Less than 9hrs til 4 day!

Last day of the cycle for C-shift and it looks like we'll have a pretty decent 4-day as far as the weather goes. Today started out rainy but turned into a sunny and hot evening. If it wasn't Sunday, we were thinking about making some modifications to the Medic truck. They managed to be first in on 2 fire calls today. Coon and Rhett (filling in again from Lucky 13) have requested a booster reel or at least an additional water can. They were thinking and said that if we removed the stretcher and it's mounts, we'd have enough room for a small water tank and maybe some hand tools. Of course the added stress of operating such a piece of equipment may be more than some could bare so I told them we should just keep it simple. Right now all they really have to worry about or to remember is "sticky side down" (that's for putting on band-aids for all of our non-medical type readers LOL). All kidding aside, some of our readers may not know that our Medics are firefighters also. They respond to fire calls on the Medic truck just as we respond to medical calls on the Engine. They carry their turnout gear in the side compartments and even have SCBA's (air packs) on the truck. In most cases, the first arriving Medic units gets put to work fighting fire and an additional unit is dispatched once a "working fire" is signaled. That 2nd Medic unit usually is then assigned as a medical group. Our medics and firefighter / EMTs also rotate apparatus. Some days they ride the Engine, others they ride the box (medic unit). Anyway, the system seems to work well for us.
Today has been a day for appliance fires. We had a dryer on fire earlier today with our brothers from The 12th Street Express (#5) and Ladder 2. Then a stove fire tonight with Lucky Ladder 13 (Medic 9 arriving 1st with Coon providing an excellent size up). Not much work involved with either incident. Engine 5 did stretch a line on the dryer but the stove fire was out on arrival. Here are some pics from those two runs, sorry about the night pictures, I still haven't figured out this camera as far as night shots go.Not much else to blog about tonight. Were sitting on 5 or 6 and are hoping for a quiet night. We made a little change to the banner of the blog. We were playing around with the look and thought some color would look good. We didn't consult with the other shifts, so it may not last long. I will admit that it looks better than what I originally thought it would. Let us know what you think about it under the comment section. I'll throw in a few links for ya to wrap things up. These are a few of the sites I check in with regularly and you may enjoy, look here here here and here. I also hope you folks have taken the time to check out the Fire Critic . We added his link to our blog a few days ago. The site is looking pretty good and today he has a link for some company level training that stems from a Sacramento Ca. close call. Take his advise, set your company down and watch the videos. Here's the direct link as well. The last link I'll add is a really cool one as well. It's about a little fire buff ... little as in a kid... worth the read here. That's it for now, an update if worthy as usual. Until then, stay safe and in the house, lock up the women and children, we're heading on 4 day! Capt. Wines.