Category: Firefighter

Fire Departments History in America

In the past 400 years, fires have caused a lot of havoc in America. Even though firefighting efforts could be traced to the 2nd century, firefighting in America traces to the 16th and 17th centuries (AFP 1). State-funded firefighting departments were nonexistent then. The only tangible firefighting efforts were either organized through volunteer efforts or private practice.

Privately-Run firefighting companies were very common because there was a financial incentive to make profits through insurance firms that paid firefighting companies. Privately-run firefighting companies, therefore, battled to outwit one another because the insurance companies only paid firefighting companies that arrived at the scene first, and extinguished the fire (AFP 1).

This system forced many firefighting companies to recruit employees who were not necessarily skilled in fighting fires, but strong enough to fight other firefighting personnel (from other companies) and protect their employers equipment (dogs were also used to protect firefighting equipment) (AFP 1).

The first real attempts of organized firefighting trace to 1630, in Boston, when fire departments hired skilled firefighting inspectors (AFP 4). The skilled firefighters provided a change to the management of fire departments, which ordinarily depended on unskilled labor (AFP 5). The inspectors patrolled the city at night to ensure that the citizenry respected firefighting laws. Any person found to have contravened the law received a fine from the fire inspectors.

The fire inspectors were also supposed to look out for any fires and organize a bucket brigade to fight the fire if there was any. Among the most notable rules introduced by the fire inspectors was the legal provision that no man shall build his chimney with wood, or cover his house with thatch (AFP 5).

The government intended these laws to serve as a policing tool that would reduce the incidence of fires. However, because most of the equipment for fighting the fires were ineffective and archaic, firefighting was not as effective as expected by the citizens.

Later, about 1736, Benjamin Franklin started urging people to establish professional firefighting departments (AFP 7). The development of the fire engine marked the need for a professional firefighting department. Even though many fire-fighting companies were reluctant to accept the fire engine, citizens forced these companies to use them.

For example, in Cincinnati, Ohio, the citizens forced the fire department to adopt the firefighting engine (AFP 7). Consequently, many firefighting types of equipment modernized and were distributed throughout most cities.

For example, a doctor, William Channing, developed the first fireboxes after the telegraph technology became prominent (the firefighting boxes were used to sound fire alarms) (AFP 8). In 1832, hoses were also used to pull fire engines (AFP 8).

Through the modernization of fire-fighting equipment and the emerging need to have state-funded firefighting departments, Boston emerged as the first city in America to have a state-funded firefighting department. The need for state-funded firefighting departments increased after privately-funded companies let uninsured buildings to burn to the ground, but saved the insured buildings (AFP 8).

This inequality led to increased pressures from the public to have state-funded fire departments as a public service to its citizens. Most municipalities in America after that established firefighting departments as a public service (AFP 10). The firefighting departments provided several services to its citizens, including emergency firefighting services and rescue services (today, the operations of most firefighting departments span within a municipality or county) (AFP 10).

Fire Departments Members, Ranks, Squads, and Teams

The organizational structures for fire-fighting departments do not differ much from the structure of the military or the police. For example, firefighting officers are sworn in as police officers or military personnel. Also, similar to the police, firefighting teams have the authority to enforce laws in an emergency (AFP 8).

Different countries have different roles and responsibilities of fighting officers. In America, the ranks of firefighters always span across the positions of a lieutenant to fire chief. Interestingly, firefighting officers symbolize their ranks using the color of their helmets. For example, the white helmet is symbolic of the lieutenant rank, while red helmets symbolize fire chiefs (fire chiefs may also be known as company officers) (Kemah Fire Department 8).

However, it is important to understand that the design or color of these helmets normally varies across different jurisdictions in America. Despite the above categorization of firefighting ranks, traditional ranking systems still apply in some jurisdictions. The traditional ranking structure was categorized into three positions  firefighter, sergeant (technician), the lieutenant, captain, battalion chief, division chief, deputy chief, and chief commissioner.

Since every ranking in the firefighting department respects the number of speaking trumpets associated with the rank (bugles), each of the three ranking structure is accorded a special number of bugles. The firefighter position has no bugles, but the lieutenant position has a bugle. Instead of the bugle, the sergeant position has got three chevrons (an alternative speaking trumpet).

The captain and battalion chiefs have got three bugles, while the battalion chief has got three bugles. The deputy and chief commissioners have got four and five bugles, respectively.

The nature of the fire department ranking structure often determines whether the firefighting department will be headed by a lieutenant or captain. The head of the team often presides over the firefighting department (usually known as a company).

The lieutenant, or the captain, often represents the most junior position in most firefighting departments in America, but because there are few state and federal company structures for defining the roles and responsibilities of every firefighting department, most fire departments in America pride in having a special departmental structure that resonates with their local needs (Kemah Fire Department 9).

Different units in firefighting departments are often known as squads. Even though many fire-fighting departments may have a squad in their departments, the roles of these squads often vary. For example, in some American jurisdictions, the squad and the rescue squad mean the same thing; however, in other jurisdictions, a squad and a rescue squad denote different responsibilities.

This is the case in New York because its firefighting department operates about seven squads, which undertake specialized functions in the department (such as managing hazardous materials). Still, in the New York Fire Department, the rescue squads (different from squads) are called when there are specialized and complicated rescue situations.

The rescue squad and the squad both operate under the wing of the Specialty Operations Command Unit. In many fire-fighting departments, the squad does not have the same type of responsibility as outlined in the New York Firefighting Department; instead, squads are merely emergency medical units that have members within the firefighting department, with a medical background. Los Angeles is one jurisdiction that outlines the activities of squads in this manner.

Fire department teams normally comprise these squads. Therefore every squad has a specific number of teams that work with them. Again, every fire department has a special structure for outlining the role of every team in the squad. Comprehensively, the effective coordination of the teams and squads (through the various ranks) outlines the effective coordination of the department.

Fire Departments Responsibilities

Traditionally, the responsibilities of fire departments mainly comprised of firefighting duties. However, in the recent past, many fire-fighting departments have expanded their roles to include emergency medical service (EMS), emergency management, homeland security management, hazardous materials response, and other emergency and non-emergency calls (Flynn 3).

Besides ensuring that they meet their basic responsibilities or public service to the community, firefighting departments also perform inspection services (for example, to ensure buildings comply with fire safety standards), review plans and integrate the contribution of interested parties (third parties) in firefighting activities (Flynn 3).

Flynn identifies four main responsibilities of firefighting departments  fire incident calls, emergency medical services (EMS), HazMat calls, and other calls such as service calls, or false alarms (4). However, it is important to mention that the core responsibilities of firefighting departments vary across different jurisdictions. For example, some departments do not offer emergency medical services. Flynn (4) estimates that about 56% of Americas firefighting departments do not offer this service.

Since most firefighting departments have expanded their roles and responsibilities, some of their roles overlap with the roles of the police. For example, this paper already shows that firefighting departments, sometimes, have structural similarities with the police. Therefore, some firefighting roles, such as investigating arson attacks, may overlap with similar roles of law enforcement officers.

Besides, suppressing fires, offering emergency medical services, and investigating arson attacks, firefighting departments also provide an important service of educating the public about fire safety. This duty stems from the role of firefighting departments in relief liaisons.

Indeed, firefighting departments have a special responsibility of imparting knowledge to the community, regarding fire safety. For example, through the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), different fire departments in the US have participated in fire safety programs. Such programs have existed for a long time.

The participation of fire departments in such a program is also historical. For example, the New York fire department has participated in this program since 1905 (National Fire Protection Association 3). Through such programs, fire departments strive to reduce the burden of fires in the community by being pro-active. Visiting children in schools and teaching them about fire safety is among the most common activity that fire departments, in different jurisdictions, participate in.

Firefighting departments also have exclusive powers that allow them access to undertake their duties in most types of emergencies. For example, when a terrorist attack occurs, firefighters have a legal authority to intervene in the situation and respond to any type of emergency that may have occurred because of the terrorist attack. Also, firefighters enjoy the legal authority to intervene in most situations that may pose a danger to human safety or the protection of property.

These immense powers rank firefighters among the few professionals who can gain access to the property without any legal consequences. These powers, therefore, mean that it may be a criminal offense to prevent firefighters from gaining access to premises when there is an emergency. Comprehensively, the roles of firefighting departments have significantly expanded in scope and the traditional role of controlling, extinguishing, or suppressing fires only outline part of the job that firefighting departments do.

Fire Departments Apparatus, Equipment, and Tools

Since fire departments often face different challenging situations in their work environments, they have different apparatus for work. Broadly, these apparatuses include aerial apparatus, rescue apparatus, wild-land fire apparatus, hazardous material apparatus, logistical support apparatus, water and foam-carrying apparatus, fireboats, fire trains, airport crash tenders, aircraft, and motorcycles (the list of apparatus may, however, expand beyond these examples).

Aerial apparatus may include turntable ladders, tower ladders, tiller ladders, hydraulic platforms, and aerial ladder platforms (Fairmount 3). The rescue apparatus may include heavy rescue vehicles, and rescue engines. Lastly, water and foam-carrying apparatus may include tanker trucks, hose layers, and foam tenders.

The choice of apparatus normally depends on a budget of the fire departments, their geographical locations, and the nature of the risks they face. However, almost all fire departments in America have a fire engine truck that mainly transports firefighters to the scene of the fire.

These fire engines also carry fire-fighting equipment like ladders, axes, and pike poles. The fire engine trucks, therefore, serve several purposes, including pumping water to quell fires, transporting firefighters to the scene of the fire, rescue services, and carrying fire-fighting equipment. Depending on the geographical location of the fire departments and the topography of the area, some fire departments may also use firefighting boats, airplanes, and fire trains.

Modern fire-fighting apparatus uses highly pressurized water that often creates a vaporous mist that has a more effective record for preventing the spread of fire. This technology has also been integrated into fire-fighting apparatus, such that the vaporous mist mixes with the normal water that is pumped through the hoses.

Besides the equipment and apparatus used in stopping the spread of fire, firefighters also need reliable firefighting tools to help them do their job more effectively.

Some of these tools are basic, and they include water resistant fire lights, fire helmets, fire gloves, fire resistant clothing, fire extinguishers, wild-land hand tools, structural hand tools, weather instruments, compasses, vehicle tools, knives, reforestation tools, and replacement parts (National Fire Fighter Corp 1).

Again, the choices of firefighting tools depend on the nature of risks that the fire departments face. For example, firefighters that work in areas that are prone to forest fires would prefer stocking a lot of reforestation tools, such as hoe parts and tree bags.

Fire Departments Plans (Incident Command)

The incident command system is very important for the effective coordination of firefighting activities and the increase of firefighting safety. The incident command structure normally works by integrating the fire departments command structure with organizational dynamics to improve the effectiveness of emergency responses (Fire Scope California 2).

The incident command structure comprises of several components, including the systematic development of the functional organization, multiagency adoption (across state and federal levels), applicability across all fire incidents, preservation of jurisdictional authority, the respect of a central command management structure, and the expansion and contraction of the command structure within organizational limits (Fire Scope California 2).

Regarding the command structure of the incident command system, it is important to understand that a simple incident may often outstretch the fire department if there is no strong command structure to manage such incidents.

Indeed, Fire Scope California says The incident commander can be quickly overwhelmed and overloaded with information management, assigning companies, filling out and updating the tactical worksheets, planning, forecasting, requesting additional resources, talking to the radio and fulfilling all the other functions of command (p. 18).

The purpose of maintaining the incident command structure is to support the activities of the fire department. For example, before additional ranking officers come to a scene of the fire, the incident commander may establish a command structure that coordinates all activities before the specialized team arrives. The incident command structure, therefore, defines who has the authority to undertake different tasks within the department (Fire Scope California 18).

However, the presence of this command structure does not exclusively outline the structure of authority within the department (the transfer of information may not be restricted within the chain of command). For example, a low ranking officer may receive instructions from a superior, but the officer may still share the findings with another officer in a different unit (Fire Scope California (18).

Most of the positions within incident command structures are dormant until there is a strong need to create them. For example, the incident command structure may be created only when there is an insufficient initial response to an emergency. When the incident command structure is created, qualified or specialized personnel are therefore dispatched to manage the emergency.

The transition from the initial response to a specialized response is often evolutionary. Different positions/tasks within incident command structures are only filled when there is a need to do so (Fire Scope California 18). In managing initial responses, Fire Scope California (18) says that the incident commander normally undertakes four functions  operations, logistics, planning, and administration.

During initial responses, different sections are filled on an evolutionary basis. The operations section is, however, an important initial response unit because it outlines the pillar of all other organizational activities that may occur in subsequent rescue operations (Fire Scope California 19). From the operations section, other levels of strategic planning are created.

In detail, the operations management level comes directly below the incident commander level. Under the operational level, there may be up to five branches of coordination. Up to 25 division groups support the branches, but task forces, strike teams, and single units (resources) support the divisions (Fire Scope California 18). Most of the operational plans for fire departments adhere to this structure.

Fire Departments Trucks and Engines

Over time, the meaning of the term truck has evolved to mean specialized vehicles that are used by fire departments to undertake their duties. The term engine was specifically used to refer to the machine that pumped water from the trucks to the fire. Today, fire departments have integrated the terms, fire and engine (fire engine) to mean specialized vehicles that pump water in emergencies (Fairmount 1). Fire trucks, therefore, only symbolize vehicles that carry ladders and other firefighting equipment during emergencies.

Fire engines have got three main components, including water, a hose, and a pump. Unlike old water pipes that were rigid, modern pipes are easy to pull and store, because they are made of rubber. The deployment of such equipment is often eased by the presence of ladders that support easy access to such materials. However, the ladders are usually characteristic of the fire truck (not the fire engine) (Fairmount 1).

Occasionally, the entire body of the truck may be one giant coiled ladder. The ladder would then elevate the firefighter to a position that he can rescue a person. Depending on the design of the truck, the tip of the ladder may, or may not, have a nozzle.

The hoses may be one, or two, so that they create a master stream of water for quelling fires, especially at the top of high rise buildings. The importance of fire trucks, and their ladders, especially manifest in rescue services. Since some of these ladders may be very long and destabilizing to the truck, firefighters use outriggers to offer support to the truck (Fairmount 3).

Generally, the main difference between the fire truck and the fire engine is the fact that the fire truck does not have water reservoirs as fire engines do. Also, unlike fire engines, fire trucks have got extra equipment that the firefighters may find useful when managing big fires. For example, fire trucks have huge saws for cutting through ventilation pathways (in rescue operations).

The trucks may also have large gas pipes (for smoke injection), important rescue tools, and fire ground support tools (Fairmount 3). Regardless of the distinctions and the importance of the fire trucks and fire engines, their roles may overlap, especially in big fires.

Works Cited

AFP 2012, History of Firefighting. Web.

Fairmount 2013, Truck vs. Engine. Web.

Fire Scope California 1994, Incident Command System. Web.

Flynn, Jennifer 2009, Fire Service Performance Measures. Web.

Kemah Fire Department 2013, Fire Department Traditions. Web.

National Fire Fighter Corp 2012, Fire Equipment, Firefighting Tools. Web.

National Fire Protection Association 1995, History Of The NFPA Codes and Standards-Making System. Web.

Introduction

Can a municipality disregard the results of a civil exam? The answer should be no. New Haven municipality should not disregard the results of a promotion test based on the fact that the exam yielded many qualified applicants from one race, and not enough of the minority since the exam was race-neutral. The municipal was not supposed to ignore the results because the exam was crafted by a professional body that ensured there was no bias towards any race but it focused on their knowledge regarding fire fighting.

History of the case

In November and December 2003 New Haven fire department conducted a racial free promotion test. The test was to fill seven captains and eight lieutenants positions. The department had authorized a company in Illinois IO solutions, to design a racial free promotion exam. Io solutions performed their task are required in designing a race-neutral promotion exam. The New Havens three rule stipulated that the three topmost scorers in a test only one of them would fill the vacancy. When the promotion exam results were out the whites scored higher than the blacks and Hispanics. In the captains test, the first person from the minority to score highly was in position six followed by another in position eight. The results would have enabled at least two Hispania in the rank of captain while the rest being whites. The lieutenants posts would all have been taken up by the whites since the first person from the minority was in position fourteen. Leaders in the New Haven council refused to endorse the names of the qualified candidates thereby making the results of the race-neutral exam invalid (Adversity.net. 2009).

After the 1991 civil rights act new court ruling brought a new dimension in the order of employment and promotion. A precedent set by the Supreme Court put any program incorporating racial or affirmative principle needed to undergo stringent inquiry. The federal law against discrimination was in good faith in helping employers voluntarily help the minority but did not compel them to always incorporate the minority. New Haven council, therefore, was not obliged to incorporate racial principles because the test had been scrutinized by the designing company and was not race-biased (Spicer, R, and Spicer, 1995).

The firefighters were justified to be entitled to the promotions because if there was one race or there were no minority promotion would have proceeded without any delay, thus the white firefighters had been discriminated against. Since the test was occupationally related there would be no reason to bring the issue of race as the disregarding factor. The positions at hand required very highly skilled personnel and declining to promote those who had scored highly would undermine the high standards required in carrying out the designated tasks.

The New Haven municipality was not justified in disregarding the civil service exam because, in the case of Dallas v. Dallas firefighters association of 1998, the final ruling was in favor of those who rightfully qualified for a certain post. In 1988 Dallas city council came up with a personnel policy that gave priority to women and minority people over the whites who had scored higher in the promotional test. At the time women were 15% of the driver-engineer position while the minority was 3% of the lieutenant position. The decision was a result of past prejudice that the council had accented to in1976. By 1992 women comprised 23% and minority personnel comprised 18% of drivers and lieutenants respectively. The council wanted to further extend the proposal for another five years. Dallas firefighters association and individual firefighters filed a suit against the council for discriminating against some of them. The district court ruled in favor of the association and firefighters based on the grounds that the council did not show any convincing reasons and there was no proof of past discrimination. After launching an appeal, the Supreme Court did not contrast the decision of the district court citing that the program was discriminating the white firefighters (Shafritz et al, 2007)

The type of examination administered to the firefighter was an assembled examination. Unlike unassembled exams that assess a candidates background, assembled examination accesses the potential of an individual in carrying out a particular job. A lawsuit was filed by Michael Briscoe that contends the writing part is prejudiced against blacks. The suit is from the thought that blacks do not perform well in written exams, of which there is no evidence toward these allegations. Since the firefighters knew the exam as was an assembled exam, the ones from the minority should have put extra effort and read thoroughly to lift up their performance.

The exam sat comprised 60% written and 40% oral. The oral part was meant to increase the chances for the minority groups in passing. This kind of arrangement was part of ensuring fairness in an effort to counter-cultural bias. Such exam setup has been criticized since it does not focus on an individuals background. Fairness is implied because minorities are outnumbered by the majority. The difference in exam performance or results is directly related to differences between the groups ability and cognitive skills. The exam can be said to be valid since it met the entire validity criterion. However this issue of including an oral part in the exam was not contested; if they had raised the issued more weight to win the case would have been on their side as the chances of the minority scoring low was well catered for (Spicer, R, and Spicer, 1995).

In Ricci v DeStefano the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the plaintiff. This means that the municipality was not supposed to disregard the test results. The ruling statement stated that the firemen were victims of racial discrimination and that the decision for the municipality to use raw statistics violated Title VII Civil Rights Act of 1991. The municipality would have gone ahead and promoted the firemen even though they would face legal suits from the minority. The ruling did not harmonize laws relating to employment; wherein one warns on employers using racial principles while hiring while the other advocates for them to take racism into account. This implies that the municipality should have looked into the matter of racism thoroughly. The court also found out that the municipalitys claim that adopting the results would have brought a disparate impact was not strongly supported (Dorf, 2009).

New Haven council should not have been guided by the racial results in canceling the promotions. It caused some harm to those who qualified for the positions because they had spent a lot of time and resources while preparing. Many had studied for months, bought textbooks, audio and visual material to help them improve their performance. Others incurred expenses through travel to libraries in search of reading materials (Adversity.net. 2009).

The firefighters were justified to be appointed to the vacant positions based on the fact that the municipality had provided equal opportunity to the candidates. They all had sat similar exams that discriminated none of them. All the candidates knew how to read and write, they all had been under formal training regarding firefighting and all were aware of the firefighting guidelines applied in New Haven. This shows that none of the candidates had a competitive advantage over the others (Cohn, 2000).

Finally, the case of Ricci v. DeStefano has not solved the conflicting ideology between protectionism against racism or any other differences, and the one requiring employers not to make employment decisions based on racial principles. It also provides precedence that municipalities and other organizations should not fall for the advocacy of quotas but should instead focus on designing the hiring practices that are justified and do not violate equal and protection principles. Based on the reasons provided above, New Haven municipality was not justified in disregarding the promotion exam that was crafted to be race-neutral on the grounds that the exam yielded many qualified applicants of one race and not enough of the other.

Reference

Adversity.net (2009). Case 50: New Haven Refused to Promote Firefighters Who Scored Highest on Exam. Web.

Cohn S. (2000). Race, Gender, and Discrimination at Work. Boulder: West view Press.

Dorf, M. C. (2009) The Supreme Court Decides the New Haven Firefighter Case. Web.

Shafritz, J. M., Riccucci, N. M. & Naff, K. C. (2007). Personnel management in government: politics and process (6th Ed). London: Taylor and Francis.

Spicer, R. & Spicer, L. (1995). Race Discrimination at Work. London: XPL Publishing.

Have you ever imagined what it’s like to be a firefighter? The physical and mental demands it brings? With long hours of work and the need to respond quickly to rapidly changing conditions? It is unpleasant work, actually no, it is frightening. As hundreds of fire-fighters whether volunteered or paid, battle the destructive bushfires, they have lost part of their incomes, sleep and precious time with their families. Hello, my name is Steven Tran and today, I will be arguing why firefighters deserve more government support.

Volunteers from any emergency organisation are the salt of the Earth here in Australia. The work of volunteer firefighters across the country never ceases to amaze me. Especially as a volunteer, it would have to be the most strenuous, dangerous and distressing areas to ever work in. These people have given everything to save Australia from the blazing bushfires yet, they still lack the basic needs for life such as income, food and rest. While they are entitled to compensation if they’re injured while on the ground, they otherwise receive very little assistance. Spokesman for the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (RFS), Inspector Ben Shepard, says that “as a volunteer myself, the reason I did this was because I wanted to help my community, not for any financial gain.” These heroes risk their lives for a daily wage of $0 but how longer will they keep doing this without receiving proper support in order to live with essentials? The compensation for firefighters is not about paying volunteers but about sustaining volunteer efforts by protecting them from financial loss.

In addition to the much needed financial support, firefighters also require rest from the arduous work. Firefighters are undoubtedly athletes who spend long periods away from their families and friends to work, exercise and train tirelessly behind the scenes and act as role models for the communities. It is a no-brainer that the job is a physically stressful task which puts the body under considerable strain. They can suffer from heat exhaustion, as well as long-term job-related illnesses such as asthma, persistent coughing, heart disease, cancer and lung damage. The body may adapt to these pressures temporarily but if this is continued for a sustained period, it may pose life-threatening negative health issues. According to the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, research has shown that firefighters are more likely to be diagnosed with a mental health condition than the overall Australian population and are “ twice as likely to think about suicide, and three times as likely to have a suicide plan.” This paints a grim picture of the wellbeing of the people who dedicate their lives helping others. They save us, but who saves them? Is the question. In response to Scott Morrison rejecting calls for more bushfire help, dozens of firefighters have angrily said that Fighting the bushfires have resulted in them feeling “exhausted and hurt”. These volunteers have suggested making the organization professionalised so they would receive the necessities to continue the fires without having to sacrifice their body and precious time. However, Scott Morrison has declined the request and says that “ these crews, yes, they’re tired, but they also want to be out there defending their communities”. He said the government was not considering professionalising the service, and he did not address concerns that crews were crowdsourcing donations for food, water and equipment. These firefighters are being stretched beyond their endurance and all they ask for is support. Yet, Morrison can’t deliver something as simple as that. He has no idea what they have to go through each day and rejects their concerns while he sits comfortably. The firefighters are exhausted to the bone yet PMs claim they “want to be there”. They are the heroes of the country and the government needs to satisfy their concerns and if they do not soon, who knows how longer these volunteers will keep going until they end up in hurt and unable to continue fighting the fires.

There’s no question that the requirements of a firefighter are tough on their families. These people sacrifice so much of their time away from home, away from their families to fulfil their duties. At work, they are involved in laborious work. When they come home, the aftereffects set in, they will be tired, detached, isolated and apathetic. The greater the demand at work, the greater backlash at home, debilitating them for family involvement. This sometimes may lead to destruction in the relationship in families. Tragically, every so often, firefighters go to the extent of even sacrificing their lives. On December the 30th, a volunteer firefighter and soon to be father named Samuel Mcpaul was killed at the scene when a ‘freakish weather event’ lifted his fire truck off the ground. McPaul was doing everything correctly until extreme winds “engulfed” the 8 tonne truck and flipped it over. In addition to this tragedy, he was expecting his first child with his wife Megan, who is now left as a widow. His child will be left fatherless. It is clear that firefighting is a very dangerous duty and the respect for those who are volunteers is beyond words. Their duty requires them to work away from their families for long amounts of time. The government must provide the much needed support for firefighters so they may be available for their families.

Firefighters are a symbol of hope and protection. They are available when they are needed. To be a firefighter means you have to have tremendous courage and mental strength. The bushfires have significantly brought up the demands of firefighters which have resulted with income loss, overworking and loss of precious time with families. The government has rejected the request for support once already, these firefighters fight very hard but all for what? The government needs to answer the concerns of these heroes because they save our country from being burned to ashes

Hearing the station tones drop for a fire and running to the gear rack to put on the turnout gear can be adrenaline pumping. Riding down the highway with the lights reflecting off of the buildings and listening to the radio traffic knowing that there is an active fire on the first floor can get the adrenaline pumping faster. Firefighters run into burning buildings while others run out at all hours of the day. For many years, fire departments have been around serving communities. Each department has a group of men and women that willingly go out and help those in an emergency situation. There are three types of fire departments, there are full-time career departments, combination departments that have volunteers and paid staffing, and there are also departments that are all volunteers. All the fire companies across the nation have the same duties but at the end of the day, some get paid and some do it without receiving any financial compensation . With the number of volunteers dropping over the years, and the change in society not wanting to work for free, it is time that all firefighters should be rewarded for their service. All volunteer firefighters should be paid with a financial compensation per call they respond to because everyone does the same job, it can bring back up the number of volunteers, and it can help those already volunteering their hours with equipment, transportation costs, and uniforms.

In the fire service, a firefighter is a firefighter. They do not get different treatment if they are paid or volunteer. You can not tell if a firefighter is paid or volunteer by the gear they wear. It is a risky job that can cause cancer, injury, or death. Firefighters put in countless hours of time to give the best service they can offer to their communities. They leave their families for sometimes long periods of time to work with their firehouse family. “We see the blaze even as we roar around the last corner, flames leaping into the night sky, jets of water already cascading onto the heat. The truck is barely stopped when we’re off, several colleagues grabbing a line and heading purposefully toward the scene” (Delong). Firefighters work in unbelievable conditions that can put their lives in danger to save and protect people in need of our services . All firefighters receive the same training so they can do their job. At the end of the day, some firefighters can say that they have a salary to provide for their families and others don’t get paid. Volunteer firefighting is a tradition in communities nationwide and members take out a lot of their time to make it their passion. It can also take a hit to the wallet to pay for the amount of gas used in personal vehicles to get to the station. Financially rewarding the volunteer firefighters can personally give them a feeling that there is no separation of volunteers and paid firefighters

The number of volunteers across the nation has dropped significantly. It is becoming harder and harder to recruit for volunteers. The apparatus was full of guys and manpower was not a problem to worry about. Nowadays, It is rare to get a truck with a full crew out of the station, unless it is a staffed station or it is a big call.”Recruitment is a problem for some departments, but a more common complaint is that it’s hard to keep people once they’ve joined” (Fleming). Recruitment and retention in the fire service is becoming a big problem because the less men and women you have, the less help you will have to do your job. I believe that if there is a financial compensation for the volunteer firefighters, more people would want to join and it can help get more manpower on the apparatus.. Many methods have been used to recruit new volunteers and the numbers keep dwindling. When I try to recruit friends to join and help, some of the many phrases I hear are “It doesn’t pay” or “it’s too much time for something that is free.’’ The next generation doesn’t want to volunteer and work without a reward. If volunteers would get paid per call they respond to or how many hours they staff the station, it would be an eye opener to the public to join. I think that the number of volunteers will grow back to what it used to be and it would be a benefit for communities nationwide because there will be more people willing to help in a time of need.

Many people today still dedicate their time to volunteer as a firefighter. Becoming a firefighter may require one to sacrifice some of their time and finances. While it can be time consuming, it can also take a hit at your income. Some active members in the firehouse have a comfort of using or wearing equipment and they would have to take it out of their own money to purchase these items. For example, it is a tradition in the fire service to wear a leather helmet. The price of a leather helmet is unbelievable and some volunteers may not be able to afford to buy a leather. Rewarding the firefighters financially can give them the money to buy their own equipment such as a leather helmet. I personally can not afford a leather fire helmet but it is a goal of mine to purchase one and wear it on the fireground. They can also buy uniforms, such as a Class A uniform. The Class A uniform is a formal uniform that firefighters wear to funerals, ceremonies, and other formal fire department events. They can also buy personal tools such as helmet band, 6 in 1 screwdrivers, and webbing. Firefighters can also use the money to fill their personal vehicles with gasoline after making many trips to respond to calls to the firehouse. Firefighters can also use the money for their families too if they would like to. “The firefighters and police who died in the attacks lost their lives trying to save strangers, strangers they were committed to helping” (McCombie). This quote is about the men and women on September 11th but it shows that firefighters are willing to put everything on the line to help a stranger in need. Volunteer firefighting is already time consuming and it doesn’t need to be taking away a part of their income to the family.

A method I think will work to give a financial reward to firefighters is to not pay them a salary. I believe that they should be paid per call they respond to and give them a financial reward per call. For example, if a firefighter responds to three calls in a day, and the financial reward is $15, that is $45 made in one day. That way the firefighters have to be active in order to earn the reward and it would not feel like the money would be wasted on a firefighter who does not want to show up for calls. The fire company can pay the volunteers bi-weekly or monthly. The financial reward should depend on the department, coverage area, and the amount of calls that the fire company responds to. It would not be the best idea to pay a firefighter per shift because they might not have a call to respond to on that shift. Having the volunteers respond to the station for calls to earn a financial reward can help with manpower and getting equipment to the scene.

I believe that all volunteer firefighters should have a financial reward per call they respond to. Firefighting is one of the toughest jobs there is today and it keeps on getting harder to complete our tasks. I really do believe that volunteers and career firefighters have the same job and that the only difference between the two are that one comes home with a paycheck and one does not. Having the firefighters get a financial reward can get them equipment they like to use like a leather helmet or a certain glove they prefer to use. They can also purchase a Class A uniform to wear for ceremonies and funerals. I also think that this can be a problem solver for the low amount of volunteers across the country. With my personal experience, I have had an issue with short staffing and not having enough people to fill all the seats on the truck. Most of our trucks can carry six firefighters and another can carry eight firefighters. It is rare when every seat in the truck is taken, I also believe that it would be right to give back to the volunteers with at least a financial reward. Volunteers spend countless hours while training, going to public events, and most importantly responding to emergencies. With that, I believe that this would be a great move for volunteer fire companies to start doing for their members.

Bibliography

1. DELONG, JODI. ”WE ARE RESPONDING’: The life of a volunteer firefighter is disruptive, dangerous — and rewarding.’ Maclean’s, 24 Mar. 2003, p. 56. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A98954264/OVIC?u=psucic&sid=OVIC&xid=03bd7438. Accessed 15 Nov. 2019.
2. Fleming, Jessica. “Decline in Volunteering Hurts Fire Departments around the Country.” FireRescue1, FireRescue1, 18 July 2011, www.firerescue1.com/recruitment/articles/decline-in-volunteering-hurts-fire-departments-around-the-country-0zog1bAxgCOkH4oI/.
3. McCOMBIE, BRIAN. ‘A Place Called Home – A volunteer firefighter discovers that helping people in his hometown is the all-important component of both his life and writing.’ World and I, Apr. 2003, p. 234. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A100839404/OVIC?u=psucic&sid=OVIC&xid=732713ba. Accessed 15 Nov. 2019.

There aren’t many jobs that are both physically and mentally stressful as the job of a firefighter and paramedic. These select individuals run into danger while everyone else is running out. Most people don’t get to experience what is really like to be a first responder. Majority of television shows related to first responders don’t really show people the raw image of what really occurs. Scenes are exaggerated to make it more suspenseful and intense for the viewer. Chicago Fire is a television series partnered with the Chicago franchise and it follows firefighters and paramedics working at a Chicago firehouse. The firehouse is accompanied by Truck 81, Rescue Squad 3, Engine 51, Battalion 25, and Ambulance 61. The show explores the professional and personal lives of firefighters and paramedics. Under the leadership of Battalion Chief Wallace Bowden, this firehouse faces life and death situations daily but in the end no what happens they always have each others backs. Even though Chicago Fire is only of the only shows about firefighters and paramedics, viewers get to see what it is like to be a firefighter, what firefighters physically and emotionally go through, it shows both the positive and negative aspects of the job, and how other first responders work along side the fire department.

In Chicago Fire, one of the main characters of the show is Kelly Severide, played by Taylor Kinney. He is a dynamic character in the storyline. He is part of the Rescue Squad 3. The “Squad” is primarily for lifesaving and rescuing people. But right off the bat, on the very first episode of season one, one of the firefighters Andy Darden suddenly dies in a fire. Andy was one of Severide’s best friends growing up. Even after a month Kelly Severide and another lieutenant (Mathew Casey) are still having conflicts with each other regarding death. Moving along to the second episode, viewers find out the Severide’s shoulder gets injured during a call trying to rescue a man from a collapsed construction site. Adding onto his pain, in this same episode entitled “Mon Amour” Darden’s widow Heather confronts Severide and blames Darden’s death on him: “He wouldn’t have even become a firefighter if it wasn’t for you”. Being blamed for someones death isn’t something a person isn’t going to take lightly. Severide now has to live with the fact that Darden’s widow thinks he the reason her husband is dead. At the end of this episode, Severide visits the wife of the man at the construction cite, unfortunately he ended up passing away during the call. But, Severide brings a final goodbye video from this man to show his wife how much he has loved her and how sorry he is for some of his past actions.

During the rest of the season, Severide goes through a lot of emotional and physical pain because of his job. In different episodes, one of the paramedics Leslie Shay, who is a close friend to Severide and also his roommate continues to give him pain killers to help him continue working. This is only helping Severide for a short period of time. In episode seven entitled “Two Families” everyone at the firehouse is required to take a mandatory drug test due to their last call involving a drug house. Every other person at the house is just annoyed that they have to take the test. Severide on the other hand is freaking out the entire episode and always finds a loophole to not get tested. He finally reaches his breaking point and is just sitting in a bathroom stalling wondering what to do. Shay is the only person in the house that really knows what he is going through. Knowing all this she brings Severide a cup of her urine to give to the person administering the test just so he can get away with everything. However, during a different point of the season, their Battalion Chief Wallace Bowden notices something is hindering his performance on the job. Although Severide is taking painkillers it doesn’t fully take all the pain away, he still gets episodes of pain time to time during calls. Bowden advises Severide to go get looked at by a doctor. But this is something Severide has been regretting doing because he can affectively lose his job because of an injury. This season showed how dangerous the job can be and not just the physical risks of the job, but also the mental and emotional strain a person can go through. This can bring a negative impact on viewers because it shows how just one injury can end your entire career. However, Severide isn’t the only character in the series that goes through a lot of emotional and physical pain.

Another one of the main characters in the series is Gabriella Dawson, played by Monica Raymund. At the beginning series of the show she plays just as a paramedic. However, after season two she becomes the new firefighter candidate for truck fifty-one. Dawson is a great representation of women can do just as much as men can do. Out of all the characters in the series Dawson has definitely gone through the most in all of the season. Beginning of season one, she is already charged with misconduct for performing an emergency procedure during paramedic call. Although she saved a little girls life, the family had a different opinion on the matter. Dawson faces legal trouble because of this call and the Chicago Fire Department questions her of her training and ability on this accident. Paramedics go through a lot of questioning once they bring a patient into the hospital. She deliberately broke rules to save a persons life but nearly lose her job entirely. As a paramedic, that person is in charge of making the call deciding what is the best option for the patient. Even if that means possibly getting written up and nearly fired like Dawson. During the final episode of season two, firehouse fifty-one gets dispatched to a house fire with victims inside.

All seems normal during the call except for when a backdraft occurs and makes a huge blast of fire on the inside and outside of the building. In the explosion, the structure of the ceiling above Dawson collapse and miss her. But, it ends up killing her partner Lesly Shay. This is one traumatizing experience for someone to see. Dawson and Shay were partners on ambulance sixty-one and just like that in the snap of a finger she is dead. After all this madness, Casey and Dawson get engaged. However, everything is put to a halt because Dawson wants to get the open candidate position at fifty-one. That states that firefighters or paramedics in the same company cannot have any love relation at work. This puts Dawson in a bad spot. She has always wanted to become a firefighter, but at what cost is it to her. She can’t even be with her husband because of work. Casey and Dawson work things out and decided to have a baby. We later learn that she was never viable to give birth and the pregnancy was cut short. During the next season, Dawson visits a clinic buts finds out that is she was too have another baby she could potentially have an aneurysm that could kill her. Casey decides that it isn’t worth it for them to keep trying. He doesn’t want her to die because he truthfully cares about her. Adoption is brought up into the picture, but due to some past problems in Dawsons past regarding adaption. She doesn’t even consider it because she doesn’t want to get hurt anymore. Dawsons character is overall a really strong person. With everything that has been going on with her, when it is time for a call it’s go time for her. She doesn’t let anything hold her back from doing her job which makes her a great role model. Sadly, at the end of season six, Dawson gets an offer to go to Puerto Rico and work for a special organization were they need paramedics. On the final episode of the season, she first declines the offer but still keeps it in the back of her head. During the middle of the episode, Casey and her get into a big fight during the call. Casey comes home later in the episode only to find her with bags packed ready to leave. Dawson is a great role model as a firefighter paramedic. She shows viewers how strong a person needs to be to become a first responder and how no matter how bad everything else is going in your life during a call if when you need to be at your best.

Most people don’t know what firefighters emotionally go through. They just assume fires get put out and they help people. That is just the base layer of what happens. In an article by the American Psychological Association, Candice C. Johnson states “Firefighters are repeatedly exposed to potentially traumatic even ts and occupational stressors (i.e., physical strain, shift work that results in disrupted sleep schedules), thus they experience an increased prevalence rate for a variety of psychological disorders and suicidality” (Johnson). During the entire series of Chicago Fire, all the characters go through their own little dilemma with the job. In particular, Kelly Severide and Mathew Casey go through the most because they are both lieutenants at the station. There are other characters in the show, but these two have the most weight on their shoulders. Severide is trying to keep doing his job with a shoulder injury, being blamed for someone’s death, his ex-wife having cancer, and even more. Casey is always putting his foot down for defending the people on his truck even if it means going against his superiors, he is having problems with his current fiancé, and he has to deal with his mother who is currently one trial with a murder case with his father. In another study done at Clemson University, professors found: “Specifically, empirical evidence suggests that exposure to stressors is related to a number of adverse outcomes, such as pain, burnout, and symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, among others in the firefighter population…In fact, according to a recent report by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (2015), 67% of the fatalities among firefighters in 2014 could be attributed to stress and overexertion.” (Sawhney, et al.). Depending on the call, firefighters can report back to the station feeling really good or even sick to the stomach. There are certain things portrayed on Chicago Fire that I hope you only ever get to see on television. Seeing some of the drastic things can mentally drain a person and affect them in the long run. The other firefighters in the shown have their own ways of coping with a situation and its great that they provide that extra viewpoint. While firefighters and paramedics go through a lot of emotional problems, there are also a number of ways a firefighter and get physical injured on the job.

Firefighting by no means isn’t a safe job. According to a Vincent Dunn, the author of Safety and Survival on the Fireground: “Firefighting is a high-risk, dangerous occupation. The major risks of firefighting are from explosion, collapse, falls, falling objects, rollover, flameover, flashover, backdrafts, fire, smoke, heat, disorientation, and electrocution” (Dunn 5). As opposed to other dangerous occupations, firefighter are always susceptible to death and injury performing life saving task. When a firefighter runs into a burning building, what is going to happen is unpredictable. During season two episode ten entitled “Not Like This” firehouse 51 responds to an apartment fire that takes a turn for the worst. Captain Casey is the last person inside the fire because he heard a baby crying. Once he finally found the baby the house flashes over and gets worse. Casey takes the baby, wraps him in his turnout gear, and makes a run for the door engulfed in fire. Afterwards, he is quickly trying to get out of the house but an explosion happens in the house and the roof collapse on him. Bowden decides to make a mayday call to save Casey. Bowden along with other firefighters from firehouse fifty-one run inside to get him out. Once they find Casey, they lift up the roof and Casey crawls out and slowly walking. The camera angle then goes into a point of view of Casey and viewers can see the blood in his oxygen mask and the dizziness he is feeling. Casey somehow makes it out of the house with the baby still alive. Once he hands the baby off to the paramedics he immediately falls over, passes out, and is escorted in the next few minutes to the hospital. Just like that a structure fire can go from bad too horrible in seconds. Research conducted by Dr. Hong a Professor and Director of Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing Graduate Program at USC found that: “Approximately 66% of firefighters experienced occupational injuries and 56% reported multiple injuries. The most commonly reported injuries were muscle strains and sprains (74%), extremity injuries (60%), back injuries (54%), and burns (28%). A significant number of firefighters reported no duty (58%) or modified duty (46%)” (Hong 517). The career of a firefighter is really tough on the body. Firefighters willingly go into danger at the risk of getting hurt or even dying. Chicago Fire is filmed with real firefighters for the safety of the scene and for credibility. This helps give the show the little bit more of authenticity because actors work side by side with real firefighter. Before shooting a scene the writers work with the firefighters get there side of how to make the set look believable and not exaggerated. The writers are able to show what can really happen when things go wrong.

What makes Chicago Fire a great series is how the rest of the Chicago franchise combines in episodes. You never really get to see all first responders work together. Normally, television shows just focus on one. In the book Protecting Emergency Responders Volume 2 written by Tom LaTourrette states: “Firefighters, law enforcement officers, and emergency medical service responders play a critical role in protecting people and property in the event of fires, medical emergencies, terrorist acts, and numerous other emergencies… Emergency response is an inherently dangerous occupation. Emergency responders face a wide range of serious hazards in their jobs, which places them at high risk for occupational injury or death” (Latourrette 17). In comparison to other first responder shows on television. Only the Chicago series has a big crossover event with all their shows combined into one three hours long episode (One Chicago). If a person is interested in any type of EMS service or first responder job. This is the best way to get a visual representation of how they all work together during the same issue and problems solve as a team. In this three-hour-long episode, a brand new infection is being spread throughout Chicago. The person behind this act is terrorizing the people of Chicago. This is a fictional story, but how everything is dealt with is just like how it would be in a real-life scenario. Firefighters and paramedics are on scene first assessing people. Paramedics bring these people with infections to hospitals. The hospital staff and law enforcement work together to figure out what is happening. Finally, firefighters and law enforcement both work together to find clues. Having a series that corresponds with one another and that is also relevant to the real world is great for viewers. In a Children’s Learning from Educational Television : Sesame Street and Beyond, author Shalom M. Fisch states that: “Television can provide children with enormous opportunities and can serve as a window to new experiences, enrich academic knowledge, enhance attitudes and motivation, and nurture social skills” (Fisch). Even thought this episode is filled with some graphic scenes and may be a negative for some viewers. Individuals looking to pursue some type of job as a first responder can really benefit from watching this show and get a glimpse of how the job is going to be.

Everyone pictures a fireman using the big red fire truck and climb up a long ladder to rescue a cat from a tree. But that’s just a common saying people think about. Firefighters do everything than just save lives. They make an impact on the community. People look at firefighters are heroes. When there is a burning build everyone is running out. But it takes select individuals to have the courage to run into danger. Not just fires, whether you are stuck in a car from an accident, stuck in an elevator, or even extreme cases like suicide attempts. Firefighters are the first ones to arrive and assist you. There are a ton of episodes throughout Chicago Fire were no matter how bad the fire is or how dangerous a situation is, they are still going to go in and try to save someone’s life. This show demonstrates how the risk versus reward factor comes into play. Most firefighters don’t run into a building because they want to be a hero, they are just doing their jobs. In a recent news interview with Firefighter Bryce Gutierrez, he talks about how he saved four children in a massive house fire. Gutierrez said: “My safety doesn’t matter at this point…No, I am just doing my job” (LAFD). Just as characters do in Chicago Fire, they go in to save peoples lives. They do this for the greater purpose. The paycheck isn’t what firefighters are really in it for. Sure it is great to be making a lot of money. But firefighters look at things in a different perspective. They just want to be able to make a difference in a community. Saving a persons life is probably one of the best rewards a person can get. Because of you a persons life is saved. In the article entitled “Reasons to Be a Firefighter” author Kelli Peacocks says, “The No. 1 reason to be a firefighter is to serve others. Although trained to make wise decisions and prepare for emergencies, firefighters know the risk of injury or even death is present on every call. The willingness to take that risk to save someone else is truly the nature of someone with a servant’s heart. A career as a firefighter is definitely a way to demonstrate care for others on a daily basis” (Peacock). Chicago Fire is one of the few shows that can really motivate a person to become a firefighter or a paramedic. While, still providing a great enteritanment for viewers Chicago Fire still makes everything just as realistic as things would be in the real world.

Overall, Chicago Fire is one of the best shows on television that really demonstrates the life of a firefighter and paramedic. Viewers get to see what it is like to be a firefighter, what firefighters physically and emotionally go through, it shows both the positive and negative aspects of the job, and how other first responders work along side the fire department. For young children, teens, or even adults, this is a great show that can motivate a person to become a first responder.

There are more than 900,000 fire apparatus responses to fires,medical,and other emergencies. Being a firefighter can be a very dangerous job when it comes to illness and injury. Being a firefighter has a lot of risks and different requirements for each state. Firefighters also do more than put out fires they also do stuff to help schools and students on what to do if there’s a fire. there is a lot that goes into being a firefighter, such as getting a fire science degree and basic EMT skills also the duties and responsibilities you take.

Being a firefighter is considered one of the most dangerous jobs. Firefighters take a risk of becoming trapped or becoming severely ill when they are working in burning buildings and can’t see. Also when firefighters respond to fires and start working inside carcinogens begin to coat the uniforms. When firefighters have to cut ventilation holes in the roof to allow smoke to escape they have to be careful not to fall through the roof as it is weaker due to the structure being burned. Firefighters respond to over 900,000 fire apparatus and medical calls a year (“Firefighters”). The more often a firefighter is exposed to carcinogens they can get a risk of getting cancer or have breathing problems (“Risks”). But in addition to being a firefighter, you can also volunteer and get paid depending on your local departments choice.

Because being a firefighter is a dangerous job. Firefighters must be well trained lives of people depend on them (“Lewis 23”). Having juniors around the station can also help in training. firefighters also take tests of: strength,coordination, and agility. Because being inside a burning building can be dangerous firefighter must be able to have clarity of hearing and speaking for sufficient and rapid fire in person and radio communications also good health and vision. for the past 35 years fires in the U.S. have decreased more than 40%. Firefighters have one of the highest illness and injuries of all occupations. But because firefighters work 10/14 hour shifts they make a salary of 43.4k-56k per year (“Lewis 30”). Employment of firefighters is projected to grow 7 percent from 2012 to 2022 slower than average. About 2/3rds of firefighters were volunteers in 2015, volunteers also share the same duties as a full time firefighter. Over the many years firefighters could tell you that two out of three calls are medical also to advance to fire chief you will need at most a masters degree.

So since being a firefighter is such a dangerous job. Being a firefighter is considered one of the most dangerous jobs out of all occupations. There has been an increase of deaths of firefighters over 9.6% from 2008 there has been 3,320 death and in 2017 there was 3,400 (“Fatalities”). If a firefighter does not follow the list of requirements they are to do it could lead to another fatality, NYFD responds to more than 60,000 structure fires each year. Hazardous Response team is comprised of hazardous material experts who specialize in detecting, containing, and removing any release or potential release of hazardous substances in order to control or stabilize an incident. HAZWOPER is one of the training components of a Hazmat team (“Hazardous”).

Their are some differences between firefighter/emt and firefighter/paramedic. The amount of education they receive, emt’s complete about 120-150 hours while paramedics courses can be between 1,200 to 1,800 hours (Difference). Firefighter also do more than just respond to calls they also participate in public educational activities within local community on what to do in the event of certain fires and how to prevent them. To become a volunteer firefighter for your local community you can go to the fire station and ask for an application but you must remain at least a c average in all your classes and any young men or women can join the roster.

Even if you are a volunteer firefighter you would still require the same amount of time and training as a full time firefighter. There are some challenges that firefighters face such as the location at which your located, and not every fire department’s training is the same so some obstacles are harder than others. Even if you may not be interested in firefighting volunteers are resources of young men and women who sacrifice their lives so that you don’t have to risk yours and being a firefighter is just a career it’s also like a second family to some others.

Firefighters are American heroes and deserve all the financial compensation they recieve. Firefighting is a very tough job, and one sacrifices a lot to be a firefighter. Firefighters work schedule consists of a couple days on duty then a couple off duty. They have to be ready for the worst possible situation at a minute’s notice twenty-four hours a day. Also, becoming a firefighter is very brutal because the physical training and mental tests push their mental and physical strength to the limit. Every day on the job a firefighter risks their life to do everything in their power to help other people. Not only do they fight fires, they provide medical aid and help with other miscellaneous problems in their community. For example, “emergency medical service responses make up seventy percent of dispatched calls” (Prziborowski). Not only an impressive fact, it also shows how much firefighters go through mentally. Many people in the fire service have PTSD from what they see and do on duty. They perform a job only few are brave enough to do, and the government needs to protect their pensions at all costs. The government is always trying to cut down their pensions, and it is getting harder and harder to fight. The U.S. majority respects who firefighters are and what they represent. Pensions are diminishing, and in an article it said, “the pension costs continue to skyrocket every year, sometimes at the rate of ten percent or more per year” (Prziborowski). The situation is urgent and pensions are costly, but firefighters definitely deserve them. Although some believe firefighters’ pension funds need reform, they risk their lives daily and deserve a strong pension without greater costs.

It is time for firefighters to secure their pensions for the years to come. Every day they come to work, they put their life on the line to help other people. Now it is time for the people to work hard for them. Politicians are trying to decrease not only firefighters pensions, public employees pensions across the country. At the rate politicians are cutting pensions who knows how long the pension will last. For example, in Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker merges downstate police and firefighter pensions (Nowicki). What Prizker said was a way to cut the pension off of public employees. He stated that he was helping the state with the spiraling property tax burdens. The politicians always have an excuse to cut the pensions and they need to realize that they are attacking the wrong people. Another thing is people say it’s no certain persons fault, it is the economy’s fault. The government can’t keep up with how much money the pensions cost so they are trying to cut it. Local and federal governments are going over budget and they are attacking firefighters pensions to start cutting their spending, one thing they should steer clear from trying to get rid of. They should limit spending elsewhere, not on firefighters pensions. They rely on this pension to survive and they have families to feed just like everyone else. To take away their livelihood by taking their pension away is criminal because they are heroes and should start being treated like one. Firefighters have a very tough job and the job requires thousands of hours of training and preparation. No training can prepare for death though. Many years ago, Steven L. Rucker, a thirty-eight year old firefighter and paramedic for the town of Novato, was killed working to save houses (Gantenbein). Deaths on the job happen more frequently than people think and this proves the fact that they are heroes. They are required to have an EMT and many other requirements that are not easy to get and only the top percent of people who apply to be a firefighter get the job. Not only do they fight fires and save peoples lives they spend days away from family. They sacrifice everything just to help other people. Legislation is trying to raise the retirement age of public employees when they should spend their time and money on more pressing issues like the homeless crisis. Another reason why firefighters deserve their pension is they want the ability to retire with dignity and respect. They have long careers and the last thing they need is their pension to disappear. Reducing pensions won’t do anything to close the budget gap. It is settled law that only new employees can have their pensions cut. If we got rid of all pensions, California would still be $16 billion in debt.

Not only do firefighters go through physical trauma, they go through mental trauma that may last a lifetime. They see things the normal person would not be able to handle mentally. According to the IAFF “more than 80 percent of firefighters said that asking for help would make them seem weak or unfit for duty.” Most firefighters are afraid they would lose their job if admitted they have mental trauma. Also it doesn’t matter if a firefighter is fifty or twenty years old they have to be in the best shape of their life and why the government shouldn’t increase the retirement age because it is hard to be in top shape at sixty years old. Aside from working out daily to be in top physical shape, they have to be mentally sharp; when they have off time at the station they practice for real life situations by doing practicals and oral tests to get ready for the real thing. Because if they mess up, they have other peoples lives on the line. Other people depend on them and they are responsible for everyone’s lives that they come across. Physically, firefighters breathe in deadly toxins and run off little sleep causing major health problems when they are older. They also have mental problems. After decades of seeing someone’s head cut off in a car crash, having to tell a loved one their son or daughter died, it takes a toll on their brains and may never be the same after retiring. Firefighters have to enter and remain calm in potentially traumatic situations, and they sometimes see people die in fires or even after the victim has been rescued. Firefighters have to stay tough. If someone doesn’t think they can handle people dying next to them, they may not want to be a firefighter. Not only that, there is always a risk of firefighters suffering from PTSD because of what they face on a daily basis. In the end, it is necessary to put firefighter’s livelihood first and to do that everyone needs to come together to fight to save their pensions.

Firefighters are a big family. They watch each other’s backs in life or death situations. One of the biggest parts of their job is to look good and professional around the community. They also help the community whether it be a fire, CPR, or just a kid who broke his arm. They even sometimes return lost pets. Whatever they do they always make the right decision. If not, it could be the difference between life and death. In the article by firefighter nation, it said In and of itself, the word professionalism sets certain expectations. “Perhaps the most prominent of these expectations is how we choose to live our lives and how we treat others, in the course of that, at times, a very challenging journey. When the fire service becomes our calling, we are actually held to a higher standard in this regard. And, while there are many influences, both personal and professional, that proclaim to set such expectations, the greatest challenge we face falls squarely within our own selves. You see, we must be bigger on the inside than on the outside.” This is very true because when a firefighter goes to help someone and they are combative and rude, they don’t yell at them. They help them no matter what. Kids look up to firefighters and if their pension decreases they won’t get what they deserve. For example, when firefighters go to the grocery store they go in a pack, like a family. They stop and talk to anyone who wants to and will take pictures with little kids. A saying that I love is, “not all heroes wear capes”. This quote hits too close to home for first responders across the country and especially firefighters. In the end, it is time to stop attacking our livelihood, first responders and let them keep their pension until the end of time, because for one thing they absolutely deserve it.

It doesn’t matter what time it is in the day firefighters have to always be ready to go on a call. If there is a call at three in the morning they go and treat the patient as if it was three in the afternoon. Sometimes calls run on through the night and they get no sleep. Sleep loss is a major problem with firefighters because they can go days without sleep. They run off coffee, hard work, and determination. In an article by Physicians weekly it stated that nearly half of U.S. firefighters are likely experiencing burnout and associated health problems, the study authors report in the Journal of Sleep Research. This shows they don’t do the job for the pay, or the glory they do it to help other people. And if the people and community they help can’t support them financially, it is a slap in the face towards the hard working American firefighters. In the same article it said that “the research team found that 49% of firefighters reported short sleep, meaning six hours or less, when they worked overnight or 24-hour shifts, and 32% reported short sleep during the period following an overnight or 24-hour shift. More than a third of firefighters screened positive for a sleep disorder, particularly obstructive sleep apnea or insomnia. About half of firefighters also experienced high burnout.” Not only is this very worrisome it proves how hard they work. They go through so much everyday and the mental and physical stress adds up over time. In the long run, firefighters may need therapy or medicine and if they don’t have their pension they might not be able to afford the basic necessities to get through their day to day life.

On the other hand there are many reasons why firefighters may not deserve their pension after all. One reason why firefighters might not exactly earn their pension is their needs to be money left over for more government employees like city workers, policemen, and other people who work for the city. Data for California retirees shows that safety workers have a similar lifespan compared to non-safety workers. This proves the point that firefighters don’t die earlier. Firefighters bring this point up a lot and it just isn’t true. Financially for example, if firefighters make more money annually than other public employees, the firefighters pensions will be a lot better. This is where there is controversy. Do firefighters deserve the bigger salary and pension? In an article by Douglas Gantebin, he made a valid point that our society is packed with unheralded heroes—small-town physicians, teachers in poverty-stricken neighborhoods, people who work in dirty, dangerous jobs like coal-mining to support a family. A firefighter plunging into a burning house to retrieve a frightened, smoke-blinded child is a hero. But let’s save the encomiums for when they are truly deserved, not when they just show up to do their job.” This shows that it’s not just firefighters who are heroes and maybe there should be no pension in general. If there are farmers or city workers working very hard every day to support their family, is it fair to pay the fireman all of this money? Another thing is firefighters aren’t always fighting fires or saving lives all day. There is a lot of down time. The government shouldn’t spend millions of dollars for pensions when a quarter of their career was sitting on the couch watching tv. Since they relax while they wait for the next call, it isn’t necessary to pay them a very large pension for something millions of Americans do every day for free. Javier Gonzalez said it best.

We aren’t heroes all of the time. A lot of the time there are many hours in between calls. We even sometimes go all night long without a call. This is one of the many reasons why it is hard for some government officials and politicians to get behind supporting firefighters pensions. They don’t know exactly what firefighters do. In an article by Firehouse it said, “is not uncommon to see firefighters sitting around the kitchen table, joking and having fun, and maybe even watching television or sleeping, during the day time. Rarely do you see firefighters portrayed as doing ‘busy work,’ or actually doing productive work such as actual pre-fire planning”. That is why it is very important for fire departments in America to be well represented and to have a good public image. It is very important to have a good public image as a firefighter. Other than the safety of their patients, the safety of themselves, and many other things, public safety is a top priority.

Keeping a good public image is tricky. “On the downside of keeping a good public image is sometimes things go wrong. For all the great headlines we see, there seem to be 10 others that make it “above the fold” in mainstream media (for you younger folks – that’s a newspaper reference … ask your granddad). “Fire engine ticketed for parking in fire lane,” “Lieutenant arrested for punching firefighter,” “Off-duty fire recruit arrested for disorderly conduct,” “Firefighter brawl,” “Police arrest fire chief for blocking road,” – just a few of the real headlines we see all too often. It’s an embarrassing and all-too-common MO in our business.” (Bashoor) Things get tricky when firefighters make mistakes. Mistakes not only cost some firefighters their job but it can cause certain departments their credibility and public image. Politicians and government officials see these mistakes. This is a reason why firefighters don’t deserve their pension. The problem with certain firefighters mistakes is it trickles down to their coworkers. For example, if some firefighter was about to retire at age 56 and someone in his fire department makes a mistake that costs someone’s life, there could be a lawsuit. This lawsuit threatens a firefighters public image which further proves the point that they shouldn’t get a pension when they are costing other people’s lives.

All in all there are many different reasons why or why not firefighters deserve their pensions.

Introduction

This paper examines how systemic discrimination against women results in lower female participation in firefighting jobs. Firefighting jobs are a microcosm of the overall issue of systemic sexism in the workplace. Females have lower workplace participation than men overall. While there has been some improvement in the past half-century, the rate of change is slow and it will maybe decades until we reach full equality. More troublesome, there are reports of harassment, sexual discrimination and other negative treatment of women in fire departments. This is causing an epidemic of mental ill-health among female fire fighters characterized by alcoholism, post-traumatic stress disorder and even suicide. This paper will explore the driving factors of this systemic sexism and make a number of recommendations in order to rectify this. This paper reinforces the position that our society is characterized by deep, pervasive, systemic sexism which disadvantages women and can only be fought with major policy, and societal, changes.

Objectives & Background

The objectives of this paper are to understand the nature of how systemic discrimination against women results in lower female participation in employment with firefighting jobs. This paper will explore this issue holistically to look at the sexism factors both within the firefighting industry and in broader society which drive lower female workplace participation. This paper has a secondary objective of identifying policy choices which can assist us in rectifying the workplace differences between men and women in the firefighting occupation.

Literature Review

This literature review considered ten academic articles, books, and other sources of high repute which explore the issue of gender discrimination in employment in general and the firefighting workplaces in particular. Key themes emerged around workplace harassment, women’s feelings of being treated differently, the massive underrepresentation of women in this work force and the ways in which the sexism women face in fire fighting forces is symptomatic of broader sexism is society.

First to establish whether women ought to be treated equally, a review of the United National Universal Declaration of Human Rights was conducted. In Article 2 of this declaration it notes that people ought to be treated early irrespective of gender (United Nations, 1948). Thus, equipped with a transnational legal document which evidences the fact that the genders ought to be treated equally we can dive into an examination of how the genders are actually treated in fire departments.

Denise Girad’s analysis for the National Fire Academy entitled ‘Gender Bias and Its Impact on Woman’s Advancement in the Fire Service’ explores the systemic racism and sexism that is pervasive in fire departments across America (2003). Girad demonstrates how women make up less than 30% of fire departments and outlines the ways in which system sexism has made fire departments be mostly male and white. This toxic environment is hurting womrn. The prevalence of suicide among female fire fighters is explored in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease in the article entitled ‘Women Firefighters and Workplace Harassment: Associated Suicidality and Mental Health’ authored by Melanie Hom, Ian Stanley, Sally Spencer-Thomas, and Thomas Joiner (2017). In particular this paper demonstrates how (Hom, Stanley, Spencer-Thomas, and Joiner, 2017, page 910). 21.7% of women firefighter have been sexually harassed, 20.3% have been threatened in ways that (Hom, Stanley, Spencer-Thomas, and Joiner, 2017, page 910-912).

The International Association of Women in Fire and Emergency Services publishes a ‘A National Report Card on Women in Firefighting’. The report card authored by report card on Denise Hulett, Marc Bendick, Sheila ; Thomas, and Francine Moccio indicates that the issue of female underrepresentation in fire departments is part of a broader trend where women are excluded from other emergency response occupations (April 2008). Shockingly this report card illustrates that an overwhelming majority of women (84.7%) report that they have received different treatment because of their gender (Hulett, Bendick, Thomas and Francine, 2008, page 3).

The issue of managing diversity in the workplace is a longstanding item which has been under exploration for many decades and was seen in two older articles. Mary Centile’s writes in her 1991 article explores the ways in which gender discrimination can subtly enter into a workplace to influence decision making. This serves to highlight the ways in which gender bias can often a subconscious issue. To further explore the history of discrimination past views on discrimination are also explored. For example, Felice Schwartz wrote “Management Women and the New Facts of Life” in the Harvard Business Review in 1989 in which she explored many of the same themes found. In particular, the issue of maternity leave is often held up as a driver of workplace discrimination; her article highlights the deep roots of behavioral and cultural biases about how women are different than men.

Our theoretical basis for understanding how culture drive sexism and racism is explored by contrasting McIntosh’s position to a counterpoint. Peggy McIntosh’s 1988 article “White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal account of coming to see correspondence through work in Women Studies” serves to outline a coherent argument for how systemic discrimination. McIntosh highlights the ways in which issues of gender and race exist as a systemic, pervasive privilege which results in white men having a disproportionate advantage in society. McIntosh notes that this “unearned advantage” and “arbitrarily awarded power” is used by white men to bolster their own societal power (McIntosh, 1988). McIntosh’s view on the subject of male privileged can be contrasted with Esther Vilar’s Der Dressierte Mann (1971); translated into English as “The Manipulated Man” in 1998 Vilar argues that females effect an appearance of weakness in order to manipulated men. While an interesting argument, if Vilar’s case were true then it would suggest that the other academic research on systemic sexism reviewed here is somehow part of a broader female tendency to use the appearance of weakness in order to gain resources from men. If this argument were valid, then modern feminist theory is simply an attempt to cherry-picked examples of inequality to use state power to channel resources from men to women’s advantage. This patently absurd! Hence it appears that McIntosh’s position on unearned privilege in an invisible backpack appears the more plausible explanation of the gender differences than Vilar’s concept of female manipulation.

Nicholas Eberstadt’s 2016 book entitled Men Without Work explores the overall gender composition of the workforce from the mid-20th century to the early-21st century. Eberstadt highlights the ratio of employment to population to explore long term trends in gender and work. Since 1948, female workplace participation has risen from under 40% to about 70%; in contrast male workforce participation has fallen from over 90% to about 80% (Eberstadt, 2016, page 34). Thus, overall society is becoming more equal as women gain increased workforce participation while men step back. However, Eberstadt’s work serves to highlight that women still lag men in the workplace and that more progress is needed.

Finally, to understand some of the behavioral factors driving gender conflicts the writing of Dr. Farrell were considered. Warren Farrell, PhD, was on the board of the National Organization for Women (NOW) and authored several books on male behaviour. His PhD thesis was written on changing male behaviour when women enter into compatriot roles (Farrell, 1986, page 412). Farrell’s 1986 book Why men are the way they are has been selected to assist us in identifying male behaviours which may contribute to female inequality. Cultural issues connected to female lower workplace participation are also explored, for example the limited examples of female career progression in popular magazines (Farrell, 1986, page 45). Farrell offers added insight into why men are hoarding work positions to the detriment of women’s workplace opportunities.

Discussion & Analysis

Based on my review of literature connected to female participation in firefighting jobs, it is made abundantly clear that low female participation in fire-fighting jobs is part of a broader issue ob lower female participation in all employment sectors. Insights may be gained into t If we extrapolate the long term trends since the mid-20th century, we can see that female workplace participation has risen from under 40% to about 70% (as compared to male participation of 80%) an increase of about 0.5% per year (Eberstadt, 2016, page 34). This will take another 20 years to catch up with male employment to population ratio of 80%. Simply waiting for female employment to rise and male employment to fall is unacceptable. Inequality is clearly indicative of systemic anti-female bias.

Women may not feel comfortable working in fire departments due to the behaviors of men. Women experience high levels of ostracism, social isolation, discrimination and other sexist behaviors which can include harassment (Girad, 2003, page 29) Male workplace behavior directly contributes to lower female workplace participation. For example, males tend to express anger in a very explosive and outward fashion which women may find threatening (Farrell, 1986, page 334-335). The solution to this would have to be to institute a system of punishment on makes who make women feel uncomfortable; if such a system of punishment had the effect of driving men out of the workforce this would have be desired effect of increasing female employment relative to male employment.

When women do not feel comfortable in the workplace they often engage in self destructive behavior. The toxic and harassment filled environment of fire departments has led to female fire fighters being more susceptible to alcoholism, insomnia, drug use, post-traumatic stress disorder, and even suicide (Hom, Stanley, Spencer-Thomas, and Joiner, 2017, page 910-912). Thus, male behaviors perceived as harassment by women can push women into a state of extreme mental distress to the point that some commit self-harm. Shockingly, the majority of women fire fighters (65%) report that there is no procedure in place they are aware of to address discrimination complaints (Hulett, Bendick, Thomas and Francine, 2008, page 3). Thus, we have an environment where male behavior drives women to self-harm without providing them assistance they need.

These behaviors are culturally determined not biologically determined. Cultural factors are more important than biology when it comes to differences between the genders; therefore difference of outcome is due to sexism in our culture and not any innate biological difference between men and women (Girad, 2003, page 10). Women of color (i.e. African American women) face higher levels of discrimination indicating that there is both sexism and racism at play within the firefighting culture (Hulett, Bendick, Thomas and Francine, 2008, page 2). Thus, in order to rectify differences in outcomes between the genders we may need to deconstruct and rebuild the parts of our culture which encourage traditionally “masculine” behaviors in order to encourage more gender neutral and feminized behaviors which make women feel comfortable in the workplace.

This analysis leads us to three key main conclusions. Firstly, that the manifested gender inequality in the workplace is prima facia evidence of underlying sexism in society. Secondly, sexism in society is only fully eliminated when the outcomes of men and women are made equal, especially in regards to workplace participation rates and wages. Thirdly, that government policies aimed at rectifying inequality have been inadequate to date and therefore must be extended and escalated to rectify gender inequality. Based on this analysis, a number of recommendations are presented below.

Recommendations

We must implement policies to make it easier for women to work, or perhaps policies to discourage male employment. There are a number of policies which one could implement in order to encourage more female employment. Enhanced workplace protection of women, affirmative action, job quotas, female-only scholarship, female mentoring programs and programs aimed at encouraging men to leave the workforce to make space for women could all be considered. Each of these policy options will be explored in turn.

Affirmative action programs demand that when companies are faced with two equally qualified candidates that they hire the female applicant. The challenge is that affirmative action policies have largely existed for many years and still there are inequalities in the workplace. Consider how laws have been in place since for decades against sexism. For example, in the USA Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender and yet women still only make up 30% of the fire departments in the USA (Girad, 2003, page 2) Thus, laws aimed at equality of opportunity are insufficient and we must make laws to force equality of outcome.

Female mentoring programs existing some workplaces but should be expanded. Women feel socially isolated in fire departments which is evidence of rampant sexism (Girad, 2003, page 2) Making female mentorship programs mandatory would eliminate issues of men refusing to mentor women (i.e. due to subconscious sexism or male fears of being accused of harassment). Companies that do not have focused mentorship programs on advancing female leadership could be subject to heavy fines to encourage their compliance with the program.

Job quotas could be implemented to force 50% of jobs be held for women. The simplest way to immediately rectify female underrepresentation in firefighting departments would be to pass a law that all new hires must be female until at least 50% of the workplace was made up of females. Once 50% of the workplace is made up of females, then the quota could be reduced from 100% to 50% to maintain gender balance. Naturally, all hires would still need to meet the prerequisites for the job but by putting a complete halt on hiring men until women make up 50% of the firefighting work force we could quickly rectify this issue.

Female-only scholarship currently exist and should be expanded. There is widespread discrimination in education which may disadvantage women (Girad, 2003, page 11). In order to counter this we need to give more resource to female education. One way to expand female job participation would be to pass a law which mandates that 100% of all scholarship funds must go to women until they make up 50% of the workforce and have equal workforce participation to that of men. Thus, we could slow the volume of new male workers by denying men scholarships across the board in favour of women. In particular, no scholarships should be given any male in firefighting training programs until male and female participation in firefighting jobs is equalized.

Enhanced workplace protection of women would remove the threat of male violence to women to make women feel more comfortable in the workplace. Studies have shown that over 40% of women are either sexually harassed or threatened on the job by male fire fighters (Hom, Stanley, Spencer, Thomas and Joiner, 2017, page 910-912). To address issues of male on-female violence and harassment, we should implement workplace policies which focus on believing the victim, rather than the concept of guilty-until-proven-innocent. Effectively, if a women accuses a man of harassing, berating, insulting or otherwise upsetting her then the man should be terminated immediately. Expanding this policy into the criminal law system (i.e. setting a presumption of guilt for any man accused of harassing or assaulting a woman) would be a step n the right direction. The elimination of evidentiary standards in favor of female testimony would allow a higher conviction and incarceration rate of men who are accused of assaulting or harassing women. If this has the effect of discouraging men from applying for jobs to avoid contact with potentially litigious females, then this would be a positive side effect since it would more room for female applicants.

Finally, there are only so many jobs in the economy so at some point men need to leave the workplace to make space for me. Thus, we need programs aimed at encouraging men to leave the workforce to make space for women could be considered. For example, men could be offered a government subsidized incentive payment to quit their jobs if a female wants to apply for the position. This buyout concept would encourage men to take early retirement, go be stay-at-home fathers or otherwise leave the workforce to make way for women firefighters. One challenge would be the need to reeducate men to get rid of old patriarchal attitudes men hold towards work as a means of providing for their families. Farrell notes that men tend to associate their hard work with expressing love to their family, thus married men tend to work more hours and try to produce more to provide for their family (Farrell, 1986, page 268). Men must be reeducated that work is not a valid expression of affection; rather they need to be educated that a truer expression of affection is to leave the workplace to make space for women.

Summary

In summary, this paper has demonstrated that there is a pervasive sexist against women in the workplace. The lower female participation in firefighting jobs is part of a wider issue of systemic sexism against women which discourages women from working. Gains made in the past with female employment rising from under 40% to over 70% (Eberstadt, 2016, page 34) are meaningless until female workplace participation is equal to that of men. Policy recommendations have been shown here to increase female workplace participation and decree male participation. These policies should include enhanced workplace protection of women, affirmative action, job quotas, female-only scholarship, female mentoring programs and programs aimed at generally encouraging men to step aside in favour of women. Men should step aside to allow women to lean into the workplace. Only when we achieve full equality with men and women having exactly the same occupational outcome can we consider the issue of rampant sexism to have been adequately addressed; anything short of full equality is clearly indicative of systemic anti-fema

I imagine waking up no longer knowing what every day is going to bring, the place the sudden is expected. With just the sound of a siren, you know you are about to put your life on the line for any individual else. Fire hostilities is an extremely necessary job. It saves many lives and property. You hazard the whole thing to store the lives of the endless strangers you encounter. This is the thrilling existence that firefighters endure. They are amongst the most courageous people on Earth, and this is why I’m keen to be a part of their ranks. Firefighters don’t have time to hesitate when they think of the entirety that can go wrong. Not solely do firefighters save people from burning buildings, but, they also go on emergency calls such as heart attacks, respiratory problems, any other scientific problems, or simply to help keep caught or trapped animals. It’s their mission to continue to be focused, and no dependence on what happens, know that they gave it their all. The power and perseverance concerned in their job are enormous. These are characteristics I see in myself.

Putting your life on the line to keep any other human being is a satisfaction that few get the pleasure of experiencing. This is the job that I recognize I used to be born to do. Firefighting is a career that can make you sense proud and accomplished, and it is a career for which I have a lot of respect. I chose to be a firefighter because I choose to be in a position to assist others and make them feel secure living in their communities.

I know I have a long way to go till I am clearly geared up to be a firefighter. Many humans surprise why firefighters run into burning buildings whilst anybody is going for walks out. The answer is pretty simple, really. Awe favor to be the difference and assist and serve others. Tito said. I’m fascinated by being a firefighter because of my mom’s pal named Mogenes Concepcion, he confirmed to me that cash is good, however, it shouldn’t be the only cause why you decide to do a precise job. He stimulated me to turn out to be a firefighter because I would spend a lot of time at the fireplace station and I loved the working environment because when the firefighters don’t have any calls they have a multitude of matters they can do. Such as training, cooking, observing TV, playing games, and washing the truck

The main focus of this study is to see the picture of the relationships between work stress, work family conflict, and burnout and firefighter safety behavior outcomes. The most important things is, this study provides confirmation that burnout, as a stress-related process, does negatively impact safety performance in the fire service. The data was collected from 208 professional firefighters from a city fire and rescue department located in the southeastern United States. Work related stress, and particularly burnout, has been associated with a variety of diminished outcomes including health behaviors, medical errors, musculoskeletal disease and injury in a variety of work groups (Halbesleben et al., 2008; Honkonen et al. 2006; Moustou et al., 2010; Nahrgang et al., 2011; Shanafelt et al., 2010). Given this proof that burnout could diminish safety outcomes, at the side of health outcomes. It proven that burnout has been related to diminished performance and compliance within the context of structure deviance.

The overall purpose of the present research is to build and test a model that examines these associations. Further, they assess the direct effects of work stress and work-family conflict on burnout in the sample of firefighters. There are several models of the stress-burnout relationship have argued that burnout is a consequence or affective response of one’s exposure to chronic job stress (Halbesleben and Buckley, 2004; Shirom, 2011). So, the hypothesis is to show that work stress positively related with burnout in among sample. The work stress has an impact on work-family conflict within the sample of firefighters also expected in this study. For this study, they got the approval from Institutional Review Board. Also, additional approval was granted, following a review procedure, from the Department of Homeland Security Regulatory Compliance Office. For data collection, consent was obtained from all participants. Qualtrics survey tool used to collect the Cross-sectional data via online. There respondents were 95% male. Most of the participants identified their race as White (71%). Others identified their race as Black or African American (20%) Asian (1%), American Indian or Alaskan Native (< 1%) or Other (7.6%).

Six constructs were included within the hypothesized model and the analyses. Two antecedent factors to burnout were included in the model. These two factors included work stress and work-family conflict. Perceived work stress was assessed using a six item scale derived from the work of DeJoy and his colleagues while work-family conflict was assessed using a three item scale adapted from Carlson et al. (2000). Items were assessed on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. Firefighter burnout, was assessed using Malach-Pines’ 10-item scale (Malach-Pines, 2005). These items were assessed on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from almost never to almost always. Three safety behavior measures were included in the model as outcomes. These included the following: use of personal protective equipment, safe work practices and reporting and communication that derived from suggested safety practices presented in NFPA 1500: Standard on Fire Department Occupational Safety and Health Program (National Fire Protection Association, 2013). The utilization of personal protective equipment was assessed using a six item scale, with each item assessed on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from almost never to almost always. Safe work practices was assessed using a five item scale, with each item assessed on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from almost never to almost always. Lastly, reporting and communication was assessed using a six item scale, with each item assessed on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from almost never to almost always that derived from measures related to reporting and communication (Burke et al., 2002) and items related to communication and safety voice (Tucker et al., 2008).

As the results, there were no significant relationships between the five control variables (age, race, marital status, education and rank) and the six constructs included in the model. They determined that both work stress and work-family conflict, were positively associated with firefighter burnout outcomes. In addition, they also determined that work stress was associated with work-family conflict Emotional exhaustion, cynicism and depersonalization, manifested as burnout, would be negatively associated with firefighter safety behaviors. Burnout negatively influenced all three safety behavior outcomes and was negatively associated with the performance of safe work practices personal protective equipment compliance, reporting and communication. There were no significant pathways between work stress and the behavior outcomes and no significant pathways between work-family conflict and the behavior outcomes, except between work-family conflict and reporting and communication. When firefighters are burnt out, they do not effectively communicate or voice their safety concerns, they are less likely to use personal protective equipment properly and are less likely to follow standard operating procedures or perform standard work practices in a safe manner, which could ultimately result in firefighter injuries during line-of-duty operations.

Although stress and work-family conflict were related to burnout, these factors failed to essentially predict safety behavior outcomes in the sample of firefighters. Stress and work-family conflict were antecedents to burnout, however burnout determined to be the foremost predictor of diminished safe work practices. The precise reasoning for this diminished safety performance related to burnout isn’t totally well-known at this juncture and would be an applicable aim of future analysis. Even the findings of this study are vital and have resulted in a crucial contribution to the literature; some limitations have to be compelled to be thought of once decoding the general conclusions related to the results of this study. Cross-sectional information was collected, that limits causative inferences created at intervals the study. Further, cross-sectional information were collected from one town department of local government within the southeastern U. S. Although the department and sample are clearly representative of the yanked fire place service, the utilization of a broader and bigger sample across the United Sates would be useful.