on Monday. I also had some dinner and shined my boots.

My crew arrived a little before six. We got loaded in the rigs, did some quick rig checks and went to station one for training. Just like last week we got sent out on a call. It was a pretty short one. While at the hospital I was going to put both rigs in service. While I was talking on the radio John came up behind me and grabbed me. It made me jump and mess up while I was talking on the radio. Everyone got a huge laugh out of that.

The second day of ICS class was fun. At least the scenarios were more fun. My eye was really starting to hurt. It was causing me enough discomfort I was not able to get back into class from a break at one point. So when I did get back in Chris saw me and gave me some Visine and an egg to roll around the eye to help it feel better. Within about fifteen minutes I was able to get back into class and finish it from there.

When we went back to the Deuce following the class we washed Rescue because it got dirty in the rain. But then I remember the air bottles that needed to be filled. We went to station one, again, and started to fill there. We have ten bottles below four-thousand PSI. Some of them were below three-thousand PSI.

Big Huge Fire

After nearly ten days without Internet access in my office I was ready to take whomever could get to me first and install something that worked. I worked the phones trying to get people who would listen to me and help me out. After having picked up my modem from UPS and installing it, the same thing was happening. But NU was worried about LP and I had to get to work on it, so I went to Taco Time for lunch and to sit there using the computer. I got a couple things done before I got a call from First Step Internet. I went back to my office and tried a couple things to no avail.

After sitting around for about two and a half hours I got work Verizon found the problem on their end, after days ago saying it was all good on their end. They would have it fixed in the morning. I said that was unacceptable. But the guy at FSR said it is normally a week turn around, so the fact I am getting it over night is pretty good. I was not impressed with all the other errors from Verizon. Later on I pulled in my DSL modem only to see it start to work. I got in more than a hundred e-mail messages and started to work on things that I had not gotten to get to.

I got into work on the LP stuff right away. But as I was working I heard Colfax out running a fire call. It was a grass fire that was getting away from them. They started to calling for other departments to come. As it turned out members and rig from every fire district in Whitman County showed up. But I was stuck getting my work done. I worked hard on it for a couple hours then when I finished I checked it in and took off for Colfax. I had called Jenny to see if people were still needed and she said yes.

When I got to Colfax there were a lot of people there. I went to the bay and got my wildland gear. I did not have pants yet so I figured I would wear my bunker bottoms. Even if I had pants I did not have boots. When I took my bunker bottoms off the rack I saw a set of bottoms for wildland. I tried them on and they fit. Then I saw a pair of boots over my stuff. I tried them on. They fit, but the metal toe was really tight and caused painful pressure points. I decided against my better judgment to wear them anyway.

Within minutes of getting my stuff on we were out the door. It was Matt, Zach, and I with Steve from the City driving us. We were heading into the fire ground. I was in awe. I have seen footage like that on the news before, but to see it in person was amazing. The hillside had one line zigzagging line of fire. Smoke was thick and there were spots of fires all over the place. It was dark outside and I could not see how bad the damage was, but I could see the fire. It was all around. It was making the area glow. It was almost over whelming. I have never been in a place like that. It was dark, I was surrounded by fire and it was so pretty. But I had no idea what I was going to have to do. I had my webgear and my fire shelter. I surely hoped I would not need to use that.

We went to the Chicken Ranch Road on the South Palouse River Road. We got out. My old coworker from IS, Dan was there with Rosalia fire. We chatting briefly. Steve did not take off right away because he did not want to leave us until we were assigned somewhere. We had only one radio channel being used and it was full. There was not time to talk. It was constant chatter. We tried several times to get out on the radio. But we were not able to reach command. Shortly thereafter my night started. A lady in a Suburban came by. At first I was annoyed because the road was filled with people driving around looking at the fire and it was hard for the fire apparatus to move around. I saw one grey truck was off the side of the road.

Anyway the lady rolled down her window and said that she thought the grain silo was on fire. We got in Steve’s truck to check it out, on our way there Clark got on the radio and said he had emergency traffic. He said the grain silo was on fire. We got there and the grey truck was still parked about twenty feet from the silo. It was in the collapse zone. I had found out it belonged to a firefighter from Colfax fire, Rick. It was being used by David who was doing rehab runs. He was trying to back out of the way for a big rig coming through and got it high centered on the back axle. A guy from Garfield Fire was there in his POV. He pulled out some chains and we were going to yank it out. But we needed to get inside. We were about to break the window when Rick’s son Eric came running up yelling that he had the key. He got in and we got it yanked out. While yanking it out the back wheel came about three feet off the ground. But it was out without incident.

We had some people from one of the agencies trying to put some water where the flames were coming out from the top of the silo. But it was not enough. After a couple minutes we had them back up and Elevator Command was established with Scott running it. I was with Scott on the West side of the Elevator. Several units were with us. There were several more units on the East side as well. We were waiting for spot fires or a collapse to fight the fire. We were there for a couple hours as it burned and slowly collapsed in on itself. At one point when the wall and floor gave out on one level a very large amount of grain started to fall from it onto the railroad tracks that were right next to it. There was a mound about ten feet high covering the tracks. When only about fifteen feet of the wall remained we figured it was pretty safe. There was no danger of it collapsing on the road. It was close to that time we learned about a train trestle that was fully involved.

Matt, Zach, and I jumped in Jeff’s truck and he drove us to the scene. On the way Zach was saying someone was asking him what squad he was from. We decided to name ourselves Squad Fifty-One after the TV show Emergency. We got on scene and the trestle was burning pretty heavily. We walked to the area where the fighting was going on. We were there for about twenty minutes and it became pretty clear that our efforts were in vain. The far side that was over the river was not going out and we could not get water on it. So they finally decided to stop fighting it and we were going to let it burn. We kept one tender truck there with a small pump. Squad Fifty-One was going to help fight spot fires. Jeff also stuck around. All other units cleared that scene and were reassigned.

For the next several hours we watched it burn and watched it start to fall apart and fall into the river. A bunch of reporters from the Daily Evergreen came by. They were taking a lot of photos and talking to us. They wanted to see this one large support beam fall. It looked like it was close to falling, but it was after three o’clock in the morning the most of them were ready to leave. So they took off and it was another hour or two before it actually fell.

I thought about a way to fight to save some of the trestle. Only half of it was in the river. The other half was over dry land where we could get to both sides. I thought that with people on both sides there we could fight it and save that part. I told my idea to Jeff and we went to look. He agreed with me. We decided what support beam set we were going to fight from. I called it the Alamo. We drew a line and we were going to fight to the end. Zach said we lost the Alamo. I said I know, we are going to fight to the end, like they did at the Alamo. We knew at the speed of the fire we had about an hour before we had to fight, so we talked to command and got two tenders and a pumper to come down and play.

With the time we had before fighting the fire we asked for some food from the Command Post. The Red Cross showed up with food and what-not. Scott came down with the food for all of us. We were able to get something to eat before it was show time.

The fire was getting closer, Command told us to be careful fighting a night-time operation. We got the unit coming and got ready to fight. We layed out the hose line and I went to the far side
of the trestle and started to wet down the supports and the beams. The fire got closer and closer. Other guys were on the other side putting water there. As the fire got closer Jim and I put down our goggles and put up the face from our coat. The heat was bad and it was still approaching. I was fighting to save the rest of the trestle and I was starting to worry a little bit about the heat and how long I could stay there. I only had a one-inch line and there was another one-inch line on the other side. The fire was slowed, but not stopped by us. Then Jeff showed up with a one and a half inch line. With his help we not only stopped the fire but fought it back. We ended up winning the Alamo and saving two extra trestles. D-Twelve showed up and got on top of the trestle and put foam and water on from the top side. For the next hour we kept spraying down the trestle supports and keeping the fire at bay. Soon it was not necessary to constantly fight. I kept an eye on the fire and sat down. My boots were hurting my feet in the toes area where it was really tight.

For the next couple hours I kept watch on my part of the trestle. I would spray water from time to time to keep the beams cool. Soon light was peaking over the hill and I could start to see all the blacken land. The fire had done a good job on burning things. A TV crew shows up and got some video of us in our operation. I was only holding a hose waiting to do something. Jim was standing next to me. I figured with us just standing around we would not be of much interest to put on the news. But I was wrong. We appeared on the news and on their website with the slide show.

Jim and I Watching the Trestle

Other Members of Squad Fifty-One Watch over the “Alamo”

Around seven in the morning I was getting pretty tired. We started to clean up and roll up our hose in anticipation of being relieved. It was only one more hour before we would get relieved with the new crews. But there was a communication break down. As the new crews went out they did not realize we were at the trestle. Clark showed up and said “this is where the missing engines and tenders where.” It was another thirty minutes before we were able to leave. So it was nearly ten in the morning when we got to the command post to fill out our paperwork and got some food. We were there for about thirty minutes getting everyone’s paperwork fill out.

Jim and I took Eleven-Zero-One to the station. We had to clean it up and spray out the radiator and air filter before we were cleared to leave.

Colfax Fire Training… Finally.

It has been a long time since I was able to do Colfax Fire Training because of softball, being on call at Pullman, and being out of town. I missed nearly all of the summer. I did some work at Taco Time and then I went to Colfax. I moved a ton of stuff from my basement to the car port and then I did some cleaning of the mouse droppings.

I got a hepafilter from the health department from Judy. I used gloved and went to work. I took a short break and signed the papers for the house sale. It is going to be finalized this week. After spending several hours getting that work done I went to the fire station and had training. We were doing some pumping and water shuttling. I was put on rehab and photo taking because of my hurting back. I got some pretty cool photos of the people on top of engine three spraying water and the red lights flashing.

After the training several of us went to Subway for dinner. I had eaten at Eddy’s so I just hung out with everyone. After the dinner I went home and went to bed.

Golfing in the Hot Sun

Tired and all I dragged myself out of bed to get to Colfax for some golfing with Ron and the crew. We were going to start at nine-thirty in the morning. I paid and got a golf cart. We set off. My first round I had at least one shot on each hole that put me on to the fairway… the fairway of the hole next to mine, however. I shot a fifty-nine on my first nine holes. Then we did all the holes again. I improved a lot. I was hitting the ball better and getting better chip shots. It took until nearly three in the afternoon for us to finish eighteen holes.

Following golfing I got a load of clothes in the laundry and then went to Colfax fire to hang out. I watched TV with Tim and we even got an EMS call. Following that call I stayed until just after eight o’clock pm. Finally I had to get home to get my laundry going. I put a second load in the washer.

I watched the rest of Men of Honor and I also got into a two hour conversation with Brian on the phone. We talked about him moving in with me. It is one of those things that I think I would like, but I am also afraid of losing my freedom. He seems receptive to it as well. We are going to think about it more and talk about it. But there is a chance that by this time next month or the month after it that he will be living with me.

Falling off a car

There were a lot of things I had to do after I got off work today. I could work at the jail. I could do some work around the house, like mowing and weedeating, or I could go to the fire station and hang out. I stayed in Pullman until nearly eight o’clock pm getting some bug completed as best I could.

Then I went to get some dinner at Little Caesars. I decided to go to the fire station. I saw some pictures from the burn they did recently. I also talked to Carl about his final days being a full-timer.

I went home around ten o’clock pm and watched some TV. I got into a show when a call came out around one thirty in the morning for someone who fell from a moving car in LaCrosse. I decided that I would go on this one.

I got to the station and drove the ambulance to the scene. While en route LaCrosse EMS called Whitcom to launch the bird. The patient was combative and it was a wise move. We got to LaCrosse and loaded the patient into the ambulance and drove to the football field. They got the lights turned on and the bird landed about fifteen minutes later.’

By the time we got back to Colfax it was well after three in the morning. I got some pop from the gas station and Third Watch was on. It was an episode I had never seen before. I decided to watch it until it was done, which was at five in the morning. That is when I finally got to sleep.

Another Rainout

Our games were rained out today because of all the rain we got yesterday. It seems more evident to me now that Pullman needs to do something with the drainage problem on the city playfields.

Because the softball games were rained out I went to fire training in Colfax. We were going to go to the trailer and do some stuff there, but we ended up instead doing our quarterly SCBA test and our yearly fit test.

Following that Scott, Jim, Matt, Jeff, and I played poker for about an hour and a half. Someone of the guys wanted to get out early so we broke the game around eleven o’clock. Not long after breaking the game we called to Wynona for a heart problem. It is funny because just a couple days ago I was thinking about how I have not had a call out there.

More Recess!

Today we went to Jefferson Elementary for EMS week. Today my role was to be outside and teach the kids about the ambulance. I walked them around it and showed them the compartments and some of the tools like the glassmaster and the “keys to the city” aka bolt-cutters. We started to run out of time so by the time I got to the last group we were really running them through and did not get a good chance to really show them as much as I would have liked.

For lunch today we had nachos. Then we went out to the playground. We played kick-ball. That was a lot of fun. I really was beating those first-graders pretty easily! Actually I did go easy on them, but I did not give them free outs.

When we were clear of the school I made my way back to the office. We had a teleconference with a guy from Sollen about some login issues we have been having. After talking to him and working with an E-mail Miki sent us we think we have it figured out.

Our softball game was cancelled today so I went to Colfax for fire training. We did extrication training. I was more or less a helper. Several of the people had not done it before so my role was to teach people and make sure they were being safe. The training went well. I did some hands-on stuff with people teaching them about the glassmaster and some other tools.

After training Jim, Tim, and I played poker for about an hour and a half. I got home around midnight and it was pretty warm in my house. I opened the window in my bedroom and let it cool down a little bit before I went to sleep.

Colfax Fire B&B

John and I talked about his taking of Brad to the Tax Dodgers softball team. We talked about softball in general and about how Brad would fit in on his team. I had decided that I wanted to not work Pullman Fire tonight and instead go to the Colfax Fire Board and Business Meeting. Then afterwards we were going to play poker.

I called around to find someone to cover for me and I finally found that Reid would do it. So I did not have to worry about that.

I headed down to Colfax for the meeting. I got some dinner at Cougar Country along the way. Board and Business was a very fast meeting. We did not have much to talk about, but I did learn they are talking about getting an IV class set up. I would like to do that if I can.

After the meeting Carl, Tim, Jim, and I played cards. We were only going to play for a couple hours because everyone was tired from running a lot of calls early this morning. My pager did not go off so I did not know about them until tonight.

I did well tonight. I think I won a couple of bucks when it was all said and done. When we were done playing cards I went home and cleaned up a little bit because some people were coming to look at it tomorrow.

Skipping Fire Training

There is one thing about fire training I don’t like. In some ways they try to throw so many monkey wrenches into things that the basic skills never get practiced very much as you are forced to always do weird things. There was supposed to be fire training tonight, but I ran to the jail to chat with Mark and Jeremy. When I was up there Mark asked for my help on a file. He wanted the file to be a form he could fill out on the computer and print it off. So I spent nearly two hours perfecting the form. There were a ton of fields that needed to be added. Once I was done with that training was already started. I got much truck and just headed home.

EMS Call in Hooper

I started with a visit to the dentist. He said things are looking good. There was a small chip on one of my back teeth. He wants me to come in so he can fix it. That will be a free visit. So that is nice.

From there I met Ryan at Rancho Viejo for lunch. I had a big taco salad. It was good. They put some peppers in it so I had to dig them out. But they had a lot of cheese and I liked that.

I went to the office and started to work on getting my NUSource rebuilt. I did a scorchedearth build. Then I deployed the project. It took a couple of hours to make it work because I was not getting help quickly when I needed it. When I finally got everything done I was getting an msxml4.dll Access Denied error. That really sucked. So I worked on that for a while but I was not able to resolve the problem. I spoke with John and we are going to see Robots tomorrow around four-thirty.

I left around five o’clock to go to the coroners meeting. On my way Pete asked me to stop and pick up the pizza from Bulldog. I got there and it was not going to be ready until five-fifty. They said to grab a pop if I wanted. When the pizza was done I went into the coroners office.

Pete and I started to eat the pizza waiting for Patti. When she did not show we made some calls and could not get a hold of her. So we did the meeting. I got coverage made up for the rest of next month. We went over some old pics talked about different causes of death. There was one of a WSU student who was accidently shot with a three-fifty-seven Ruger pistol. He was carrying it outside getting ready to leave school for the summer when the shooting happened. I was surprised that I had not heard about it. He said it was probably because everyone was gone for the summer already.

After the meeting I went home and watched CSI and started to watch Without a Trace. With about ten minutes to go in the show we were toned out for chest pains in Hooper. The call came in twenty minutes earlier, but there was no address or anything so we were not toned until they got a phone number. The bird was launched and we flew out there. To get to Hooper we actually take twenty-six into Adams county and then turn on a road that takes us back into Whitman County.

She was in a bed and breakfast there. There was a large grass area right in front so we set up a LZ right there for the bird. We started to work on her getting an IV going and had a hard time doing it. Finally the bird landed. We took her down stairs and they tried about five more times before finally getting an IV going. We got her to the bird. They loaded her up and took off. We drove back to Colfax. It was about a two hour call when it was all said and done.

While at the bed and breakfast one of the La Crosse EMTs asked me if I saw the haunted room? I asked what she was talking about. She said at the end of the hall one of the rooms had a guy who died in it. And now if you move something in the room he will move it back where it goes. I went do to the room and it was closed with a piece of tape on the door attached to the frame.

I went home and watched a little more TV before finally calling it a night. I turned my pager off and went to bed.

Working from Pullman… again

With my doctor’s appointment tomorrow I am going to work from Pullman from Wednesday to Friday. I also planned on getting back to Colfax for fire training. I went into work and we had our now weekly meeting today. We moved it up to one pm so I could get out of dodge.

The meeting was ooooh soooo fun. I got some more bugs put on to my plate. Then when it was over with I tried to get my box working. Between yesterday and today something stopped working correctly so I cannot work on the bugs I have right now.

I left around two o’clock to head to Colfax. I got into town and tried to set up my VCR to record House. I could not get it to work, but Ryan said he would do it for me. Then I went to the fire station. It was Board and Business today. So there was not much going on. When it was over I went to Subway and got some dinner.

I went back to the fire station. Jim, Carl, and I played poker until around eleven pm. It was a lot of fun. We laughed and joked about stuff. I ended up winning a couple bucks. My money bag is a little more full after those winnings.

I went home and watched some TV before calling it a night. I wanted to make sure I did not miss my doctors appointment.

Working from Pullman.

Today was my first day working from Pullman. I got into the office and got the VPN set up and signed into my computer. At first I was using terminal services. Then after Ryan and I met for lunch at Pizza Pipeline, I went to the MSFT site and found they have a Remote Desktop application for Windows Two-Thousand. I got it installed and it is much better than terminal services.

After I was done working for the day I went to Colfax for fire training. It was my first one in about six months. It was good to see people. We did some hose evolutions. There was a new guy there. I showed him a few things about the hoses and flaking them, and putting the together.

I sprayed a little bit of water and helped reload the hose. Then I went into the day room and watched House with Ken. After House was over I went to the jail. I had to take my ACCESS re-cert test. I got one-hundred percent on it. I hung out at the jail until just after midnight when I finally went home to go to sleep.

Intramural’s week two

I was woken up to a EMS call. I rushed to the station and made the call. It was a lady who was sick. After the call I hung out at the station. I talked with Carl and watched some TV. I was going to hang around to see if any more calls would come out. I was getting tired so I went home and I planned on taking a nap.

When I got there I found out I was supposed to be on call for the coroners office. I didn’t think I was on call today. So I called Pete and let him know I was around and available. I then went to my bed to take a nap. I slept for about an hour when Pete called.

There was a death at the hospital. I called the Colfax hospital and found out the details. It sounded like a case we would turn down because the doctor would sign off on the death. I was happy because it was getting close to game time. I went back to sleep.

My alarm clock sounded and I drove to Pullman for the games. The weather was better. We started by playing the Longballs. We lost two to fifteen. We did not make it through the order twice. I only had one at bat and it was an out.

We went to the next field and did some BP and infield practice. Then the second game started. I pitched the first one so I let Dave pitch the second game. It was a closer game but we still lost. Three to four. So we have to win one of the two games next week to make the play offs. I again went oh-for.

I grabbed some dinner and went home. I watched the Simpsons and the Sketch Show then I went to bed. I had to get up early and get some stuff done before I left Colfax.

Thunder Home Opener

This morning I was woken up by my pager, but I never heard the call out. I missed the call. I went to the station anyway and hung out for a few hours. Ken and I talked about religion and watched a movie call the Doctor. Then I called Reggie because I had not heard from him. He flaked out on me and now I don’t have a spotter. So I started to call everyone in my phone book to see if I could find someone. I could not. As a last resort I called Ryan hoping he would help me out in my time of need. He did not.

I stopped at Big-Five and got some binoculars to use at the game. I drove to the stadium. I met up with Brian. I got the team roster and I got the other teams’ roster. I started to get their names written down if they were hard to pronounce. Several players said hello and shook my hand. It was good to see people. I went into my booth and set up my stuff.

I had a real hard time at first trying to say the offense and defense players when they made the play plus all the announcements. Finally I decided that I would only do defense if it was quick and easy. Other than that I only announced the offense. I think I started to better after that. I still made a few errors with saying things. I got tongue tied at times. But over all I think I did an okay job.

After the game Jerry said he wanted me to be a lot more one-sided in my announcements. He pretty much wants me to be a cheerleader and get people to make noise on third down and other things. I am not sure that it is right, but he is the team owner so I will do so.

After the game I went home. Then I stopped at the jail. I hung out there most of the evening. Ryan tried to call about eight times. I did not answer the phone. I just let it go to voice mail. The last time he tried was about one am. I was not much in the mood to talk with him.