Posted: 2/15/2007 5:02:52 AM EDT
|
Canton Tx has it's first openly gay fire lieutenant. That's right, our very own TheRedGoat was promoted to Lieutenant in the Ok, maybe not openly gay, but c'mon, who here thinks his arfcom gayness is limited to the internet??? TRG has been with the fire department for about 18 months or so. While he may be more of a jokester than most, when necessary, he shows the intelligence and maturity necessary to make good decisions and ensure the safety of fire fighters and others on a scene. IMO it was a great decision by the Fire Chief. Congrats B. TXL |
Geez even with my volly department that would be extremely fast, even probation is a minimum of 1 year. But hey congrats! Im shure he will make a great officer! 
|
|
His day job is a college professor. He lives about 2 miles from the station. He usually runs more calls than anyone but the few paid guys that are there. He spent months getting their IT section working, and the man works his ass off doing stuff at the station that needs to be done. He also picks up alot of paid shifts when he can. Between that, his leadership, his personality, and his ability to learn very quickly, he was a great choice, even after such a short period of time. TXL |
I did 4 years in Little Rock on an ambulance and then moved to a small town in North east Arkansas. I joined the volunteer fire dept there and after 4 months was made the EMS LT. Our Asst Cheif, also an EMT(but never did anything with it for more than our fire dept) was with me on a major call, and saw how I acted, reacted, gave report to the medics and wrote the report. He'd been in charge of EMS. He publicly told the chief and other officers I'd forgotten more about EMS than he knew and it'd be a mistake not to put me in charge of it. Within 6 months I had 4 more people in EMT school, that I got a hospitial to donate, a medical director, and an EBLS certification for the fire dept with AED's on our first due fire and rescue rigs. By a year I had one in every station and 3 in central, along with about 6 total EMTs. I also arranged for them to get experience 3rd riding in Memphis and Little Rock My fire probation continuted for 2 months after because the standard probation was 6 months. With volly depts sometimes it's the best man for the job. On a small rural dept with a low (less than 5 runs a week usually) call volume, that happened to be a guy that'd spent for years loving friday nights working gang shootings, hit and runs, interstate MVA's etc etc etc. I literally ran more calls in a day than a lot of these guys ran in a month. I was there about 2 years total. They were great guys and leaving that department was one of the hardest things I've ever done. They are now paid and all my captains are gone. I'd be a 26 year old captain of a town that now has a part time paid dept and a call volume that keeps the guys busy enough to not get to fat. Bigger depts like Little Rock have people that have been trying to make driver for 5-10 years and can't get it done because the competition is so high. Most of those guys would be a god send to any small town VFD. It's very rare to find one that's not hurting bad for personnel, especially EMS guys. |
