Good-looking. This has to be a requirement for firefighters.
And many agree. We have yet to see an ugly fireman!
You find yourself ogling at these handsome men (and superwomen) as they speed by or as they alight from their eyecatching red fire engines while responding to a 911 call.
And ogling during emergency can distract. But these fightfighters are simply beautiful people!
Fire Station No. 6
Mesa has three teams of this captivating tribe in Fire Station No. 6, located at 1802 Cliff Drive right next to the church by the business center.
Each team is made up of a captain, an engineer and a firefighter.
The teams are designated by shifts in a 48-96 work schedule, a recent innovation that took in a nuance of Santa Barbara living conditions. The new schedule allows better commute time for these valiant workers, most of whom live outside the city.
Shift A is under Captain Steve Felix, nicknamed “Gato” (the cat). He is the most senior among our Mesa firefighters with 38 years of experience. Inspired by an uncle John of Montecito Fire station, Steve joined the force in 1972. He is a Santa Barbara native: born in 1949 at Cottage Hospital, graduated from Santa Barbara High, got his AA at city college. He joined US Forest Service and at age 21, became a full-fledged firefighter. “The Mesa is reasonably low key, ” Steve says about being at Station No. 6. Relishing his Mesa assignment, he adds, “The aspects of the Mesa I enjoy the most is the ocean coast. ” Steve loves to fish and knows some secret lobster places. His teammates feast on his catch at least once a month.
Steve is married and has two sons.
Shift A engineer is Robert Gardner aka “Bad Bob. ” He hails from Santa Maria and was paramedic in their local ambulance team. He joined the Navy for four years, after which he was a volunteer firefighter before becoming one in 1980. His first assignment was Station No. 1 as firefighter, got his seniority and passed as engineer. He has been on the Mesa for four years of his total 28.
Bob is divorced and has a daughter and a son.
A regular routine at the station are fill-ins. At interview time, Hank Hamburg was there for Bob.
When our local firefighters did 14-day deployments to the Zaca fire area last year, Hank was in the team that responded to the helicopter crash protection effort. The helicopter, carrying a 1500-gallon of fire extinguishing chemicals, had a mechanical problem.
A native and current resident of Torrance, Hank has 24 years of firefighting experience. His first year was with his town force, had brief stints in Palms Springs and Palos Verdes before coming to SB county. He was initially assigned in Orcutt with Captain Earl Corden. He has worked in SB for the past 23 years.
Hank lives in Torrance with wife and stepdaughter. He too loves to fish and goes hunting in his free time.
Shift A’s firefighter is Dean Millar alias “Caveman” - for his love of red meat. Originally of Fresno, he now lives in Orcutt, with wife Laurie and young children Riley, 5 and Madison, 3. “Orcutt is the Montecito of North County, ” he notes.
Dean has been a firefighter for 13 years. He was in Forest Service for three years. He recalls his “first taste of fire in the Fresno County schoolhouse” where he helped in the rescue of three people. He was hooked since then.
The Caveman shares Gato’s lobster/fishing hobby and is sworn not to divulge their secret places.
Stan Thompson is captain of Shift B. He agrees with the others that working on the Mesa for the past three years makes him feel lucky because Station No. 6 “is a highly desired assignment. ”
Stan has been a firefighter for 30 years. He lives in Sereno, “between Carpinteria and Summerland, where the smell of horses meets the transport corridor, ” he quips.
Like many firefighters, Stan first trained with the Forest Service. He joined the force in October 1977. Stan is married and has two children.
Shift B is made special by the presence of a female engineer: Sara McCarter, originally of Kansas but since 1980 has worked in SB. She first moved to San Diego then came to study teaching at UCSB. A female firefighter friend encouraged her to become one when she was 27.
Sarah underwent the three years of rigorous physical training, learning proper use of firefighting equipment and accessories, and mastering the medical response routine - just like everybody. All firefighters are expected to do so, no special treatment.
She worked with Station No. 1 for her first ten years and thankful that she has the Mesa assignment for eight. She lives in the neighborhood with husband Daniel, a firefighter who recently retired from the job.
For now, Shift B is missing a firefighter. Filling in for Matt Gritt’s vacated post for a day was Cory Cloud with three years of firefighting experience. Cory’s father Allan, is a retired firefighter now living in Vista del Monte. Cory has a circle of friends from SB High who are in the wait list for a post in the force. He too first trained in the Forest Service. Cory is married.
Shift C is headed by Captain Patrick McElroy also a Santa Barbara native: La Colina Jr High, SB High, CalPoly then UCSB Anthropology. He has Forest Service experience and became full-time firefighter in 1981, 11 years of which is on the Mesa. During all 27 years with the SB force, Pat lived with his family on the lower Riviera.
“The connection that we (Station No. 6) have with the Mesa is personal, ” Pat says. Like the others in the station, he relishes the fact that everything here is within reach - dining places, fast food, laundry, post office, grocery. Indeed, there’s the Mesa catch word: “self-contained. ”
Engineer for shift C is Jono Otsuki. Originally from Salinas, he first worked with the Monterey force as a pump operator. He worked in Redondo and Hermosa Beach as a firefighter then as engineer.
John is married and has young children, a son and a daughter.
The Shift C firefighter is Justin Williams from Walnut who graduated from Loyola Mount College. He trained as a firefighter in 1995 and joined the Los Angeles firefighters in 1999 before his SB post. His eight year experience in the force is good enough for girls to swoon over. The big news is: he is still single!
A Firefighter’s Work Life
Rule No. 1: All three members of the shift must be together in the same place, at all times, no matter what!
If for some reason, a member of the team has to run errands outside of the station, the two others must come along. For their entire 48-hour shift, the team must be together in the same place. No exceptions. The rule is crucial because without one member of the team, it cannot function effectively.
The captain has overall supervision and makes all the decisions in the firefighting work. He holds the game plan. The engineer, who is the fire engine driver, is responsible for providing the proper amount of water during the firefighting action. The firefighter is the front line man in the fire scene.
This is why the team must always do things together as one: train and drill together, work out together, run errands together, eat together, as they should work together.
This is also why compatibility of personality and character is important. The essence of team work is at high stakes.
As Stan puts it: “The firefighting profession has its little unique culture. ” To highlight its uniqueness, he adds: “This is a fulfilling work that most people do not have: we have the opportunity (to save lives) every minute we are at work. ”
Realizing this and given their lucrative paychecks and tempting work hours (48 work-96 rest plus a great deal of optional overtime), the wait list for firefighter trainees has dramatically increased through the years.
Stan recalls that during his years in the late 70’s, there were less than a hundred applicants. In Sarah’s time ten years later, the list went up to about 800. Three years ago, Cory took his test with 6500 others.
Firefighter training averages nine hundred to a thousand hours per year or six to eight hours daily. It consists of the routine drill of learning the basics of firefighting, the medical aspects involved, and mastery of tool and equipment use.
In Santa Barbara, the Training Tower is behind Fess Parker’s Red Lion Resort.
A good note on firefighters’ living quarters: it’s been upgraded to have separate beds and baths for every member of the crew. Good news for our female firefighters.
Daily routine
On a daily basis, the firefighters do certain technical routine: check all equipment - pump, ladder, hose line; get physical training; monitor and manage the calls.
Our Mesa teams generally do physical work out at the City College campus - running, pumping irons, drilling.
The local firefighting scheme is managed through the central desk at the station downtown. There is a hierarchy of call response distribution by affected areas. For instance, the closest two stations to No. 6 are No. 1 and No. 5. Should other teams be needed in an emergency here on the Mesa, these stations come next to the first responders.
Strike teams are made up of five engine companies with bulldozers and hand crews. For residential structures, the ideal ratio is one-on-one.
What are the usual calls? They are primarily medical. There are the traffic accidents, brush fires, car fires, and unique to the Mesa station, the cliff rescues for those caught while climbing by city college and beach areas such as Leadbetter and Hendry’s parks, and by the stairwells from the ocean. The Mesa team also occasionally assists in harbor rescues
Any recent excitement? Shift A responded to a call at around six in the evening from Shoreline Park. A 61-year-old man had stopped breathing and the team successfully resuscitated him. Two weeks later, the grateful man came to the station to thank his rescuers.
During the storm, our firefighters were quick to avert the fire that was starting by Washington Elementary.
TMP took pictures of a recent response to a medical emergency at the Mesa Shopping center, only one of many we’ve witness in this area so far.
And our Mesa red fire engine and its good-looking crew is always a sight to behold!
Important Note from our Firefighters
A working smoke alarm in your home can save your live.
Eighty percent (80%) of fires in the county today have been prevented because of the expedient use of a functioning smoke alarm.
Smoke alarms are cheap and easy to set up. Most of them use a nine-volt battery (the rectangular kind).
Make sure that you check on these batteries on a regular basis. When running low, the devise beeps or chirps to let you know it’s time to get a new one.
Be smart and save lives - including yours.
Have a good smoke alarm! |
