Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We're so happy and honored to be joined by Captain
Nick Limick from the Omaha Fire and Rescue. I got
to tell you this fire department. I was looking at
the Instagram that you just told me about. You guys
have a really cool thing that you got going on here.
But I first want to talk about your background, because
it takes a special person to want to be a
first responder, but especially a person that wants to deal
(00:20):
with fire. Tell me about kind of how you got
involved with the Omaha Fire Department in this industry.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Yeah, you bet. Thanks for having me on the show
today too. I appreciate that. So I've been on the
fire department for a little bit over sixteen years really
since I was a little kid, you know, grew up
in Omaha, went to Omaha Central High School. Just I've
always loved the city and really really enjoyed helping people.
(00:46):
You know, That's the big thing firefighters, first responders, They
want to help people, and I think that's really what
motivated me to really push myself to be the best
I could be and put myself in a position and
where I could be there to help people even when
they're having, you know, their worst day and I think
you find that with a lot of first responders, they
(01:07):
really really just want to help people.
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Fire is such a destructive thing, but it's also something
that I don't think there's a single person that doesn't
have some type of fire related experience of Okay, I
saw this, you know, I was at a campground and
there was a fire, and it might have been completely controlled,
but there takes somebody knowing what to do with this,
either to make it or to put it out. There's
(01:30):
that exact kind of thing, you know, in your own
home in a lot of ways, even if you're not
planning on seeing a fire at all. And that's the
unfortunate thing about wintertime is it seems like you guys
are pretty busy with this. What are the biggest causes
of fires especially in the wintertime of what you've been
seeing over your sixteen years.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
So the big thing is when you get in that wintertime,
that colder weather. You know, obviously people are using space heaters, candles,
especially when we get in kind of the holiday season here,
lots of candles. December is actually the biggest month for
candle fires. You're looking at overloaded electrical equipment. You know,
people will putting up a lot of lights, that kind
(02:08):
of thing. So in the wintertime, you know, everything everyone
kind of retreats inside, you know, because it's so cold,
and there's just a lot of opportunities, especially as space here,
there's a lot of opportunities for things to go wrong
if you're not you know, being careful, if you're not
understanding how to prevent those emergencies, those those fire emergencies
(02:30):
from happening.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
We're speaking with Captain Nick Limeick from the Omaha Fire Department.
What would be the first couple of things, you know,
like number one, number two, number three, the top three
things that the fire Department here would suggest to people
to prevent fires, because you know, you might have children around,
you might have people who don't even know that something
is like burning, well, like a candle or something. What
(02:53):
would be some of the things that you think they
need to put at the top of their list.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
So the number one thing, the very number one thing,
is to make sure that you have a working smoke
detector in your home. That's going to be the biggest
thing that's going to save your life if there is
a fire. Right making sure that you're testing those smoke
detectors every month to make sure that battery is working.
If you don't have a smoke detector in your home,
the Omaha Fire Department has a program where we can
(03:19):
come and install a smoke detector in your home for free.
You can go to Omaha dashfire dot org and you
can request one online there, or you can call us
at our Public Education office four oh two four four
four three five six zero and request a smoke detector.
The big thing is is we want to make sure
that every home in the in the city of Omaha
(03:42):
has a working smoke detector. That's the number one thing.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
Yeah, that in and of itself, is there a certain
number of fire smoke detectors, Like if you have a basement,
a first floor, and a second floor, should you have
one on each floor?
Speaker 2 (03:58):
You're you're gonna want to make sure that you have
a smoke detector on each floor, and especially one outside
of the bedroom space. So that's that's going to be
able to alert you when you're sleeping. The most dangerous
time for a fire to happen is when you're asleep,
sure you know, and having that smoke detector in a
position where it can alert you wake you up, make
(04:19):
it so you can work to get out of the
get out of the home safely. That's that's that's going
to be the best place. Okay, what's number two on
the list? Number two. Number two is going to be
especially when you come into this winter time. Then to
this winter season is space heaters. You got when when
you're dealing with space heaters, you know, you want to
make sure that you have the area in front of
(04:40):
that space heater clear at least three feet. That's that's
one of the biggest thing you want to make sure
you know, and and and especially when you get into
the holiday season, there's lots of presence wrapping paper, yeah, yeah, yeah,
decorations of all those different things. They get stacked up.
We forget about something that something like that. That's that's
one of the biggest things. Those space heaters get really
really hot so to heat your room, and they can
(05:02):
they can start something on fire just from that radiant heat.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
So the easiest way is to just make sure things
are clear. If you happen to be using one, it's
not bad to use one, it's you just have to
be very sure about where it's located. And especially you
want to like if you're not monitoring it. It should
be off right, That's that's the big thing.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Yeah, if you're in the room with it, having that on,
keeping that room comfortable, that's okay. But the big thing is,
just like with any tool, you know, having an adult
be there to be able to supervise that tool. You know,
you don't want to just leave it running. Just like
with any tool, you know, you don't just leave it
run and let the kids play with it, right, leave
it going. You want someone there to be able to
(05:42):
make sure it's that stayin safe, you know, wherever that
might be.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
That makes a lot of sense. And then if there
was a third thing that people could think for home
fire safety or prevention specifically, I'm guessing candles may be
involved here.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Candles are a big are a big thing, especially coming
into December. You have, like we said earlier, all the packages,
all the all the decorations, those kind of things. But
December is actually the biggest month for candle fires in
the United States. In the United States in the month
of December, there's an average of twenty five candle fires
per day. Wow. Right, So that's a big thing. We
want to make sure we're never leaving candles unattended. You know,
(06:18):
we want to make sure that we have a three
foot space around that candle. When we're talking about maybe
we put candles up in the window, right, we want
to make sure that our curtains, our drapes are well
away from that, you know, because that that's something where
that that a drape is perfect for a fire to
be able to climb up and really set that room.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah, it could get out of control and out of
your reach of being able to be controllable. And it
I mean, if your your windows tall enough, it could
spread to the floor above pretty easily through a curtain
as well.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Yeah, I mean through through through the curtain. I mean
if if there's a ventilation says you know, there's there's
a lot a lot of issues with that, you know,
and uh and fire fire doubles in size every thirty seconds.
So if you think that kind of that that law
of compounding that thirty seconds a minute, all of a sudden,
that fire gets pretty pretty huge pretty quickly, you know,
without without some extinguishment.
Speaker 1 (07:12):
We're speaking with Captain Nick Limick of the Sorry, I
don't know why that was so difficult for me to
say right there, but with the Omaha Fire Department, and
you talk about this, is there a way to kind
of help obviously prevention and then calling nine to one
to one I'm sure is step one. No matter what,
if you're seeing a fire that isn't just a controlled
(07:33):
thing that we knew we were doing in the fireplace
or whatever, is there a safe way to try to
extinguish a fire in your own home if it's a
small enough fire before you try to leave.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
So the biggest suggestion if there's a fire in your
home and for a single moment, if there's any wonder
what should I do? The first thing you do is
get out? Okay, get out. And when we go and
we talk to families, talk to schools, talk to people
about fire safety, it's it's really really important to pre plan,
talk about these kind of things before they happen, right
(08:07):
because when that emergency happens and you've got to try
to figure it out as you go, that's a high
stress situation that's going to be very very difficult. That's
why we want to we want families to practice emergency
situations before they occur. We called Edith exit drills in
the home that whole family can get together plan Hey,
what do we do if there's a fire? Right? Do
(08:28):
we have a meeting place outside outside of the home
if there is a fire. So when we come out
here the fire department arrives, do we have all the people?
Where are people at? What do we need to do?
You know? And that expands, you know, just that preparation
in just an entire community risk reduction kind of standpoint,
not just fires, but what do we do if there's
a tornado? Okay, we go down here, we have this
prepared down here, what do we do if the power
goes up? You can really expand that to not just fires.
(08:52):
But the big, big one is is practice that emergency
you know, train so people know what to do before
it happens. And then that's going to make things a
lot better. We always joke and say, you know, people
don't really rise to the occasion, you fall back to
that level of training. That's why it's so important, you know,
to have your family of people, you know, practice in
(09:13):
those emergency type of situations so they know what to
do when they.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
If they do happen. Definitely good information. Can you stick
around another segment for me?
Speaker 2 (09:21):
You bet? You all right?
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Captain Nick Lemick from the Omaha Fire Department. Going to
stick with us. We'll have more with him next on
news Radio eleven ten kfab.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Emrie's song on news Radio eleven ten Kfab.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
You guys are very active on social media, and I
think this is really really good in the modern age,
letting people know if there have been fires, Letting that
people know if there have been anything that you guys
have been called to. How important is it for the
for the public to be able to see what you
guys are up to, you.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
Know, it's really important. One of the things that we've
been really trying to do is is really make that
connection with the community. It's a vital importance for the
Omaha Fire Department to be connected to the community, to
represent the community that we serve. You know. That's why
we've we've continued to expand our recruitment efforts all throughoutout
the city, uh and and engaging with the social media
(10:13):
so people can kind of see what it's like being
a firefighter, getting some of those fire safety tips, you know,
those little reminders, just building just fostering that sense of community,
you know, from from a department, so that's here to
serve the city.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Now you do have updated information on these fires. But
I have to tell you you have introduced me to
your Instagram feed which is covered with this beautiful dog
that is hanging out with you guys in a lot
of different places. Can you tell me kind of about
the dog and why there's a dog in so many
(10:50):
of your guys's photos here, Sure.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
You bet so. So a few years ago, the Omaha
Fire Department, UH really made a commitment to the well
being of our firefighters, you know, UH, and it's it's
it's really important to make sure that your first responders
are able to respond, you know, physically and mentally. And
one of the things that that that Omaha Fire Department's
(11:13):
really been supported of is our peer support team, building
that peer support team to make sure that firefighters can
have the tools that they need to continue to make
these calls because sometimes, you know, things things are rough,
you know, but UH, but given them that support and
UH and with that peer support, we were able to
partner with the First Responders Foundation and the Guide Dogs
(11:33):
of America, and the Guide Dogs of America provided us
a facility support dog, UH free of charge and UH
and so there's there's no cost to the tax Peryio.
It's completely funded by private donations and from Guy Dogs
of America. And uh, our little dog, his name is Mochi, right,
he's a two year old yellow lab and uh and
(11:56):
it's great he goes and he's able to visit the
fire stations and and it's really amazing because you see
these tough people obviously people who want to help help others,
but they're you know, they're the big tough person that's
ready to climb a ladder or kick a door or
you know, be able to do CPR or do all
those different things that need to be done under under
massive pressure. No, under under pressure, and you're able to
(12:18):
see this little puppy, this little guy come in here
and uh, just the smiles, they're just just the smiles
that come on the faces of the of of all
these firefighters and uh and it's something that you know, uh,
it really it's really a it's a big stress reducer,
you know for a firefighter. So it's it's it took
it took about a year of training. Are our dog handlers,
(12:41):
Firefighter Josh Fry and Firefighter Geena Brown do a great
job making sure that that Mochi gets out and about
and and meets people, goes, goes to schools. You know
it can help us with the fire safety classes with schools,
goes and visits firefighters. Make sure make sure that we
keep things positive.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
I got I got to tell you everything I learned
about different people who put themselves in harm's way for
the betterment of our communities. I am floored with how
much it takes within themselves to do that and the
sacrifices that they make so on behalf of the entire
fire department. I'm going to thank you Captain Lemmick for
(13:20):
coming in and not just providing this information, but for
what you guys do for this community. Thank you so
much for being a part of our show today, and
I'm sure we're going to talk again very soon.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
All right, thanks for having me on