A little Unit 2...

So as I may have mentioned before, I'm happily into Unit 2. Unit 2 is more technical skills, that also happen to be (for the most part) individual skills. We've been learning how to cut holes in roofs for ventilation, extrication, and car fires. We went to perfectly good house in Mclean on a Thursday, tore the inside apart, cut holes in the roof, and left. Friday we ripped cars apart with the "Jaws of Life" and other extrication tools, and then Saturday we set cars on fire, just so we could put them out. Did I mention I'm getting paid for this!!! I hope y'all enjoy the pictures...just some of the stuff we've been doing...


122's ROOF!!!


Half of the roof after 122 was done with it...


"My Taurus is on fire!!!"


RFF Goza in action!


Up close and personal...

UNIT 1 IS DONE!!!

Unit 1 is done. I'm currently in week 13 of my 22 weeks of training. I have also finished Unit 1 which consist of all of the hoses, ladders, and SCBA. I passed all 13 tests on the first try which means no retest. Also managed to pull out a 100% on the written test. Not to bad if I do say so myself. :) Now it's onto Unit 2, which is some of the more technical aspects of firefighting. It's also more individual task, instead of the two firefighter evolutions that there were in Unit 1.

So I'm a little over halfway through. Thanks to everyone for your comments. It's nice to come home after a long day and read what you all have written in the little time I have to relax in the evening. More to follow...


Happy to be done with Unit 1!!!

Halfway there...

So 11 weeks down, and 11 to go. The end of this week starts Unit 1 testing. Then it's on to Unit 2. Busy week ahead, but I'll see if I can keep you all posted.

The world from 105'...Straight up!

And last, but certainly not least, the self pic from the top...

People certainly look a lot smaller from that height!

Truck 438 (West Centreville), and Tower 424 (Woodlawn) swung by the Academy yesterday to give the recruits a little fun, 105' of fun. 105' feet doesn't seem like a lot until you start climbing.

Burning...with hoses!

So we got to go into the burn building with hoses to put the fires out. It was awesome. I've attached some photos to give you an idea of what it's like...

FIRE!!!

Burn building on fire...

The past two weeks...

So it's been a busy past couple of weeks. Their have been some long days, hence the lack of updates. Last week consisted of four ten hour days, with Friday off for the graduation of the 121st recruit class. It was four days of SCBA practicals consisting of daily checks, donning and doffing, EBSS, and the maze. I'll explain.

Daily checks is our daily procedures for checking out our SCBA's. Donning and doffing is taking our gear on and off. The requirement for this is to put on your gear, get in the fire engine, put on the SCBA, buckle the seatbelt, get out, finish getting the gear on, and get on air, all within three minutes. The EBSS station consist of following the hoseline with a blacked out facepiece, to a downed firefighter, hooking up the buddy breathing system, and dragging the person out to the place that you started. And last, but certainly not least, the maze. It's dark, it's small, you crawl, climb, turn around when you have no room, take your SCBA off, put it back on, try not to get tangeled up, and do all this while making sure you don't run out of air. Good times.

This week has also been a long one. We learned about hoses, pulling them, and then reracking them. It's been extremely physical, but fun as well. We've been flowing water, although it's only been into the air. Tomorrow is the first day in the burn building (yes, we have to work on Saturdays, but don't worry, I get Monday off). It's only going to be with water cans, but it's going to be real fire, up close and personal.

In other news, my computer died, so I ended up getting a new one last weekend. I'll see what I can do about getting some action shots tomorrow, and see if I can't get them up on the blog to give you a good idea of what's going on with my academy life. So until next time...