“Get rid of this Buck!”

“Where?” I yelled back.

“I don’t care!”

I glanced over the edge to make sure there was no one downstairs.  Then I just chucked the table over the side of the landing.  It smashed on the floor below, but there was so much noise I couldn’t hear the crash.  The landing was narrow, and this gave the four of us more room to move.  Flame was starting to roll all over the ceiling now despite our best efforts to shoot it back.

“Damnit, we need another line up here!  I don’t have a radio!  Who’s got a radio!”  Bill was yelling through his facemask, and was now looking at the little antenna sticking out of my pocket.  “Give it here Buck!”

He reached over to me to grab my radio.  He ripped the velcro loose and pulled.  It was just at that moment I remembered that I had put my glasses into their case and placed them in the same pocket before making entry.  I saw the case tumble off into the distance.  It was lost in the black smoke instantly.  Those were the only pair of glasses I had.

I couldn’t hear what Bill was yelling into the radio.  It was something about a hose, but I knew it wouldn’t be enough.  I hadn’t been a fireman very long, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if a fire is rolling so hot that a full stream from a two inch line has no effect on it you don’t have long before its time to give up.  The water was just turning to steam.

Then I heard a lot of yelling to my left.  I looked over and saw the helmet lights of several more firemen.  I wasn’t currently holding the line, so I decided to go over and see if they had another hose.

“You got another line?”

“Nope, we’re a truck company.  We’re gonna tear some shit up.  Here, help out!”

He handed me a closet hook.  I couldn’t tell who he was although it looked like a crew from the neighboring district.  They had already started pulling down the ceiling in the room adjacent to us.  One fireman pulled down a large section and fire sprang out, licking the drywall around it.  Another fireman saw this, walked over to a wall opposite from that side of the room and jabbed his own hook in the wall.  Again, flame shot out.  I was in yet another corner of the room.  I buried my hook into the wall and pulled, exposing yet more flame.  I looked behind me a saw the metal air vent near the ceiling glowing red hot.

“Time to give up!  We’re surrounded!  This is some bullshit and we need to leave!”  One of the truck company guys was yelling at me frantically through his facemask.

“We’re leaving, get your guys out!”

*               *               *

It had been a slow Christmas Eve.  We had only had about three or four ambulance runs.  As the evening progressed, the calls trickled until there was nothing.  All the taxpayers where enjoying their holiday, and no one thought it necessary to call 911.  It was bitterly cold outside and snowing hard.  I would later read that it was only two degrees outside when the fire started.  But early in the evening after dinner all I could think about was the hot cup of coffee I was enjoying before turning into bed early.  I was hoping to get some sleep on a quiet night before going home just in time to open presents with my family.  I had stepped put onto the apron to enjoy looking at the snow fall for a few minutes before turning in.

But the silence was interrupted when the tones dropped for a fire alarm.

We pulled up to a very large house in a posh area of town.  The people in this area were so well-to-do that we often used commercial building tactics and preplanning for the residences.  This particular residence was just below 8000 square feet if you include the basement. 

There was a little smoke showing in whisps, but the air was still clear inside the residence and the family was still inside.   We knew we had to act fast, but it had not become dangerous yet.  If it was slowly building in the walls we might have plenty of time to locate it and cool it off before it got enough air to burn hot.

“We just had this fireplace installed,” she told us.  “This is the first fire we have started in it, but something is not right.  The wall is so hot.  It just didn’t seem right.  The kids noticed some smoke outside and we called you all.”

“How long ago did you light the fire, ma’am?” asked our captain as he pulled out the thermal imaging camera to inspect the walls.

“Three hours ago or so.”

“Really, three hours?  It was hot all this time and you never called?”

“I wasn’t sure what to do.  I thought it might cool down.  I don’t know anything about fireplace construction.”

Our captain was now pointing the camera higher up the wall.  “It looks hotter as you go up.  Ma’am there may be a bit of fire inside your wall.  We are going to have a look upstairs as well, and we’ll get this figured out.”

Just as he was finishing his sentence we heard yelling from the husband upstairs.  Something about smoke coming from the walls.

After that everything was a bit of a blur.  To be honest, I do not have much fire experience, and I was never much of a fire fighter.  At the time I worked for a tiny suburban fire district that catered to the rich and famous.  No one on the department had fought a house fire in three years.  The residents in this area were so rich that all the houses had super sophisticated sprinkler and alarm systems.  The occasional faulty alarm made the bulk of our fire runs.  My whole fire career up to this point had consisted of me carrying an ax while I looked for an alarm panel.

Being a paramedic in this district was different.  We made medical runs all day long and constantly responded to the neighboring towns for mutual aid.  To be honest, our own district called for an ambulance about one a month, but we averaged about 8 to 10 runs per day.  And that’s how our salaries got paid.  And that’s why I was hired.  Being a fireman was just an afterthought.  I had zero experience and even less interest in the profession.  However, I was about to get a crash course in how not to fight a fire. 

*               *               *

I made my way back out onto the landing to tell my crew that it was hopeless and we had to go.  As I was yelling as much through my facemask it became apparent that they had come to the same conclusion.  We were going to pack up the hose and back out slowly but we heard this horrible creaking and groaning sound that slowly turned into a rumble.

“Go! Go! Go!” shouted Bill who was coming at me like a freight train.  If I hadn’t started running myself I surely would have been trampled by the others.  As it was though, they were going to have to work to keep up with me.

I abandoned the low and slow routine that comes with structure fire fighting.  I was running just as fast as a short squatty man in 70 pounds of gear can run.  The staircase ahead was L-shaped, with a landing halfway down turning to the left.  As I reached the top of the stairs I could hear the roar of the house coming down around me.  I couldn’t see through the smoke and I had no idea where the last step was.  I simply kept running forward and slammed into the wall in mid flight, sliding down the drywall to the first landing.  I then sprang from that and reached the bottom floor without touching one more step.  Seconds later I was outside the house.

I ran about halfway to the street, and turned around to count heads to make sure everyone was behind me.  Thankfully, all four of us where kneeling in the lawn panting and gasping for breath as the entire roof caved into the house.  My friend Tim started shouting that he was burned and I rushed over to him.  He was tearing off layers of gear screaming, “My neck!  My neck!”  As I got to him, the difference in temperature made it look as if he was on fire himself.  The environment we just left was close to 800 degrees, but out on the lawn it was only 2.  Smoke and stream were rising off of us as if we were covered in dry ice.  I pulled back his collar and found an ember that had made it’s way into his coat.  I brushed it off and started laughing.  He looked at me for a moment as if I was sadistic or insane.

“No! No! No!” I yelled.  “You’re going to be fine.  It was a tiny ember.  I’m sure it hurt like a bitch being sealed up in your coat.  But all you will have is a little blister, which is a damn sight better than having a wholehouse fall on top of you! 

*               *               *

The rest of the night was an exhausting marathon of dragging hose, moving hose, emptying hose, rolling hose, laying hose, and whatever else you can think of to do with hose.  If it was round and had water in it, I carried it somewhere.  This of course became tiring after a while.  Add to this the fact that we were constantly getting wet and the water would freeze to us in sheets.  I lost track of how many times I had to walk over to a tree and bang myself against it repeatedly to break the ice off.

Without my glasses I was completely useless.  Everything was blurry anyway, but the fact that the place was shrouded in snow made it intolerable.  People kept ordering me about by pointing a finger and saying, “Go over there and do so-and-so.”  Shortly afterwards I would be found wandering aimlessly in the neighbor’s yard looking for some non-existent object.

The only thing left to do was surround the house and drown it.  And that we did.  Two deck guns and a stinger turned that 8000 square foot house into the Fortress of Solitude.  The house could no longer burn.  It was encased in ice.

*               *               *

We got back to the station at about 6am on Christmas morning.  The next shift had learned of the fire and some had already come in to help with the clean up.  I wasn’t much good for anything.  I was blind, tired, could barely walk, and was prone to falling asleep every time I sat down for longer than 20 seconds.  At 6:30 the tones dropped again for a roof collapse at the local elementary school.  The weight of the snow had apparently made the structure give way.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me!”  All I could do was sit on the floor.  I had no energy left.  Thankfully there were enough people on hand to manage all the trucks.  That call turned out to be the real thing.  No one was hurt, but they were there for hours.  Thankfully, my partner and I were allowed to stay behind.  She was kind enough to give me a lift home.  I was unable to drive without my glasses and had to abandon my car at the station.

I arrived back home at about 8am on Christmas morning.  Exhausted, blind, sore, and disgusted, but happy to be alive.

Christmas was wonderful despite the circumstances.  My daughter was still a toddler and did not really yet grasp the concept of Santa Claus, but she would squeal with delight whenever she was presented with a gift.  After a while we figured this out and let her open all the presents.  I eventually fell asleep on the floor in front of the tree and was soon evicted and banished to the bedroom for snoring.

*               *               *

Upon my next shift I was greeted by all my excited co-workers.  “So Buck!  What did you think about your first real fire?”

I will tell you what I told them.  And mind you I still believe this to this day:

“That was quite possibly the stupidest fucking thing I have done in my entire adult life.”

“What?” They all looked shocked.  They were still high from the thrill of it all.

“Let me tell you something.  I nearly got crushed and burned alive the other night.  I lost my glasses, and just about ruined Christmas for my little girl.  More important than that, my little girl almost lost her father.  And what did I risk my life for?  Was it for a child trapped upstairs?  No.  Was it because someone’s life was in danger?  No. Was there any danger to life or limb at all during that entire affair?  You bet there was.  Us.  We were the only thing in any danger there.  And for what?  So that we could attempt to save somebody’s stuff?.  Yep.  That’s it.  I risked my life for somebody else’s pile of stuff.  Consumerism at it’s finest.  Someone, who I might add, who was too fucking stupid to call 911 until well after the walls had been on fire for a couple of hours.  I can see it now, ‘Honey, why do you think the walls are so hot next to this brand new fire place that’s just been installed and has its first fire burning in it?  It wouldn’t be because anything is wrong, would it?  Naaaaahhhhh.  Couldn’t be.  I’m rich and stupid and nothing bad can happen to me.  Give us another fucking glass of merlot to fortify my denial and abject stupidity.  I want to let this bitch get good and rolling before I embarrass myself by calling the professionals to take care of it.  An army of burly twits is waiting to descend on our house and save all our stuff.  And in the end insurance will pay for it.  Raise your glass then.  Cheers.  Here’s to being rich and stupid.’  Screw this profession.”

I meant it, and I still mean it.  All of my coworkers at the station looked at me in horror.  There were all sorts of argument as well as insults to my character.  But I think fire fighting is one of those things where most people in the profession can’t see the forest for the trees.  When I pressed them and asked, “Is your life really worth risking for someone else’s stuff?”  I got no answer.  Don’t get me wrong.  There must be a fire department.  There will probably always be one.  People have to perform rescues.  People need to be cut out of cars.  There will always be hazardous spills.  But for the life of me I still have no idea why a sane man would run into an empty burning building to try and save someone’s stuff.  It’s just beyond me.  And thankfully, I no longer have to do it.  I quit quite some time ago and have no wish to go back.  Attention all snooty merlot-swilling nouveau riche idiots: I am more important that your stuff.

Well, at least I’m still alive to tell the tale.  I am sure there will be various opinions on my stance.  There are legions of fire fighters out there ready to defend their wish to be the witless pawns of the insurance industry.  Let the flames begin!