"Enjoy it" Ladder Work with Captain Billy Grubb

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I'm big on the roof report depending on if it's a the, you
know, the old typical shit and get going.
And I'm not I'm house fire roof report to me.
And I know there's people out there and go, Oh, this guy, you
know, playing the cowboy thing when you got when you got your,
your IC #2 sitting across the street and he can see pretty
much everything that we're doingon these on these residential

(00:20):
houses. You know, I mean, even on your,
your, your what we would classifieds a larger home.
You're 3500 square feet and above.
I mean, we got, we got areas from the worst of the worst of
the best of the best in my organization.
But that I see #2 that BC is sitting outside, right?
And he can see do what I need totell you.
It's got an A12 pitch and you got asphalt shingles and you
know, like there's an ace, you know, I'm.
Merely fucking interested. When it's when it's good time,

(00:43):
we're getting it right, so cut the holes and whatnot.
Welcome everybody. This is Copper say fireman
podcast. This podcast is for fireman
burning the ships of complacency, laziness and
excuses for promoting the love and passion for the job,
encouraging eagerness and mastering the craft of the fire
service. The information, opinions,

(01:04):
values, recommendations and ideas are the host and
individuals of this podcast and are not affiliated or endorsed
by the fire departments, organizations or companies that
individuals work for. This podcast is for general
information use only. Endorsed by the Copper Say
Fools. I have a privilege to sit down

(01:26):
with Captain Billy Grubb. He's got 21 years in the
American Fire Service. Currently Captain specialties is
he's a ladder guy. Training captain.
Career highlights. He's held job titles of EMT,
paramedic, firefighter, engineer, captain, training
captain, BSO, automotive technician, insurance claim
adjuster, welder and fabricator.He is most proud of mentoring

(01:48):
and training and developing members all the way from riders
trying to get a job up to the his current position, Captain.
So with that said, Billy, first of all, thank you for your time,
brother. Yeah, thank you for inviting me
to your house. And did I miss anything in that
intro? No, sounds pretty good.
Right, good deal. So we are sitting down.
So this has been a a coveted spot on the podcast.

(02:11):
I've been saving for you individual right.
So what I really want to get into today is I want to talk
about the ladder work right and the aspects of it.
So not just the typical house fire that everyone thinks about.
I want to talk about the extrications, I want to talk
about the crap, the freaking squeegeeing and everything that
kind of coincides with this. And really just that mentality
and attitude of a good ladder guy.

(02:33):
And then just really spit on theculture that you've been
involved with because you're notcurrently from the area that you
work with, right? And that's kind of how we met
and became friends. So I just kind of want to cover
all this stuff today. So with that said, so let's
start with the ladder business. So you're currently a ladder
captain, the fire deartment you work for, correct?
Correct, right? So let's let's go from Step 1.

(02:56):
So when a booter rights or probie, whatever you guys called
near department, they come out of the Academy.
They don't know shit yet. They have they have a little bit
they got 25 years when they're assigned to you.
So in the department you work for every probationary
firefighter, booter, whatever you want to call them gets a
rotation at least on the ladder.So when you get them, what is

(03:16):
your goal or should say like right from the kiko, what are
you trying to establish with them to try to make them
proficient, efficient firemen obviously only have them short
period of time, but what's your priority list on that?
In our organization, the way they come out of the Academy,
they don't necessarily do engine, engine ladder.
I might get them fresh out of the Academy.
So regardless if I get them day one out of the Academy or

(03:39):
they're starting their day one of their last rotation of the,
the last rotation, I, I start with where you at on the mayday
stuff? Do you know how to give a
mayday? The, the, the safety aspect of
it? They get hammered so much in the
Academy with the skills of, you know, what they're doing, taking
plugs, laying lines, doing the whole thing that, and they do
get the fire ground survival that's done by the, the big

(04:01):
boys, you know, so they get all that.
But I want to know, Hey, boots on the ground.
I go down, it's me and you and can you save yourself?
Do you understand how to give a mate to operate the radio all
that? That is my my borderline right
out of the gate. Go off of that stuff because
personal safety is huge, huge. We don't need to lose any more

(04:22):
brothers and sisters, right? Absolutely not So and I give it
to him. I'm a little bit old school, you
know, in the fact of how how I deliver that message.
And I'm like, look, number one, my number one job as a, as a
captain in this organization is not to hand your family a
fucking flag like that. That's it.
Or call them from the, call themfrom the hospital.
So that's where I start with that.

(04:42):
And then honestly, the, the nextstep right after that is I go,
Hey, you're, you're, you're now on a ladder.
So all that stuff that 90% of what you did in The Academy Is,
is going to go away. Like we, we have different fun.
We do engine functions in, in, in our organization, but that
doesn't mean that primarily we're doing ladder functions.
So get the get the engine thing out of your head and we'll go

(05:05):
from there. And then I kind of go from then
I move into, you know, what you learn in the Academy.
What do you know about building construction?
Because building construction ishuge.
That's plays a vital role in what we do.
I mean, vehicle anatomy, building construction, all that,
that, that's huge. So I start at the very nuts and
bolts of that. What do you know about building
construction? What do you know about vehicles?

(05:26):
And get a baseline for where they're at.
Not everybody, as you know, you know, being as a recruit
training officer, you know, not everybody walks onto those
grounds, has the same starting point.
So I got it. I really try and connect with
them as far as where they're at and what they're doing.
Building construction. And then day one, boots, ground
man. I get them on a roof, put a saw
on their hand and I get them on the roof.

(05:47):
You have to, I mean, because youknow, old Adage had a guy that
retired from organization not not very long ago was my
engineer when I was a booter. It's just like, and he always
made the joke he's he was an engine guy through and through
the entire career. And he'd always be like, you
know, we get a new booter on theladder down there and he'd be

(06:07):
like, he's like, you never know,man.
He goes 5 minutes from now, you'd be on a roof cutting a
fucking hole. You ready?
You know, And now like he's likeI said, engine guy through and
through that, you know, young inmy career, he, he would always,
he did that same thing. And it was just like, hey, day
one, put them on a roof, put a, put a saw in their hand and, and
go at it. And I have, it's really funny.
I have a like a reputation in our organization because

(06:31):
everybody's like, hey, man, you got to put some fucking
blindfolds. Those guys with saw in their
fucking hand, you know, and thenguys get they get worried and
they they show up and they're just like, that's what I'm like,
we're I'm going to blindfold youtoday.
Like they went out of the Academy.
Here we go, Jack, I'm a blindfold you.
And they're like, what, what youknow, and I go, I have a purpose
for everything I do and I tell them I go, they can be 3:00 in

(06:51):
the morning, 3:00 in during the day.
I go, you get a good ripping, working fire, blowing out every
orifice, that thing coming up onthe gay while you you can't see.
And I go, I don't want you to cut your foot off.
I want you to make sure that youyou can make your cuts, make,
you know, cross your cuts, all that I go and you're going to do
a blind man. I go my very first hole, legit

(07:11):
no bullshit. 2nd shift out of the Academy.
I was assigned to the engine. So I was boned up on the all the
engine stuff, how the engine wanted me to operate and the
engine had to go do some specialtraining.
They kicked me off and put somebody else on move slid me
over the ladder. This was this was the day one
man, this like date or checking shift out of the Academy.
The captain on there was like, OK, And I, the the guy that was

(07:34):
I was relieving moving over for was like, hey man, don't forget
your ladder bell. Like, you know, done all this
stuff, forgot all of it. Of course.
Second story, blowing apartment fire.
We went we were first on scene. We go inside, no hand line no
can nothing. We go inside.
Fuck 0 visibility. We come out and they're like I
can't see shit my mass is smoke Jack can't see shit so I go go

(07:54):
down. Literally engineer hands me a
running saw. I can't see a thing, puts my
hand on the ladder, smacks me onthe ass, says go to work.
So that whole thing of day one, you can be on a roof and you're
going to be fucking blind there.Here we go.
I have the story to back. I have the experience to back it
up. And it's just like, and people
go, oh shit, I didn't really think about that.
You know, like. What it wasn't so it's for for

(08:15):
the audience now. So you say you you'll blindfold
the guy. So what?
What do you put him through so? So Step 1.
So we'll get, we'll get down there, make sure they're
familiar with the saw, know how to start it operate, break, all
that good stuff. Then we go up and then I just
have them cut lines. So in our organization, typical
residential house fire bread andbutter deal that people call

(08:35):
it's, you know, we back cut, we roll 1 Truss, we roll 2 trusses.
We stop at the third down, cut, down, cut.
So they know their sequence. So I'll have them just cut the
top cut. So they feel feeling those
trusses, feeling that, that going across, have them do it
two or three times. And I'm like, OK, cool, got
that. All right.
Now just let's finish up a quickhole.
Then I go, you ready? I'm like, all I want you to do
is cut, Cut a straight line fromhere to there, cut a straight

(08:58):
line, roll the trusses. Then I pull their, turn their
hood around backwards so it covers their fit and their mask
and they cut. See how you do?
I'm like, how did you feel? Where did you feel like you were
at? How is the back cut?
Did you dump the saw? How did it feel in your hand?
Did you feel it? Did you feel the Truss
underneath your feet? Did you?
Where you standing on trusses like, Oh man, and I'm like, you
know, and every single time it'snot a straight line.

(09:19):
I mean, you could you could get out a square and put it on a 45.
Like I mean, I'm sure all over the place corner and they bring
it down like it's just the way that they walk.
So I do that and I go, OK, you got that feel.
I go. Now we're going to we're going
to do we're going to do another.We're going to pull that sheet.
Whatever. Now I want you to cut a hole
regular, OK, cool. And I I talk them through

(09:40):
footwork and the way that I do my footwork, everything, you
know, 2 foot on center, sliding your feet where the saw sits.
It just works for me. I just kind of developed it over
the years. And then it's like, OK, cut one
home. Let's here we go standard what
you know how to do. Let's do it.
They do it. I go, all right, we're going to
flip the sheet. We're going to go to another
one. And now I'm going to bring your
hood over and I go, I literally take them, walk them up.

(10:03):
Saw a running brake on and then I grabbed their hands and I put
the, I put the saw kind of whereI want them to start so we don't
mess up our props, right. So I'm like, OK, there it is.
And I smack them on the head andlike, let's go.
And then we walk through it and they cut the whole hole and then
see where they're at. And I always laugh.
I'm like, nobody's ever cut a perfect hole like that the first

(10:24):
time. Nobody, nobody's ever done a
perfect, you know, And they're like, oh, shit.
And then I show them, Hey, you, you're from your top cut from
your head cut to your to your first down cut.
I'm like, you're a solid 10 inches away.
I go, here's the deal. I go, we'll be able to bust
through that depending on who your crew is and you know, what
kind of what kind of power are you guessing how?
Many layers of roofing. Exactly how many layers of

(10:45):
roofing, What did they do to this thing?
You know, I mean, on a good day with cross cuts, there's roofs I
beat the living shit out of justto get through.
So I go, OK, so then I hand thema hook.
I say I hand them the trash hook.
And I go, hey, all right, your tennis is off the mark there.
I want you to bust this through.And I make them work it through
and I go, that's what your partner, that's what you're back

(11:05):
to you guy is going to have to deal with.
And I go, and I guarantee you he's going to mother fuck you
the whole way home, you know, because you didn't cross your
cuts. And I go, but, and I go in
again, this is the Academy, thisis a, this is a prop, right?
I go, this ain't, there ain't three layers, 4 layers, 5 layers
plus a shingles on there. This is OSB.
We get on plywood, we get on, you know, I go through the whole

(11:27):
thing. I make him feel like, hey, don't
fuck this up again. And but I also tell him and then
you, you come back and go, nobody's ever made a perv cut.
And here's the thing. I go a hole is a hole.
I don't care if it looks, you know, my 1st hole, the the
captain I was working for that second shift, He's like the fuck
boot. He goes that hole look like
Louisiana, you know, but I was blind.

(11:48):
Luckily my luckily my senior manwas like, he's like, hey, skip.
And he literally holds up my SCVA mask and he goes, Oh, you
should have wiped it off and he's like rubbing on it and it's
not coming off, you know. So I just tell him I go a hole's
a hole. What what's the purpose here?
And then I then I dive into why we vertically ventilate, right?
And I'm a big why guy. Like I, I made sure that they
understand the why throughout their their time with me.

(12:10):
And that's good. That's fairly new for the
American fire service as a hole.Correct.
Like we, you know, and I don't remember I was in symposium or I
think it was a it was a Mayday, three day Mayday deal that I was
in and there was a guy that was talking about a book.
And I don't remember the book orthe author or whatever.
But I like this has like this pyramid at the top, at the small

(12:31):
part is why, you know, everybodygo down to the bottom is what
happened, right? Yeah.
Then then there's a smaller group of folks that will go, how
did this happen? Right.
And then this smallest group at the very top is why did this
happen? Oh, OK.
And that's another thing that stuck with me.
You know, this, this training deal that was that.
And it's just like, so I make sure that I explain everybody to

(12:52):
the best of my ability is why? So they don't just randomly go
up and do something and think about it.
Why, why are you doing that? Why are we cutting a hole?
Do it? Did we need to cut a hole?
Because believe me, when I got on the job, if our foot hit the
roof, you were getting a fuckinghole.
Exactly. But it's not there was no
question. We, we've, we've progressed,
right. We've got to that point to where
working attic fire, whatever thesituation may be, it's clear in

(13:14):
the house, you know, whatever you don't need that ventilation.
I'm real big on. I'm not.
And that's a that customer service aspect of the job.
Oh yeah, A. 100% don't cut a hole if you don't have to.
So they enjoy that and it's it'sit's a good kind of first day
bonding like, Hey, this guy's gonna get my ass.
But the same time I, I learned like, wow, like that's in and I
not everybody. I don't think of it.

(13:35):
I don't know that there's anybody else in our in that
organization that does that. No, I, I, I'd almost guarantee
there's nobody else. I've I've, I've known you for
quite some time now and I've never heard that.
I didn't know you even did that.So that's, I think that's
freaking awesome. We, we talked about.
So what you're doing with the booter, what you're kind of
progressing into introducing them to the ladder, everything
else. So let's start talking about the

(13:56):
ladder work a little bit. Let's start.
Let we'll just start with that bread and butter house fire.
As a ladder captain, what are your priorities?
Explain to the guys like every system runs differently,
predetermined running assignments, waiting for
command, whatever the case mightbe.
But let's talk. Yeah, I mean, you had mentioned
it, right? Vertical ventilation is a
freaking hot topic right now in the American Fire Service.

(14:18):
I already know where you stand, and I back you 1000%.
I want to hear your personal reason, your opinion on ladder
work, on those bread and butter house fires.
What should we be concentrating on?
And then let's talk about that vertical ventilation benefits,
disadvantages, whatever kind of case might be.
Yeah, priority safety, You know,coming into this thing as a

(14:39):
ladder captain is priority stepping off of the truck or not
even before I even get off the truck, listen to radio traffic
on the way, Does this sound likeI'm going to have to get on that
roof and go to work? That is the number one that
that's going to send me in two different directions.
What are your as a ladder captain?
What are your personal red flagswhen you start hearing that
first in engine company? What are you listening for
going? Hey, we are fucking getting this

(15:01):
shit. We're getting on that roof.
We're getting a hold now. So it starts with the on scene
report, right? In our organization, it's an on
scene report, brief description.What not any smoke conditions
fire showing. So if I hear hey, obvious
working fire, that's the first click.
If the if in the on scene reportthat front seat that captain
says obvious working fire, it's rocking.

(15:21):
OK, so now we know we got we gota good fire.
Then the second one is, is if they they tell me that it's
coming out of a window, a door, whatever, I'm like, OK, it's in
the house versus in the structure, right, contents,
contents that are early structure inside the residence,
the versus hey, blown out the Gable lands, OK, maybe maybe not
on the attic fire. And then if depending on the

(15:44):
distance that I'm travelling, ladder companies in our, our
system, our ladder companies areabout 20% of the over the total
unit. So we, we have some distance to
travel at times to get there. So if I hear that initial, the
initial can report, you know, hey, we got heavy smoke, man.
We get we can't 0 visibility or high heat.
Then it's like it's go time. Copy.
It's absolutely go time. I continue.

(16:04):
I just wanted to clarify that for everybody on what your what
your triggers would start clicking in saying where you're
trying to get your mindset. Go ahead, brother.
So the high heat, deer visibility, what not right?
So in my world, the the, the fire service that I came up in
and as it has progressed over the last 21 years, I've been 18

(16:24):
with my current agency is cutting holes.
And like you talked about a hot topic.
Why? Why do we cut holes?
So old senior salty captain, respect the shit out of them.
Old hard nosed guy. He would, we, we, he would point
his fingers at you and we tell you, hey, he's gunning you down,
you know, get you the double guns whatnot.
But early on he looked at me andhe's just like, Billy, why do we

(16:46):
vertically ventilate? You know, and I'm just like, you
know, as a builder, you're like,hey, remove the heat and the
smoke, you know, make it safer for the firefighters.
Gave him the book answer right? Right.
And he's and he goes, yeah, you're kind of close.
And he's like, yeah, firefightersafety.
He's like, but primarily preventmushrooming to prevent flashover
conditions, to increase visibility, intend ability
inside the structure for us to do effective search and rescue

(17:09):
and locate to see the fire. So that's that's why we're
ventilating that that's and I know a lot of people get off on
the, you know, bursary and all the NIST and all the different
things. What not you ever been in a
house fire and you're cooking you you want a haul.
So that's what drives me to get on that roof and be like, OK,
we're getting a haul. So we go up and you know, and

(17:29):
then from there, once I know theheat conditions and everything
that's going on in there, then we, I've assessed in that
building. The, the minute I step off that
truck, like residents block homelightweight construction, you
know, what, how, what area it's in, what kind I, I have a pretty
good idea. I'm real big on knowing your
area in your first due. I have a really good idea what

(17:50):
type of roofs under there based on what, what years it was
built, you know, on time it was built.
So get on, you know, get on the roof and then sound it.
I'm huge. And you know, you got to find
your trusses, find your structure, right.
So you find your structure and do that and then you know, where
is the fire located? I, I always try and my days in

(18:10):
training and all the ladder training that I've done over the
years. Big thing is, man, you guys need
to be looking at, at the building.
You should have a pretty damn good idea, especially on your,
your single family residence. Where's that fire located?
I shouldn't have to call to somebody inside to tell me where
the fire is. They probably can't figure it
out either 'cause they don't, they can't see.
So looking at the window smoke stain, window smoke conditions,

(18:31):
you know, that, that whole reading smoke thing that that's,
you know, you got to invest in your profession and you and you
got to, you got to dive into thedetails and you know, hey, heavy
black smoke, brown smoke, white,where's it coming from?
Where's it going? What's it like?
Hey, this window's black. The window next to it's not,
hey, that's probably a contents fire.
It's so you got black, brownish smoke.
You know, it maybe started in the in the house, getting into

(18:52):
the attic, getting in the contents and I like to have a
good idea where I'm going beforeI even get on the roof.
You know, I'm a guy step off thetruck, my engineer's throwing my
ladder, my sawyer's getting sawsready to go and I am walking to
the front door. If not one or two steps into the
front door, I want my own eyes on the conditions to before I
step foot on that ladder to knowwhether I'm going to cut or not.

(19:13):
And real big is seeing at least three sides of the house in my
own eyes. It's not taking anything away
from anybody, but we're the ladder in our our system.
We dispatch 3 engines and one ladder.
B Cole BCS to any type of, you know, reported working fire or
reported fire. So I'm the only ladder guy and
there's not a lot of people thathave that perspective.

(19:35):
Like I said, we're 20% of the apparatus that are in there in
the system in our area. But so there are guys that have
20 years on the job and they spent three months on a on a
ladder truck. So I, I, I take that into my own
hands. Look.
So then we make the roof, check the structure, making sure it's
good sounding, have an understanding what's probably

(19:56):
underneath of us have a good idea where we're going.
And we we make our way over there.
Nobody on my crew goes before the sounder just flat out just
doesn't happen. That sounder is our Everything's
in his hands until we get to where we're going to cut I.
Spend a lot of time talking about sounding and what it's
like to be on a roof and what it's like to feel, you know, the

(20:18):
roof under you, whether it's on fire or not, you know it's going
to be different and it's you know, our area is is newer, you
know, considering in the American fire service you got
New York, Boston, you know theseguys that have. 1800s Buildings
were built in 18. Early 1900s.
You're you're you're you're talking 200 plus year old, you
know, row housing, different decks of construction, balloon
construction, stuff like that. But like I, I put, I put so much

(20:41):
time into that. We stand behind that, that
sounder and you find me that structure and, and it and it's
go time, you know, fairly newer construction.
We make that and then they know,hey, I give them a direction
where I want them and and we start heading up that way.
I'm systematic in the way that Ido holes on roofs.
Just you, you have to be, especially when you get in that,

(21:02):
like we talked before that that 0 visibility on a roof, you
know, like you better put that Ibetter know where that saw is
going without even seeing it, you know, so we, we make our way
up, we have our sequence of cuts.
We cut our first hole. One of the biggest questions I
get asked all the time from guyswanting to know about ladder
stuff like, well, do you call interior and ask if they need a
second hole? How do you know what are you

(21:24):
looking for for a second hole? You know, I'm, I'm a fireman
through and through. I'm like, no, you know, you
better know what your job is andwhat you're what, why you're
doing it and what you expect to get out of that hole.
What kind of product and do you expect to get out of the hole?
And so then I just determine, I look in the hole.
We popped a, we do a louver cut on residential.
We pop the louvers and then, youknow, try and drop the lid from

(21:45):
the top if we can. Sometimes we can't because it's
blowing up and out at us. And then I make a determination
if we're going to cut a second hole, we're going to extend the
single hole that we got. You know what, what kind of time
on fire we have on this thing, You know, time of dispatch time
there. How long did it take us to get
to the roof? All those things come into play
and the amount of fire and for me, if I've got any type of
pressurized moving smoke, I'm cutting a second hole right now.

(22:09):
Game on. Let's go.
I'll cut 2-3. I'll, I'll go until I either
it's time to get off of this roof, it's going bad or we get,
we get some kind of kind of conversion on the inside that's
reading that smoke. Understand what's burning.
You have that amount of heat andsmoke and turbulent, you know,
moving smoke. Like I don't need to talk to
nobody. This is what I'm trained for.

(22:29):
Like this is what we do. Like get up there and so and
then cut a sack and hole extended whatnot and then go,
you know, give him my roof report.
I'm big on the roof report depending on if it's a the, you
know, the old typical shit and get going, then I'm not I'm
house fire roof report to me. And I know there's people out
there and go, Oh, this guy, you know, like, you know, playing

(22:50):
the cowboy thing. But when you got when you got
your, your IC #2 sitting across the street and he can see pretty
much everything that we're doingon these on these residential
houses. You know, I mean, even on your,
your, your what we would classify as a larger home,
you're 3500 square feet and above.
I mean, we got, we got areas from the worst of the worst of
the best of the best in my organization.

(23:11):
And but that I see #2 that BC issitting outside, right?
And he can see do what I need totell you.
It's got an A12 pitch and you got asphalt shingles and, you
know, like there's an A, you know, I'm.
Merely fucking interested. When it's when it's good time,
we're getting it right, so cut the holes and whatnot and then I
most of the time on the residence, you know, like my
roof report is as I'm coming down, hey, I got your two holes
cut got moderate heat, moderate smoke coming out roof is still

(23:34):
tenable coming off the roof right and par, you know, par 3
whatever. So it's come down and then, you
know, regroup and, and I'm one of those guys that your, your
physical, your physicality and your, your physical fitness on a
job. Like I'm ready, like, hey, let's
go swap out bottles and we're going back to work.
Like they're, I'm not, we're nottaking 15 minutes getting 2

(23:55):
sequenchers and you know where we're here to work.
So then once we we swap bottles,hey, ready for reassignment,
let's go, let's go, you know, and then typically depending on
the nature of the fire and then we're going to go in in salvage
and overall. And the salvage and overhaul for
me is right under ventilation, right?

(24:15):
So you talk in priority list. Yeah, OK.
Priority. It's that important.
It's that important to me. Yeah, this is.
I'm gonna give you the why. Oh good, I know you are.
So one of the things that you know, you have mentors and
people that, like I said, hit something just hits with you.
It sticks with you, right. And so ladder captain I worked

(24:36):
for was long time ladder captainSalt salty salty dog, and we had
done a department rebate. So he comes down and he had been
up on the north ladder and the seat very senior, very senior
and. Yeah.
I, I, I booted under him. Yeah.
I, I I'm well, yeah. Good for you.
Yeah. So I started working with him.

(24:56):
I had, he got the spot down South with us because the rebid
got shook up. We added some our ladders went
ALS. There was there was some
dynamics. So he was very senior man, but
he wasn't the most senior ladderguy.
So he ended up coming down Southwith us.
So he brings the, the salvage mentality that I didn't have,

(25:17):
man, the house that I grew, the house that I grew up in, I say
grew up in, you know, the house you always have that house that,
you know, I spent 13 years at this house, you know, and which
is not very common in our organization nowadays.
He comes to the House of I literally it was, it's an old
school house. It's it's, it's a Firehouse.
It's a It's a good house. It's a.

(25:38):
Great house. You know, these these guys were,
were old school back in the day when we messed with each other
and did all that stuff. But he comes down and he had a
little more, I'll say administrative mindset.
You know, he's just kind of thatlittle bit more straight and air
a little more by the book kind of guy.
We're down there, you know, definitely the.
Father figure for sure. 100% thethe strict firm, yeah, yeah,

(25:59):
'cause typically speaking would be being down South.
That's that's the younger crowd,the younger captains, younger,
younger drivers, right? The younger firemen.
Because it's the busiest. Busiest here we, we, we ran, you
know, prospectively speaking, we, we ran a lot of fire.
OK, so this older guy comes down, crusty guy, and so he
starts having conversations withus, you know, hey, what about
this? What about that?

(26:19):
What how do you guys do this? What do you guys like to do?
OK, now this is how it's going to go, right?
And we went, yeah, it's probably3 shifts in and we go on a house
fire in the area that we worked in, socio economic, lower income
families, you know, type of bad,bad neighborhoods.
We go on this house fire and it was just like, he's just like,

(26:42):
hey man, make sure you know, we're going to salvage.
We go and it's an attic fire. OK?
So we don't go to the roof, we don't cut, we gun in hay,
salvage overhaul and the engine guys are on the inside and they
are blowing the fucking lid downand they're just destroying
everything on their path. And I'm that that gentleman came
in that place and he, he startedrunning shop.
He was like senior captain. He didn't need to tell anybody.

(27:05):
Nobody need to ask. They knew, Hey, this is the
boss, man. He's coming in and he's like,
what the fuck are you doing? Oh really?
And he's just like, stop. And he literally started putting
hands on guys and was like with bike poles, like hey, stop.
And I'm just like, holy shit. I'm like, what's going on?
And they're just destroying shitleft and right, man.
And he just, like fires above us.

(27:27):
I can see from here to the back bedroom.
Calm down. We know where it's at.
They're getting water on it. Let's protect these people's
shit. And I'm just like, oh, fuck,
man, what's going on? So we, we did our job.
What? Not we go back to the house.
We're sitting at the kitchen table.
And he's. And I was just like, I go, hey,
Skip, I go, I go, you're seriousabout the salvage thing.
And he goes, yeah, I am. He's like #1 priority is life

(27:51):
safety. Second is property conservation.
And he goes, that's probably allthese people have.
He goes and guess what, Jack, hegoes, they probably don't have
renter's insurance. They probably, you know, they,
I, you know, some of them own the place.
So most of them don't, probably don't have renter's insurance.
And he's just like, and you're messing their shit up, man.
He's like, you're messing their shit up.
And then I go back to when I was, when I was a boot.

(28:15):
So my second rotation, ChristmasEve, we get a fire.
And his conversation sparked me back to when I was a booter
couple years previous and Christmas Eve fire, we get
kicked out of the house and we're off to the races and it's
a dual engine company house. Other engine comes in from one
way. Whatever.
We go inside and this house kitchen's blowing, just

(28:37):
absolutely blowing. We get the assignment, we get go
go to the east to get it all cleared, all the bedrooms and
all that stuff and tile house. And the owner was trying to put
the fire out with green light with a garden hose.
So it's we're ice skating. And I mean, as we're going down,
like I'm on the knob and he's trying to pull more, I'm like, I
need more lie. I need more lie, you know, and
he all, all I hear is just, I can, you know, pictures of shit

(29:01):
coming off the walls, the whole thing.
And Long story short on that, weget all done, we go outside and
the homeowner's out there and, and I said, it's Christmas Eve
and he's just like, man, I don'tcare about any of those
presents. I don't care about anything in
that house. He goes, there's one picture in
the hallway. He goes, there's like 20
something people in that picture.
And he goes, three people are left alive.
Wow. And he's like, that's why I want
that picture. First thing comes to my mind, so

(29:23):
we go back in, find a picture offrames busted up, glasses busted
up, pictures intact. Take it outside, guys crying
instantly starts crying, bucking, hugs us.
And it's like, hey man, thanks. And so that put me back there
and it's like salvage is a big deal.
Salvage is something that is very underrated and the fire
service, I believe, as a whole from going across the country

(29:43):
doing different things in different organizations.
It's but it's just like at the end of the day, and I had this
conversation with my my boots and I'm like, Hey, when you talk
about salvage and overhaul and all that and you know, under our
SO PS and why we do it and what not, I'm like, OK, we go into a
house, we go into what we call John F Long special 1500 square
foot ranch style house, right? I go and we get assigned a

(30:04):
salvage. I go give me kind of an order
what you're looking for for to, you know, make sure that we take
care of either we removed from the house covered with covers.
You know what not, you know, andit's funny the, the vast array
of answers I get, you know, you get something and the guy's
like, fuck, man, get 70 inch TV.Yeah, you know, you know, and
other guys are like, oh man, maybe I got guns in the house
and, you know, like, whatever. And like, OK, now you're getting

(30:26):
somewhere. And then I go down there.
I like, hey, start with pictures.
I go pictures on the walls, man,you know, and I go mounts, you
know, hunting mounts. Those things are massively
expensive. Hey, maybe that was the last
time, you know, this guy and hisdad went hunting, you know,
their sentimental value in that.And then we go all the way down
the line of like, hey, let's protect computers.
Let's protect and we protect computers because why people put

(30:46):
files on computers, right that's.
Where all the other pictures arethe other.
Pictures the the bank statements.
You know all the taxes that you know everything else.
And then some of these kids, man, I call, I call them all
kids, man. Yeah, they're kids.
We're we're old enough to. Get kids.
Yeah. And so then it's just like you
watch your eyes. Oh shit.
I'm like yeah you you care aboutthe 70 inch TV and go to fucking
Walmart for $300.00 and buy them.

(31:07):
Another one, No big deal. No, no big deal.
And then I tell them that story from Christmas Eve.
I, I literally tell them that story and I'm just like, you
have to really think about what's, what is important to
people. So salvage is a big deal in me
because, and I've done it now. I mean, not now, I'm now, I'm
not, you know, getting to be the, the, you're a ladder guy,
right? And, and it's, you know, I gone

(31:29):
in the houses and go, you know, I just had one less than six
months ago. You know, this, this guy and I
had, you know, he's younger thanme.
I think he's got 2-3 years less than me.
He's getting ready to get promoted to captain.
He's got probie on his truck. He said go out to airport.
She like, hey man, hold on, holdon, hold on, hold on.
I go, let me let's throw some covers.
Let's get some stuff done. This cat comes around the corner
and he's like, and I go, hey, I go, let me get some covers.

(31:51):
I know what your job is. Let me do it.
You know, I want to do, I'm likewe having this conversation,
'cause this girl, I'm, I'm not that guy, like what we're not
doing that, but I have that conversation with him like in,
in it's eye opening for him thatproperty conservation a second
on our our tactical priority list.
And you know, so take care of people's things.
Houses can be replaced. Obviously life safety is number
one, No, no doubt. Well, I'm going in, we're, we're

(32:13):
going in on that, that thought. Really consider what you're
doing when you get in there, youknow, and isn't that, Yeah, man,
that thing's ripping. Hey, we're firemen.
We're, we're, we're doing work. But what's the situation?
Is it kitchen ripping? OK, I can go back there and, and
I can, I can get stuff for people.
I can get medications. I can get, you know, all the
things that are going to matter to somebody and, and the whether

(32:34):
you like it or not sentimental to #1 as long as everybody's OK,
right. The next thing, the next step in
your mind to that start the grieving process or whatever you
want to call it, is that sentimental stuff.
Shit, man, my mom gave me that. She's no longer here, you know,
like, hey, you know, like, can Iget it?
And honestly, like, it really struck home when my dad died,
you know, and it's just like, you know what I mean?

(32:54):
Like then, you know, just like different, you know, parts of
your career phases, man, I used to have this guy.
Hey, man, you're in phase one, you're in phase two, you know,
like of life and, you know, kidswas a number, you know, a big
one. Change your perspective a little
bit. And then, you know, my dad
passed away before I had kids. And that was, I've lost a lot of
people in my life. We won't get into the you know
who's what's, but. The guys, the guys know, you

(33:18):
know, yeah. They they know where I'm going
to, but I've lost a lot of people in my life.
But you know that man, you know,that was the the real close core
family. You know, I've lost that.
So when my brother and I are going through his stuff, shit
man, like that, that added to it.
You know what I mean of like, hey there, there's things that
people want that you really wouldn't think, you know, things

(33:40):
of high value depending on what area you're working in.
You know, I I've gone so far as we pull up on this, on this
garage fire, right, and we cut the door off and you know, get
the get the guy in the knob in there and get So all of a sudden
I'm like, right when the smoke starting to clear up, you know,
knee level, I'm going, holy shit, man, that's a 64 Chevelle.

(34:00):
What? And I'm going, and this is, and
this is a big ass garage and I'mlike, oh fuck, man.
I fucking sprained it because the home owner was standing on
the sidewalk. I haul my big ass down to the
sidewalk. I go, where are the keys for the
cars? And he's like, dude, they're all
in a fucking lock box. Here's the code.
Like I went in like smoke level down in Midwest whatever.

(34:22):
These guys are working this fire.
It's in the backside of this garage.
And I go in and yeah, and I get the keys.
I go, come on. I grab my, I grab my, my guys.
And I'm like, let's go. We're playing valet, ready to
remove cars. And I go, don't even worry about
fucking starting them. I go kick it up, kick it, kick
it, drop it in neutral. We're going to start pushing
them out. And this guy ended up having
shit man. He had a couple $1,000,000 with

(34:43):
cars in it and we and we, we saved quite a few of them.
He lost a couple, but he he saved a quite he he saved a
couple of them and it was like, dude, this guy's out there like
you're my fucking. Hero.
I was going to say, I'm sure he loved you.
For it, yeah. And and I don't care for that
term hero personally, you know, he's just like, damn, dude, he's
just like he goes. How did you even know?
Car. I'm the car guy because I'm the

(35:05):
same. Like, dude, I saw that 64
Chevelle and it's funny because,you know, my next vehicle that I
build is going to be a 64 Chevelle because that's what my
dad had, you know what I mean? So I saw them tail lights and I
was like, it's go time, like if the car's out.
But but that's I'm just saying like, you know, long, long
winded on the on that fact, but it's it is different things

(35:26):
being different to people, right.
So salvage is a big deal for me.Yeah.
And like you and like you said, different phases of life and it
kind of goes towards what we were saying before, like when
you're like, hey, we are in salvage mode or whatever.
Am I in a retirement community where they're going to have
picture like picture albums? I'm going to be grabbing those
things? Or is it an area where it's like

(35:48):
college base or whatever where, hey, I'm trying to grab
computers, PlayStation stuff like the like, because that is
their most important advice. Possession like, and I know
every, every fireman listening to this.
I'm like, I was thinking as you're talking, I'm like, if my
house caught on fire, I want people to grab my old lids, my
American flag when I was in the service.
Everything else can fucking burn, you know, like they are my

(36:09):
personal like. And so yeah, I'm, I'm literally
thinking I'm like, what would I want the fireman to grab?
You know, like. Like, yeah, and it's funny,
'cause I, I had that conversation with my wife, you
know, and I'm just like this place burns.
I'm the whole one of the fucker better burn down like I'm
telling you right now. But there's a couple things that
I want. There's a picture in my in my
shop with, you know, me and my old man, you know, I'm like,
just like thing things like that.

(36:29):
I got a picture with another individual on there.
I'll leave nameless, but like big deal, big deal will be, you
know, but it, it's just like therest of it.
And that I it almost kind of drives me to be very non
materialistic. Yeah, you know, to to to a
point, you know, memories. That's huge.
You know, like you said, the pictures and all that stuff.

(36:50):
But it it is yeah like we have those conversations all the
time. Like this thing fuck cooks off,
man. Like and you've got 5 minutes
like crab. This unfortunately where all the
sentimental shit for me is all next to the, you know, the
welding gases and. Oh yeah, cool.
Yeah, but the most dangerous area and also the most likely to
catch on fire. Right.
It's starting there. You ain't got to get the fuck
out. Get the kids, get the fuck out.

(37:11):
Yeah. Absolutely.
All right, so we've been, we've been yapping about houses for
over an hour or over 1/2 hour. Excuse me, but so before we get
into the other section of the ladder functions, that which I
really want to touch, I just want to, I want to talk about
commercial real quick because wenever fucking talk about
commercial, right? I'm going to have some people
that are mad I. Know, I know.
You are so All right, So CaptainBilly Grubb, right?

(37:33):
You're on or you're on ladder, whatever you get, you get popped
out to that strip mall fire, right?
And it's fucking cooking. Middle occupancy.
Fuck, yeah. I mean, everyone listening knows
this is fucking hard on time, right?
This is this fire is good for everybody.
OK, So you. Right, Captain Billy Grab, you
arrive on the ladder. Let's talk to the audience,
right? What are your again?

(37:54):
What are your triggers? Right?
We already know you're going on the roof to get a roof report.
Are you telling the guys to cut smoke holes, inspection holes?
Are you trenching? Are you making big ass holes?
What are you doing as a ladder captain?
What's your preference? What?
What do you prefer? So first thing on any commercial
thing, especially first do as a first do ladder like I, I pride
myself on knowing my first do right.
So where, where are we putting this thing to, you know, to

(38:17):
start? Hey, OK.
Center occupancy. You like scrubbing corners?
What do you like to do? Yeah, so it it it depends.
I I'm yeah. And it guys that know me and
listen to this thing and laughter ass.
I'm like, I'm an I'm an always and never guy.
Yeah, never always and always never, right.
Like it's just they don't. Those are two words that don't
exist in my vocabulary. So.
Correct, I'm real big on readingthe situation, big on corners,

(38:38):
especially big box. Your Home Depot is your Walmart,
your your grocery store, stuff like that and even larger your
mega stuff that you know, getting an industrial.
But strip malls are they're a weird animal, man.
They are, you know, depending onthe length I put my truck, I put
my turntable to where I can reach my cut off point and what
is my cut off point? And that is based upon not as

(38:58):
you know by the book, number of occupancy, most endangered, most
number of endangered, right, so.They even go into.
Value yeah, that's right. I get it.
Values like last on my, you know, my thing because they,
they're companies, they should have insurance and they're going
to, you know, like exactly that.So yeah, but I, like I said,
biggest thing is let's put the truck to where I can reach it

(39:22):
with the stick. If we have to go big water and
get a cut off point depending onwhere we're at.
This is a hot button too is, youknow, strip mall.
I can get to it with a 24, right?
A big taller strip mall. The newer ones, yeah, we can get
to them with a 24 and depend again, depending on the size and
all that stuff. A lot of, lot of variables in

(39:42):
there, but there's been conversation of like, well, do
you put the stick up and and geton the roof off the stick or,
you know, quicker? Yeah, it's a lot quicker for us
to throw a 24, you know. But again, I'm, I'm a numbers
guy and I'm like, hey, my guys. Hey, I want a minute and 45 from
the time we step off that truck to the time we're up in that
bucket. Like yeah, air brake hits.
Yeah, like if go to like we get after it.

(40:04):
So, but the biggest, but my big thing is, is it at night?
Because if it's at night time, I'm telling you 9 times out of
10, given some other circumstances, I'm taking the
bucket, putting the bucket up inthe air because we have giant
floodlights on there and light me up, man, Give me, give me so
I can see. But get on the roof.
Where's the occupancy? You know, can, is it at a stage

(40:24):
where we can cut directly over the occupancy?
And typically when we when we dothat, I'm just kind of cut
somewhat of a normal hole. We're going to figure out, I'm
going to do some sort of inspection hole, which for me is
like a three 3 foot wide triangle type thing.
Identify the structure as we make our way over to the fire
occupancy. Couple smoke holes.

(40:45):
Hey, is the Smokey over here now?
We're probably 2 occupancies away.
OK, one more. OK, Hey, we know it's cooking
right here. I can see flames lapping up or
that's where the main body of the the smoke's coming out.
OK, get, we'll get over there. And depending on the structure
on the roof, the techniques thatthat I like is more of the
residential style because you can you can louver commercial

(41:07):
roofs and panelize roofs and allthat.
You can stand on the purlin and then you have it against
construction. With construction we have
different ways of cutting it andknowing that structure, what's
underneath of us that's going totell me how I'm going to cut
that hole. But as far as the end goal is, I
want to cut, people say trench. I don't really use the word

(41:27):
trench, but I I'm going to cut holes at least half the distance
of that building, that minimum, let that smoke get up and over
there, let somebody in that adjacent occupancy get some
water in there. That's my cut off point and it's
usually if I can't get, if I getover the occupancy to cut a hole
but it's running, then I go 1-2 occupancies over and that's
where I'm going to cut my quote UN quote strip.

(41:50):
And that's your last stand. Hey would no matter what we are
making any hard stop, right? Fucking yeah.
I make the joke of if we go a couple occupancies over because
it's running and I cut a trench through there, that's not for
ventilation, that's for where I can initially put my master
stream off. You know what I mean?
That's I I'm making access before I have to make access.
Like yeah, they they like, yeah,like I said, the hard line in no

(42:11):
way it's going to progress past here.
This is line in. The sand line line in the sand
and and then you know, so strip mall specifically hey man then
then our job is pretty much doneon the roof on that side because
we got our cut off point if needed.
If they didn't get a handle on it, this thing's going to go
defensive. And now I'm in protection mode.

(42:31):
I'm making sure we're safe. We're in the bucket.
Get my water supply. We don't have pumps on our
ladders in my organization, get my water supply.
And then we're just going to do everything you can to make that
stand right where we, we cut that trench where where we, we
made the, the, the wall, I call it, you know, so roof reports on

(42:52):
strip malls specifically. Those all get right out of the
gate. It's going to take us some time
to get to where we're going and stuff like that.
I'll hit the roof. Hey, we got and all the way down
to I and I, it's funny. I go from residential where I'm
like, yeah, I don't really give a roof report.
Like you can figure it out like that isn't a big deal too.
Strip mall where the roof reportI'm giving you is going to be

(43:13):
fairly detailed copy. You know, Hey, I got hey, we got
an L shape. Hey, there's a firewall running,
you know, on the L side separating, you know, the north
running building from the West running building.
Like I get in the hey, your AC units, cooler units, whatever
Senator occupancy every second occupancy over one above the
fire occupancy from top third ofthat, you know, like whatever
that looks like because the guysinside may or may not really

(43:38):
care. But if you, if I say, hey, you
got a large AC cooler unit aboveyour head to the back rear end
of the structure in the center and they're in the center of the
structure and they're like, thisshit's getting rough.
You're like, oh shit, look up, man.
Like, hey, just give them some knowledge.
But the firewalls are huge. I get I get that out first and
foremost. I'm not a wordy guy on the road.
You've heard me move that, you know, I'm not a wordy guy, but

(44:00):
when I get up there now, now I see #2 whoever's right, whether
it's IC1 or IC2, you can't see me, right?
And I, and then I get real specific, hey, we've got an 8
foot parapet to the north and 0 parapet or two pair pit to the
rear. I gave out that type of
information because you can't see me.
And if you got to come get me somebody or something goes S
like, hey, understand my third means egress.

(44:22):
Maybe like, because my engineer should be throwing that second
means egress, but my third meansegress.
Like make sure it gets to the back because I'm not scaling 8
feet and like not doing it, you know what I mean?
So but I I'm all for vertical ventilation on, on strip mall
type stuff, bigger box commercial.
That's, that's, that's a different conversation.

(44:44):
You know, that that, that's a, that's a whole another podcast.
Yeah, but I mean, commercial at a minimum, hey, I mean, even,
you know, your strip malls and all that stuff at a minimum,
even if this thing's cooking off, hey, we're going up in the
bucket anyway. I'm going to give you a roof
report. You know, I, I, I can give a a
good roof report without fun stepping foot on, really

(45:05):
stepping foot on it. The only thing difference is
tenable or not tenable. Yeah, that's, that's really the
extent of the difference. But otherwise, commercial strip
mall stuff, I can still give youthat roof report, you know.
Yeah. Hell yeah.
Well, all right, so again, let'swe we can only we only have
enough time to kind of scratch surfaces and stuff.
But so we scratched commercial, we scratched residential, right?

(45:26):
So we we've talked about the fire aspect.
Let's talk about the rest that no one ever fucking talks about,
right. So let's talk about
extrications, 960 twos, motor vehicle collisions, whatever you
guys call them in your system, right, Let's talk about because
I feel like, and again, personalopinion, I feel like this is
what separates a ladder captain from an engine captain.

(45:46):
That has just been lucky or successful on roofs on, you
know, either residentials or commercials because let's be
honest, it's not terribly difficult for 98% of our fires,
right? If we can make the roof from a
roof ladder, get up there, soundreal quick, get a quick hole,
get off, do some salvage, right?It's not like typically that

(46:08):
difficult. I feel like personally, again,
just my opinion, 960 twos are way different.
Extrications are way different, right?
And I'm not even talking about the crazy ones where we have the
cars underneath 18 Wheelers, right?
Or the heavy lifting exercises we need to do, just the the
bread and butter. So what separates what should,
again, your personal opinion, what should a good ladder
captain have in his wheelhouse when he's rolling up on that

(46:30):
extrication energy company's already there.
There's a reported victim trapped, right?
Like what is? What does that look like for
you? So the separator is knowledge of
vehicles. I I mean that this if I had, if
you're asking for like in a nutshell, that's it.
Knowledge of vehicles and right turn wrenches my in in my life,

(46:53):
you know. That we listed it earlier,
right? Yeah.
Mechanic, you know, technician, whatnot.
My dad was a master mechanic, you know, owned his own shop for
28 years. I was eight years old when I
changed out my first transmission.
You know what I mean? Love it.
But like we talked about earlier, you get the vast
majority from guys that they don't know how to start a
fucking lawn mower, you know, bewhen they get to us, you know,
we have to teach them that. So whether it's previous

(47:16):
experience or when you get on the job.
And right now I'm currently downat the training Academy on doing
ladder, our ladder training and it's extrication.
So this is perfect. So it's vehicle anatomy, man.
Like you understanding how a vehicle is put together so that
you know how to take it apart isparamount.
Like huge. Absolutely.

(47:37):
And then when you start talking about the heavy lift stuff, you
get into, I love the fact that you said 18 Wheeler too, by the
way, I mentioned that in my class.
I'm like, Hey, this is, you know, this is a semi truck, a
tractor trailer, 18 Wheeler, depending on what part of the
country you're from, Man, I loveit.
I probably love it. So put that vehicle anatomy, you
get into that heavy lift stuff, you know, Hey, what vehicle
systems are on that semi 18 Wheeler?

(47:58):
Whatever you whatever you want to call it, that can help you,
right? You like understanding how these
things are put. Together in airbags.
All the way down to I talk about, I go, hey, man, what,
what can you do? Like this thing is, this thing
is a bucket of fuck right. You're you're just drawing a
straws. And I go and that person's wedge
up underneath that steering wheel.
I go, what else can you do? And everybody goes, Hey, roll

(48:19):
the dash, do this and that, like, OK, cool.
Like we're, we're, we're workingour asses off.
I go, how about a fucking 14mm or a fucking 516 fucking
millimeter socket and a 3/8 ratchet.
I go, it's 4 bolts to take the fucking seat out.
And generally speaking, anywherebetween 8 and 10 inches off of
the floorboard. That's some significant fucking
room Jack when you're talking about and expectations.
Yeah, like cutting hair. So how is that vehicle put

(48:41):
together? You know, I got guys that I go
up to him and I go, hey, man, I go, is this a human body or a
full frame? And they're like, what?
Yes. Let's sit down, son.
We got some work to do, you knowwhat I mean?
But that's what I do. I mean, and that's I you talk
about a good ladder captain and what they do in extrications by

(49:03):
baby. I mean, yeah, dude, don't get me
wrong. I got this job for the fires.
I love the fires thing, but being a car guy growing up in
the world, you know, motorcyclesand cars and like extrications,
my baby and like that anatomy piece and I and I teach these
guys I'm like, look, man, hey, what?
And I, I as booters, I have them.
I go, Hey, what vehicle you drive?

(49:24):
Hopefully they know what they drive.
And then I'm like, OK, hold up behind the ladder, you know, on
the back apron there, and I go open the doors and all this
stuff and they're like, I thought we were doing
extrication. Oh, we are.
And they're like, whoa, what? But I tell them.
Like, hey, we're going to go over a vehicle and that man, I'm
like, hey, you a car guy. You're not a car guy.
Like are are you the guy that you barely know where to put gas
in it? Or are you, you know, you're

(49:44):
you're replacing a camshaft on aweekend?
You know, like tell me what all the way in between?
Like what are you doing? And I haven't bring the car up
and you would be, you wouldn't be surprised, but so many, I'm a
high percentage of the new guys that come on and even guys who
got time on the job, which is really scary to me.
But you go, hey, man, you know, everybody gets the in the kind
of a post B post C post, you know, whatever, you go, OK,

(50:05):
cool. Hey, where's the cow?
Where's what's the transverse called?
You know, hey, what's a dash trap?
What's you know what's. Oh, yeah, your face.
Oh, I wish I could see your face.
Your face. Like what?
Yeah. Yeah.
But like, they're like, I don't know if I'm clip, you know what
I mean? Like is this is this, you know,
the one I get everybody on like,hey, Fender versus quarter
panel. Which one's in front?
Which one's in front? Oh, they're all all fenders.
Well, depends on where you come from, you know, NASCAR hillbilly

(50:27):
11 months like me. Like it's a quarter panel, Jack.
Yeah, that's what it is. But extrication is a fluid
thing. I mean it.
I have not cut 2 cars the same ever.
I mean, processes very similar, but the damage on the car is a
situation never to do the same very dynamic thing.
And then extrication is one of, if not the most stressful things

(50:50):
that we go through. Like if you're really in tune
with what's going on, highly stressful.
And I make and I, and I have this comment, I tell her at the
time I go, hey man, what happenswhen engine goes on a house
fire, right? They go inside, I go, who's
watching? Like, fuck, you can't even see
each other, you know, right. Lot of company.
Yeah, we go on the roof. People are like, hey, what the
hell? They don't even know what we're

(51:10):
doing up there, right? So they wouldn't know if we
messed it up. And not real high stress, you
know, overall, you, you need to be a little stressed.
If you're not, something's wrong.
But extrication, guess what, man?
When you pull up on a scene, I mean, aside from like a
pediatric code of drama or something like that.
When you pull up on a scene and the roof line is touching the

(51:31):
bottom of the window and there'san arm sticking out and they're
smacking the roof and they're screaming.
And then you look around and there's 30 people out there with
phones and cameras and watching everything you do.
And then even in the fire service in in our system, you
got the engine company standing there with a hose line behind
you going, hey man, hurry up man, do this, do that.
Ambos are weighing BC's watch. What are you?

(51:52):
Waiting for you and everybody can see what you're doing.
This is like this is as good as it gets man like this.
You want to talk about an adrenaline rush like you're I'm,
I'm over there going, I'm like, Nah, I'm barking.
I'm like, hey, get this, get that, get this, get that.
And my mind is going 400 miles an hour over top of what we're
doing. Like I tell my guy, hey, man, I
want you to make a perpendicularcut on the rocker panel on the,

(52:15):
you know, the front side of the B post.
You know what I mean? I'm telling him that as in my
mind, I'm going bang, bang, bang, BCDE.
This is what we're doing. Hey, like, next thing, next step
that doesn't go right, going here, going there, doing this.
Do I need another company? Like, I'm 110 miles an hour.
Yeah, you know, and I'm like a duck on the pond.
Like guys are going to laugh because this is another one of
my things, especially when I talk like guys trying to get
hired, you know, interview. What's a duck look like on the

(52:36):
pond, man? That thing's just gliding.
It looks nice right under underneath his little web
feeder. Going 110 miles an hour.
And on these scenes, I'm a duck on the pond because that is
literally my mind is going 400 miles an hour of like, this
isn't going to work. This is going to tear.
This is going to do this, it's going to do that go down that
line because it's extremely the,the real legit, the bigger deals
that I've been on, like, you know, and it's bad, man.

(52:57):
You like the guy was just talking about today one that we
had that kids hanging upside down.
It was a 45 minute expectation to get the first one out.
And we ended up being like an hour and 15.
It's 108 outside. The car's upside down.
We're leaking, it's leaking fuelall over us, you know, and and
it's just like the kid that we're cutting at the the second
kid that we're cutting out that's literally hanging from

(53:19):
between the console and the chair in the in the front seat,
like his foot is stuck and like it's his, his brother's nine O 1
in the front pass house. You know what I mean?
Like you talk about pressure. Yeah, come on, man.
Like and that, that's where likethat's why I love extrication,
man. Like I get it's like, hey, cool
man. Like yeah, fire.
Let's go. I'm in.
You know, you get an extrication, I get a little

(53:40):
sorry, bonered up, you know whatI mean?
Like it's, it's, that's my baby,man.
I love it and we've talked in previous episodes too, and it's
it's so similar to forcible entry because it's like he
already said, like your mind's going 400 miles an hour.
I know for a fact you have planned A through probably G or
H already in the works and then thinking about, all right, if I
go past HI, go back to the truck, get 6 more plans going,

(54:04):
right. But the cool thing about
extrication, and I'm curious if you agree with me is a lot like
forcible entry. Even though you started at plan
A shit that don't work up. We're going to be OK hybrid C,
right? Let's pick Q over here.
But the cool thing is you can goback to A because you went
through all different other plans and you had compromised or
weakened an area that wasn't able to to finish plan A and go

(54:26):
back to plan A right and then maybe.
Continue because Plan B and PlanC made it better to do Plan A.
Exactly. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, no, no, yeah, 100%.
I mean, I would fucking puzzle. Yeah, like, I would be, you
know, just being honest. Extrication is that times 10,
you know what I mean? But like, 100% correct.
Like the forcible entry thing isit it's wild, man.
I mean, you're talking about thebasic, Basic skills of what we

(54:49):
do, especially ladder companies In my system, everybody like
defers the forceful entry thing to the ladder companies, which
is bullshit. Yeah, everybody needs forceful
entry. But yeah, 100% like, I mean,
something as simple as insane. Same thing there, man.
How's this door bill? You know what I mean?
How's the door bill? That's that's what gets my motor
going, man. That's what's like.
Hey, yeah. And hey, we move this, we move

(55:10):
that and plan a Plan B, you know, now we're on E and you go,
oh shit, man, we move that far enough over, Hey, we could do
this now and go back to A and it's going to be we got a good
bite. Now we got, we got a good, you
know, we got a good purchase point, but.
You would never got there unlessyou went through seven other
plants. Yeah, yeah.
Like it's, that's why it's fun, dude.
Yeah, and it's fun. Like you were talking about
being high stress, but that's also why I really enjoy it is

(55:33):
because they're never the same. They're high stress, they're
fucking. Let's get it on and you have
something tangible, right? 90% of the time you do a real
legit deal. They're alive in there.
You know they're alive in there,right?
They're either screaming, yelling or talking to you.
You know the whole thing. You have something this tangible
that is the that is the amount in our system and and I know

(55:54):
across the city you got that risk management profile right.
You want to talk about being in the green like that You're in
the green like it's 100% it is go time and it's just and I like
the complexity of it. I like the being able to figure
it out and make it work. Whatever, whatever it is like
you have to figure it out and you have to make it work.
And it's not that. And I do and I I do this as a

(56:15):
part of my extrication thing. I go, hey, man, this isn't your
hey, we're not seeing a medium sized house fire with the
obvious working fire or land flying for the West technician
three quarter search rescue, youknow, interior search rescue
fire tagged. Now, if it's traded, assuming
such and such command, like I just blurted that out, like
extrication is not that thing. It is different every time and
it's complex and it's that not that standard.
Like we can outline it, but if you don't know the way that that

(56:37):
vehicle's built and you get there and it's an accordion,
then you don't even know where to start.
Yeah, you know what I mean. And that's and the crazy thing,
and it's, it's something that we've built into training
academies across the United States right now.
We build a lot of scars when it comes down to vehicle
extrication for recruits, right when we first introduced because

(56:57):
we always give them 360° access on those vehicles.
And like you said, how many goodcut jobs have you been on that
you can walk all the way around the job or all the way around
the car? Probably almost none.
Yeah, maybe one if. You're lucky and I mean, we're
fortunate here in the in the valley where we're at that I
mean wide open spaces. You're not dealing with narrow,
you know, back east roads, busy New York City, you know, the

(57:19):
tight spaces and stuff like that.
But, you know, man, 'cause there's, there's always another
car involved and it's always, it's always right where you need
to be. Yeah.
And then here, here's the land, land of the construction.
You got Jersey barriers on all sides and single lanes.
And, you know, this whole like nonsense.
And, and it's just like, that's why I say I'm like, this is
every time we do extrication training.
And then to touch on the, the Academy piece of it, because,

(57:41):
and then I get them and then I'mlike, OK, like in our
organization, we run regional Academy.
So we have multiple agencies that operate under the same, SO.
PS And then we go to the same regional training academies.
So everybody does everything a little bit different, right?
You know, one of my phrases, there's nine ways to fight fire.
All ten of them are right. Same thing, right?
It's such a basic generic approach to the whole thing.

(58:05):
It's good. And don't get me wrong, like
I've been in that training world, like I, I get that and I
understand the why, you know, because it's regionally, we
can't, you can't be doing this because we don't have that
equipment on our truck. You can't say that like it's,
it's very basic because it's a regional thing and that's OK.
But it's just, I just wish we did a little in our in our
world, in our region, Like I wish we did more of ladder stuff

(58:25):
with in the Academy. No, 100%.
And it is progressing that way. But it's still like in all
reality, we need to like double our Academy length and then like
literally that second-half needsto be ladder work.
Yeah, like and we still not haveenough time.
Yeah, and and it's it's one of those things, like you said,
because there are so few of them.
The the focus is not there. And then, you know, yeah, I'm,

(58:48):
you know, selfish. You call it whatever you want,
but it's just like, but what we do is like, it's it it you talk
about high risk, the low frequency.
The most important? We do, you know what I mean?
Like across the fire service in this country, there's very few
people I think will argue with the fact that the most dangerous
place is to be on the roof. You know what I mean?
And then we take the technicality of extrication.

(59:11):
You know, it's not that just getoff, take a plug saying it's
your thinking, your, your, your mechanics are involved, your,
all your, your weight capacitiesof your equipment.
How does it operate? Like what's the weight of that
vehicle? Like?
There's a lot of technical stuffthat goes on in my mind on, on
these things. And we don't scratch this like
we don't like, we don't even barely flip the air on the

(59:32):
surface, you know, like it's, it's just, but then that's put
on guys like myself and you know, everybody else, you know,
worse on the ladder that with that short time that you have, I
am dumping knowledge, you know, because I and that's, you know,
kind of sidebar. But like in the, in the fire
service as a whole, like I had guys that were old crusty guys
that had all this experience andknowledge and didn't like, get

(59:55):
it out there, man. Like get it out there.
We need to make everyone better.And I don't just mean, you know,
my station, my house. You know, the, the battalion,
the department, the city, the valley, the state that the, you
know, whatever that and I've gone across the country and, you
know, different training things,mainly extrication stuff.
But it's just like, you know, bea sponge man.

(01:00:16):
Like take this in be as in, you know, one of the guys who was on
my truck and he's like, you know, he's just like be engaged
in your profession. Like, you know, be a student of
your profession. And and that's, you know, we got
guys on a job that they give 2 shits and it drives me nuts, you
know, that we have that conversation.
Well, I mean, that's why like, Imean, this podcast exists

(01:00:38):
because Copper State Fools. Copper State Fools was brought
around because of exactly what you said.
We no longer want SMEs subject matter experts, right?
There's always going to be the smeeze, right?
But we don't want like old school, like you were just
saying like, hey, I'm the extrication guy, but I'm going
to teach extrication, but I'm going to teach.
I'm not going to teach you everything because I still want

(01:00:58):
to be the guy, right? But that's finally fucking gone,
right? It's like, spread the fucking
knowledge, spread the word, learn something new, then teach
it and teach as many people as you can.
Because again, if we don't teachit, it fucking dies, right?
Right. And, and here and you want to
hear one of the phrases that I've heard a number of your
phrases I remember in my in my career.
And every time somebody says it to me, it drives me absolutely

(01:01:20):
fucking nuts. Oh, it's a good one, man.
Oh, yeah, it's a good one. And it's really kind of dumb.
But it's, you know, somebody's like, oh, man, hey, I'm so glad
you were. You were the latter, Captain, on
this call. I know where.
Yeah, right. Tell.
Tell them why. And and it's, yeah, hey, man,
that's huge. Like for me and for who I'm
like, hey, that's awesome. I'm, I'm glad, you know, you
have that confidence in me. What I immediately go to,

(01:01:42):
there's a fucking problem when we have my, you know, my, my
organization, we have 3 ladder companies in our organization,
roughly 250 members, but you know, 3 ladders, 3 shifts.
Why is it that you're glad out of everybody that I'm there?
Because we're failing because weare failing as an organization

(01:02:03):
to have other good ladder people.
And the that's the reason I'm involved in training is not
because I want, I want you to hear how good I am and how much
I know it's, I don't want peopleto say that like that is to me,
like you. You just scratch the chop over
with your fingernails for me because yeah, it's nice getting
the kudos and then have that confidence.
But as an organization, why aren't we all at least up to

(01:02:28):
par? You, you know what I mean?
Like, I don't expect everybody to have, you know, the, the
extensive knowledge and whatnot on, on vehicles or you got other
guys are on building construction, like whatever.
Like, but the fact that you wereliterally, because this is a bad
situation, you're like, thank God you were here, right?
No, because it what, what if this happened on another day,

(01:02:48):
another shift, another time? Hey, I had to take hours out,
like whatever, you know what I mean?
And like, literally like I had achief officer tell me, I thought
you were on the truck. I was on vacation that day,
thought I was on a truck. And they're having a
conversation in the car and they're like, hey, man, you the
BS OS like, hey, we should probably pull him.
You know, that's it. It looks bad.
Like, oh, that's, that's Billy. Like, hey, he, he, he knows what

(01:03:11):
he's got it. He, he won't be up there any
longer. He has to be.
The BSO looks over and goes, that ain't Billy.
It's a move up, right? Acting out of class and not
somebody that you really want there on that ladder.
And then just like immediately pull them.
Yeah, no, like anybody that's inthat spot needs to be 100%
confident and capable and what is the basic par requirements of

(01:03:35):
what we're doing And we have got, we, we've got guys that'll
be like, I don't feel comfortable working on a ladder.
They get rolled out. I don't feel comfortable.
Working. Yeah, I've.
I've heard it myself, you know. What I mean and those guys,
that's bad. They were like, hey, Stevo, man,
it's it's been a long time. Hey, it's OK.
Well, let's work on stuff. Let's start from the beginning.
But yeah, it's scary that and, and I know this happens across
the country because of staffing and everything, anything else,

(01:03:57):
right? But I know that happens
everywhere and it's fucking terrifying, right?
And the crazy thing is the public has no fucking clue.
Oh yeah, you know that. Like they see a ladder company
from whoever fire department, right, Rolls up and they're like
highly trained professionals. We've talked about it before.
All the public cares about is it's highly trained
professionals and we do our fucking job, right?
They don't know all the insurance and outs of it.

(01:04:18):
Thank God I guess. Oh, yeah, Like I've had family
members and they're like, you know, they'll send me something,
you know, off Instagram or whatever.
And it's like guys, you know, singing in the truck on the way
to the call, what the public sees, it's just fire trucks
blaring down lights and somebody's going, you know, and
they're like, look at those bad motherfuckers.
And then they're going to go getsome, you know, and they're
coming to see my house, my family, like whatever.
And like, what are we in there? Like, oh man, what's our dinner?

(01:04:41):
You know, like we're off in a different, different zone and
like inside of a house, everybody's like they're going
in there. It's like the TV shows, you
know, like they're going in there.
They're handling business. No, we're falling over fucking
furniture. That's.
An acid? What just happened that happened
inside and not outside? But like you said, the public
doesn't know, you know, and I had a recent incident with, we
have a private ambulance company.

(01:05:01):
I had a recent incident where we're on a rollover.
Two people ejected whatever didn't go well, you know, and
one of them was, it was a very, very busy day.
It was a inner facility dedicated unit because they had
to backfill it and they came in,you know, and one of the things
I said is like, hey, I realize that you're an inner facility
unit, but you guys work in the system too.
Like when the. Billy's talking about

(01:05:23):
ambulances. Yeah, so the yeah, sorry, that's
I, I say rescues, but our ambulance is in private company.
And I literally had the conversation.
I said, and you know, got a little heat for it too, but I
was like, hey, I go, you're not an inner facility, but you know
that you are going to work in the system if levels get low,
right? Do you think that patient cares
that you're an inner facility init?

(01:05:43):
No, no. And I looked at him and I go.
Neither do I Oh, good for you. Yeah, and that's I call like
psychology for that. But I'm not the guy that, you
know, steps back, just go whatever you know, I say what it
is. I got you.
And but that's, that's the deal,man.
Like you got to know what you'redoing when you get here, you
know, and that's that, that whatthe public thinks of us.

(01:06:04):
And what the public sees is, youknow, you got four guys getting
off of, you know, $1,000,000 apparatus with all the equipment
in the world shoved in that truck to handle my problem.
Yes, right. And we need to be there.
And I just, we're not as good aswe think we are.
And I'm not saying as a whole, but it just why not be better

(01:06:25):
when you're talking about people's families and people's
property and people, you know, the why did we get into this
business? You know, and that's why I love,
I love when the the salty guys that just bitch about everything
show my truck. We don't bitch on my truck and
we don't bitch. And then the first day they'll
start bitching, Hey, man, no, shut it down.
I go, Hey, why'd you want to be a fireman?
We asked the new guys that right?
The new guys coming in, Why do you want to be a fireman?

(01:06:47):
Why do you want to be here? Oh, I want to help people.
I want to do this. I want to do that that well, it
used to be, you know, the guys with 20 plus years on the job,
they're the all salty ones. They've been doing it forever.
You know, they've seen everything and done everything.
Now it's in the three five year guys.
They're pissed off when the fucking light comes on.
And it's just like the public thinks completely different to
you, man. And I and I want and I'm more on

(01:07:07):
the I want to be more on the endof when we show up, what the
public thinks is what the public's going to get.
Yes, you know what I mean. That yeah, that's who we
actually are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, dude, 100%.
So what? Yes, I'm going to say fucking,
let's try to keep it super shortbecause we've we've been going
for a little bit. But before we go on and kind of

(01:07:28):
wrap up this episode on just barely scratching the ladder
work surface on the extrication talk, right?
So you talked about all the crazies, right?
And your mind's going 1000 milesan hour.
So, and I know because I leaned on you hard because I went a
deep dive on EV. So I so I leaned on you hard
because you had already done a bunch of research, right?

(01:07:50):
And again, the network of firemen, right?
So what do I do? I come to you and say, Billy,
man, I need help. This what I've been tasked with
to design this class for the region, right?
And you're like, bro, here's everything I have to use it all.
Alter whatever you need to do, right?
So I know you have a vast knowledge on EV.
So just tell the guys listening on the considerations, right?
And the extra dangers, but more importantly the I would say the

(01:08:14):
additional hindrances for guys like us that work on ladders
when it comes down to extrication on EV.
So I have a very non standard approach to that so.
I I don't even know if that's that makes sense.
I have a very non standard approach, so I I fucking love
it. I skilled that I oh quadruple

(01:08:35):
negative. I hope I know I love it.
Yeah, but yeah, fuck I'm not English isn't my strong season,
OK? I love it.
All right, brother, go ahead. I treat every vehicle the same
whether whether whether it's in with with some exceptions, every
vehicle the same. One of the advanced extrication
electric vehicle hybrid deals that I went to, three day deal,

(01:08:56):
we had a mechanical and electrical engineer.
This guy put it on and he basically said he goes, how do
you know it's an EV, right? And then this guy like has
emblems and he literally holds it up and goes, oh, OK, this is
a Honda EV and he fucking chucksit across the room and I'm like,
what the fuck? And he goes, you don't know.
He goes, but I'm going to teach you an approach that's going to
keep you safe. And he's like you treat every

(01:09:17):
vehicle same basically. The short version is you disable
that 12 Volt disable the high. Voltage.
There's so many safety systems, and this is extrication side
specifically. There's so many safety systems
that are in those vehicles that this thought process of cutting
through a high voltage line, theorange lines that run through

(01:09:40):
there, all that stuff, that you're going to have this
massive fucking explosion. Not you're going to die.
Everyone's going to die. Not going to get off of the
weeds, but the way that though even just the cable itself is
built is designed to shut that system down.
So take the 12 Volt out, do whatyou got to do first, right?
Move seats back, you know, move steering wheels up.
Do whatever you got to do. Change the radio station.
What do you want to list to whatever you got to do, right?

(01:10:02):
But then disconnect the 12 Volt,disconnect the 12 Volt.
Biggest considerations when we get into that, where are we
working right? We're working a post B post
rocker panels, rolling dashes, all that stuff.
Battery pack locations vary greatly across the board.
Don't puncture the battery. I mean don't put anything

(01:10:23):
through that battery. I will be a little more
specific. As you know, we pulling peak and
look for airbag stuff. I'm doing more of looking under
the car, seeing if I can identify where the battery packs
or or what not. Your auto manufacturers, you
know, obviously the big boys that we all know the it's the
floor board. It's the that battery.
Most of them are kind of put center of the vehicle towards

(01:10:44):
towards the rear, you know, somewhere in there.
Not really in our cutting area for the most part, but pay
attention to where you're cutting.
I'm not worried about the cables.
I'm ADC to 12 Volt, all that don't puncture the battery, but
every it's still an extrication,right?
There's a lot of nuances that I got to dive into, but like a lot
of nuances with, you know, the big boys, the T, the T vehicles

(01:11:08):
that you know that are out there, right, like, hey, you
know, magnetic doors, different things like that, you know,
access bumpers in the front bumper pushing it, blah, blah,
all the all those little nuancesthat come along with that.
But for the most part that it's it's the same.
Now there's considerations, right?
You know, because I'm way more concerned about fire on an

(01:11:30):
extrication in an EV or a hybridbecause of the battery stuff,
right? Because just that jarring motion
kick something off one of the small cells in there.
There's research on that, the impact type stuff.
Set that off and you end up in the thermal runaway, blah, blah,
blah. You get that off and we've done
that. But the EV stuff is one big

(01:11:52):
thing that I learned was everybody, and there's stages of
this, right? When, when they first came out,
everybody was like, OK, what do we got to do?
We can't cut them. We can't do this, can't do that.
And then it turned into, hey, gofind the emergency disc or the
emergency or service disconnect.Sorry, service disconnect.
The name is service disconnect. We're not there to service the
vehicle, right? Where's it at?

(01:12:14):
Who knows? Do you know?
Most of them are, you know, pretty easy to get to find 2,
but you know, now you're openingtrunks, you're wasting time,
you're not getting the patient out and stuff like that.
Are you trying to go under the passenger seat?
Who fucking knows? Yeah.
Yeah, there's a ton of things disconnected 12 Volt.
We're not in the service industry, you know, and then all
the way up to, and then it just depends on who you talk to.
I had gone through these classesand stuff and then I started

(01:12:37):
going to manufacturers. And after talking to my, the
third manufacturer that has hybrids and full electric
vehicles and the spiel they're giving me over the phone, I'm
like, you guys are liability driven.
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Don't cut. Don't cut the rocket panel,
don't cut the A post, don't cut the like.
Don't do. Anything.
How the fuck you want me to get them out?
Yeah, you know what I mean? But I treat every vehicle the

(01:12:58):
same and and it's just falls under that pulling peak.
Make sure you know where you're at.
Don't puncture that. Puncture that battery, you may
not be able to recognize it's it's an electric vehicle.
There's Silverados out. I mean all the different brands,
they all have them, you know, and if you're if you're going to
rely on badging, you know, and even somebody's like, oh, well,
there's no true front grille because there you don't need the
air movement that's smashed to shit.

(01:13:19):
How do I know if it's an actual grill or not?
You know what I mean? You're like, well, there's no
exhaust. Well, I can't tell where exhaust
would at. Three O clock in the morning on
the side of a hill off of the highway.
I can't tell you what, what kindof car and if it's truly, you
know, that bad. I don't know, I don't know what
it is. So I got to take so that
standard approach, standard outcome thing.
Caveat. Once you kind of figure that
out, there's obviously other telltale signs and stuff like

(01:13:41):
that, but make sure the vehicle's off man.
That that's that's number one. First and foremost, I, I, I, I
walk up, look in the window. Hey, OK, vehicle often is in
park. You know, that's step one on
any, any 962 still assignment, which is, you know, for us, a
single company response Fender Bender.
Hey, man, the guys have gotten killed by like, oh, they're

(01:14:02):
looking under the car. I think it might be drivable.
Patient freaks out, hits the accelerator, boom, runs them
over. You know what I mean?
Like, come on, man. Like just there's there's
different things to think about with that.
But as far as the extrication side, I'm still going at it.
I'm still still doing what we'redoing.
Cool. Well, good deal.
So yeah, like I said, and there is and like I said, Billy is not
saying like, hey, disregard the fact that it's EV, EV don't do

(01:14:25):
any sort heightened insurance orwhatever.
There's so many things out there.
So there's apps that have ER GS for vehicles.
Now it will show you where the battery compartment is the
easiest way. And like, I'll let Billy chime
in too. If you just take the floorboard
out of it, you're going to be safe because it's either the
entire floorboard or a portion of it, you know?
So if you're not pushing Prion off that floorboard, you're

(01:14:48):
going to be OK. And you're correct.
That's where I say most of thesebatteries when you start looking
into and you really dive into itand then they do have vehicle ER
GS, but being in the automotive industry, you got to understand,
man, they changed it. They changed it around mid year,
mid model year, you know, thingslike that.
It's just a constant evolution. So that standard approach, stay
away from the, the center of thevehicle kind of pretty much from

(01:15:11):
the seed edges and there you go to the center.
It's kind of where I stay away from, But again, I'm still
looking to make sure we're not going to puncture that battery.
I the, the wires and I'm, I'm just speaking frankly like it's
not that I'm not concerned aboutthem, it's in my mind, but
understanding how that again, understanding how that system
works, I'm more app to go, somebody goes, oh, hey man,

(01:15:32):
there's an orange wire. Cool.
Well, we need to cut it there. Go ahead. 12 volts disconnected.
That system's done. As long as we don't go directly
to the battery, we're fine. You you know, I got no problem
with that. Yeah, exactly.
And it's it's funny too. And I, I know you know this
because we've talked about it, but it's like, and when I teach
an EV class, I always tell them the same thing.
So we show them the anatomy of the orange wire, we show them

(01:15:53):
the cut out, right, how it's double insulated.
You cut through the low voltage before you hit the high voltage,
right. So you're deeming the vehicle
safety anyway by always explain it to him this way.
I'm like, if you fail to identify it's electric vehicle,
right? And then you do cut through that
orange wire, right? Will there be a spark?
Probably, yeah. Will your tool be OK?

(01:16:13):
Yes. Will your fireman be OK?
Yes. The biggest emergency is going
to be the environmental emergency.
Your fireman probably should have spanced.
I'm like, that's probably the biggest emergency outside of
that. Yeah, it's it's basically like
somebody put a firecracker at the end of your cutters and you
should go. You're like and that's.
Exaggerating a little bit. It's not even that.
Bad, You know what I mean? You'll be OK, like just trying
to like hem it down because I remember you've been on the job

(01:16:36):
for a little a couple more yearsthan I have.
And it's funny because I remember when Priuses came out,
they were the first hybrid EV slash whatever, anything outside
of what we've been used to. And I, I, I don't know if you
were taught the same way. I back East.
I was hot. I remember like when they came
out, it was like, don't even look at the fucking orange wire
because you know. Somehow he had to kill you.

(01:16:57):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then and then just like the
bottom line, like they talk, youknow, like we talk about like,
well, what if it's raining outside?
What it like electrical theory, man, it's grounded through the
chat vehicle, like all that stuff.
And it's just like, hey, man, you have to understand the
systems that you're working within order to to decommission and
take them out of the equation, right?
Like so. It goes back to what you said in

(01:17:19):
the very beginning when we firststarted talking the why.
Like if you know the why, guess what?
You're a better fucking fireman.You're more effective fireman.
The safer fireman, more aggressive fireman.
All the above, right? And you just said it from the
get go. You're like, hey, you like to
explain the why. This is why.
We, you know, explain the why. So that's perfect Fucking
Segway, bro. So the why So question number

(01:17:40):
one, we're going to get into it.Why?
So we asked the new guys. You just said like, hey, just
ask the salty guy that's freaking bitching in the back
like the why? But why did Billy Grubb decide
to be a fireman? What did you get?
Bit what? What was the scenario?
I don't know, I, I, I didn't getthe the, the bug, the bug,
right. You know what I didn't, you

(01:18:00):
know, my family tells me they'relike, man, ever since you
started talking, I'm gonna be a fireman.
I'm gonna be a fireman. Oh, really?
Yeah. Just like, very strange.
And then honestly, I think it turned into going into my like
my teenage years, it was just like, yeah, that was just always
in my mind. Like when people would ask, you
know, all through school, your grade school, all day, what do
you want to do when you grow up?You know, and there's, you know,
a typical fireman, you know, andthen it, then it turned into
like whatever, you know, every little boy wants to be a

(01:18:22):
fireman. Like, yeah, but it's an actual
job. Why can't I do it?
And then, you know, and then, you know, you got your movies,
your backdraft, all the different things that come out
and it's just like, dude, that just looked fun to me.
It just looks fun. And then you Start learning
about the the fire service, right?
You need a little bit of medical, you know, medical
classic. We run all our we were full EMS,

(01:18:45):
the whole thing. I'm paramedic.
So it's just again, it's something that it's challenged
me. And then it just kind of evolved
into once I started learning more about it, it was just like,
yeah, yeah. I'm not a, I'm not a desk guy,
man. Like, you know, I'm a people
person. I like to talk.
You know, you're half the time you're out here looking to go,
all right, man, we gotta move onto the next station.
But like, it's just like, I, I loved it.

(01:19:05):
You know, I love people. I love all that stuff.
And I come from a family very giving, very loving.
And it's just like, hey, man, you know, the value of what you
do isn't in money. And so that turned into that.
And then I think part of it was is as I go a little older, it
was like, huh, that's every little boy's dream.
You know, when I got on the job,I had numerous traveling.
Let's go, man. You're the only person I've ever

(01:19:25):
met my entire life that said I want to be a fireman as a kid.
And you just went and did it. That's like also Swin did it.
Yeah. That.
So I don't have. There's one other guy I know,
Kevin Weiss, because I think he said the same thing.
He literally was like, I came out the womb like freaking
talking like a fireman wanted tobe a fireman.
And he's like, I never look. Back.
God I love that guy. I know I used to be a fellow
born Ohio guy. Like that's the exact boy there.

(01:19:48):
Well, dude, I love it. So always wanted to be a fireman
as a kid. And now you said you have, what,
21 years, right? Yeah.
So 21 years later, any regrets? No, I wouldn't say I really have
any regrets, man. I mean I I.
I, I, I'm a positive guy. Like, I love my career.
I love where it, what departmentI ended up with.

(01:20:09):
I love the people around me. I love where I'm, where I've
been, where I'm at and where I'mgoing, man.
Like I just this this job I've got, you know, 21 years in the
fire service, 24, you know, I did EMS ambo stuff before this
and I've loved every step of theway.
Basically your entire adult life.
Yeah, that's fucking awesome. All right, so since we got the

(01:20:32):
why now, right. So now you're a fireman.
So what's your what's your, yourpersonal opinion?
What's your favorite fire department tradition?
But more importantly, why isn't your favorite?
Yeah, dinner. OK, so, so why?
Let's let's talk about it. So, so I'm half Hispanic man and

(01:20:53):
my mom who was like, you know, your mom's always nurturing your
thoughts and she you want to be a fireman, you gotta learn to
cook, man. You gotta learn to cook.
You gotta learn to cook. So, you know, 70 years old, I
started cooking and I love food.I know for those who don't know
me, if you ever see me, it doesn't look like it, but I like
to eat. So cooking has been a thing.
Cooking, family, cooking, that whole, that whole deal, right?

(01:21:13):
Yeah. So when you get in the
Firehouse, and so I was I was ready.
I was like, hey, day one, you know, old, you know, traditions
that I came up under is booter day one.
You're cooking a meal like, hey,we'll drop you out.
We'll you go in the store to getall the stuff and be in the
truck waiting for you. You know, nobody's helping you.
Like you figure the fuck out, dude.
But it's what comes with dinner is a number of things.

(01:21:37):
First and foremost is the sitting at the table, no matter
if you're the new guy day one tothe guy that's got 30 years on
the job, everybody's sitting at the same table.
And you know, there used to be the old, you know, blue to go
sit in the corner or whatever. I've never agreed with that at
the dinner table and I that was never done to me.
So sit at the table and as a young from the young guy, you

(01:22:00):
can learn a lot. You can learn a lot because what
do we do when we're eating dinner, right?
Yeah, we talk shop. We talk shop.
So people say, you know, we kindof touched on it, you know,
earlier today when we were just bullshitting this like, you
know, that, you know, the kitchen table, it's more than a
kitchen table for me. It's the dinner and the dinner
is because everybody at that house sits down at that table.
You come together. That's where the quote UN quote

(01:22:23):
brotherhood is for me. You know, the talking.
And then inevitably we talk shop, inevitably we talk shit.
We make fun of each other. We do all those things which,
you know, helps us cope, helps us deal, helps get us through
the day. You know what, whatever you want
to say. But it's that we're sitting down
for dinner. There's a number of, you know,
you eat breakfast, lunch, whatever.

(01:22:44):
You do whatever, everybody does their own thing, whatever.
But you sit down at that table. And that is a staple for me and
the American Fire Service is when anything in the
documentary, anything you watch,it's, they always show them
eating dinner. So it's that sitting at the
table talking from the young guywho's probably not talking a
whole lot, especially if he's onmy truck, to the senior man who

(01:23:06):
is telling stories about what hedid 20 years ago, how things
were. The younger guys get an
education, the older guys get torelive the fucking glory days to
the middle guy who's working on a promotion to anything.
Family problems, right? Fucking kids did this by by
fucking, you know my wife. Damn my whole lady's.
Bothered. Yeah, like God damn man, I got

(01:23:27):
to go home and do this and blah,blah blah kids parties coming
up, you know, blah, blah. Like the conversations that are
had over dinner and that interaction, camaraderie if you
will, that goes on huge. The meal itself.
I have eaten things I never thought I would eat.
I have explored other, you know,traditions, nationalities, you

(01:23:50):
know, whatever, right. Like, we're such a diverse group
when it comes to dinner and depending on who's cooking or
who comes with up with what ideayou might be having country
fried steak to tacos to something that came out of
Guatemala, Philippines, you know, the Philippines.
Yeah. Oh yeah, I know, I know, you
know. What I mean, but like, dude,

(01:24:10):
like there's so much to that because of the way we are when
we're eating dinner, it's everybody's pretty much who they
are. And there's there's not a lot of
politics. You know, I know guys talk
politics over the kitchen table,but at its core, it's you get to
learn so much about your brothers and sisters.
You get to learn about their families.

(01:24:31):
You get to learn about who they are.
They tell stories about when they're kids.
I tell stories about my old man,you know, buy your guy, ride it
down the road. You like the whole thing, you
know, and then that meal adds toit.
You get to understand a little bit of somebody that's Italian,
somebody that you know, comes from Mexican background, you
know, Central America, Asian, whatever.
There's so much. To me, it just exemplifies the

(01:24:54):
fire service as a whole number of different people.
One goal, one thing, and that's put food in my fucking mouth and
God damn it better taste good, you know what I mean?
Like. There better be enough of.
It that's number one, man, Whatever it is, I don't give a
shit as long as there's enough, you know what I mean?
So that's that's what what my favorite fire department
tradition is. Just dinner.

(01:25:15):
Yeah, I love it and it it's funny.
I'll tell a quick story and we were just talking about this
today and I I just want to sharewith the listeners because I
love it so much. So my first experience, my first
time ever meeting you right. So I'm booting on your truck at
one of our busiest stations and you I don't know if you're tempt
in there or you're working overtime or whatever the
scenario was, but the first timeI was working for you first
time, I believe I've met you. And it was funny because you

(01:25:38):
were like, what we doing for dinner, right?
And typically at that point, that house almost never cooked,
but the first 2 was good for a lot of different foods and
everything else. And I'm in for whatever you're
like, Hey, I don't work everywhere often I know exactly
where we're going. So we go to this Mongolian BBQ
place and not only was it the fact that I had never had
Mongolian BBQ prior to that, So it then it's like, let me show

(01:26:00):
you. So you showed me like you're
literally show me how to pound. Down the meat.
Into the bowl to slam his name. Fireman man, we got to get the
most for our buck bro, that's what we do.
Literally by the time like your container, my container is
busted and open, you're like, oh, that's so you know, you did
it, You know, then we go back tothe house and then we set the
table and we eat, you know, and we have that firemanship, but
it's funny because it's like it literally at that moment, I had

(01:26:24):
never met you before. We were talking shop a little
bit already knew I liked you. Then like that was like drove it
home. I'm like, he's a boy.
He's a fucking gamer, right? Because, like, right off the
bat, I'm like, this is fucking awesome.
But then again, the crazy thing about it had nothing to do with
the fucking fire service had to do about food.
Yeah, you know, and, like, but that's how I knew I like him a
lot. Ready for the gecko.
All right, so it's a brand new question for us, and I think

(01:26:48):
it's a good one. So if you could tell just one
thing, and that's probably the hardest part about this
question. So if you could tell, give words
of advice. One thing only to a guy with
five years on and less Right, which is what we know now.
Most of the American Fire Service 50% of their department
five years and less. What would the one thing that
you wish you know you could tella guy or you wish you were told

(01:27:10):
when you have five years on or less that would make them
positive experience in their career?
Enjoy it. All right, explain that, you
know, because a guy with five years and less is going to be
like what you know. Yeah, so enjoy it.
It it just encompasses everything.
Like generally speaking, for themost part, guys got into this

(01:27:32):
job because they wanted it for some specific reason.
And it's just like, hey, man, you should be enjoying this.
It doesn't get any better than this, man.
Like take it in like even the shitty nights, man.
That you know what some of the funnest nights I've had on this
job is one of our 17 fucking calls 3:00 in the morning, man.

(01:27:53):
And I'll tell you a little storywith this one.
So the crew that I had, I mean this, this was epic and it was
epic. And it was my engineer that I
had when I was a booter on that particular engine Captain I had
known when I first got hired, hewas he was out doing training
and I was red shirting, which isbefore you go to the Academy.

(01:28:15):
And I met him and then guy next to me was got hired 3 months
after me, six months after me, something like that.
And through the channels we found out were actually cousins.
Like yeah, weird. Wow, OK, weird, weird deal.
So. And glow, West Virginia action
going on. So it was a Hispanic side, Yeah,
so close. But like you're getting your

(01:28:37):
shit kicked in when like 16th call, whatever, it's 3:00 in the
morning and the song regulate comes on the radio.
You know what I mean? Like we're like, dude, this like
we're just getting it, man. Like this is just like, you
know, nothing exciting, you know, fall injuries, you know,
just like we're in we're we're in the bad part of the time.
Just it's just it's a bad night.Garbage calls, you know, you got

(01:29:00):
your head kicked back, you know,and you're just like trying to
catch a little shut eye, you know, or you're not driving.
So you're like, I just, you know, put close my eyes, man.
Regulate comes on the radio and we just start off.
He goes you Nate Dogg, I'm Warren G got it.
And we just start singing, man. We're singing.
And our captain, same thing. He's got his head back and all
of a sudden he just looks back and he just this guy's smile is

(01:29:24):
legendary like this. I mean, you like he would.
He's a great dude, great dude. He recently retired here in last
year, but he's family and it's just like, that's it, man.
Like you got in this job to havefun.
For me, it's that the, the, the camaraderie that, you know, like
being on a sports team and like football.
And it's just like, what else? Like what?

(01:29:45):
What else is there, man? Like, we're, we're doing it.
And when shit hits the fan, where are the guys fixing it?
You know what I mean? And it's just like, yeah, you
got to get through those nights and those long days, whatever,
but enjoy it because the minute you start becoming negative,
that's a hard trend to get out of, you know what I mean?
You got to find enjoyment. Too.
That's the whole. It's terrible.
Like that's where I'm like, you got to enjoy it.

(01:30:07):
Like I enjoy every minute of it,man.
I got, like I said, I'm 18 yearswith current fire department and
it's just like I go to work. I still work at a busy house.
Yeah, I, I have no intention of working at a slow house, but
it's just like the and as a company officer, I'm up there
having fun. Like I'm like, hey, it's 2:00 in
the morning. Stop, stop at the corner store,
man, you know, and they're like,OK, whatever, I go in, you know,

(01:30:29):
get, get my, my, what I call essentials, you know, and then I
come out with 3-4 bags of, you know, gummy candies and
Twizzlers and like dumb egg boysthrough bonding, man.
Let's like I try and make it funbecause.
And and it's not if you got a good crew and whatnot, it just
happens naturally, but enjoy it because there comes those times

(01:30:50):
when you're sitting at that kitchen table and it's dinner
time and you're telling a story,you're laughing, your stomach
hurts, whatever, because you're talking about things that were
fun and enjoy. And it may not have been fun at
the time. You're covered as shit, you
know, so and so whatever. And your skipper sitting out
there and then somebody goes, Hey, how come you're not there?
And they're helping him and he fires off he goes everybody
before people cover his shit before I get in there, you know,
and it's just like, enjoy those little moments that you don't

(01:31:13):
you're you're tired, you're you're rundown.
You've been working your ass off, you know, enjoy.
I don't care if, you know, 4:00 AM, whatever 20s call, whatever
it is, enjoy it because this is the greatest job on earth, man.
I love this. This is it.
Enjoy it. And you get tactical with the
actual fire service stuff, but it's like, enjoy what you do

(01:31:33):
because it's a whole lot of fun.And if you talk to people that
are retired, they don't miss thecalls.
So I'm like, most of them, like,I don't miss running the fires,
you know, like, yeah, like, theyenjoyed it all the way up to the
last day. And everyone was like, I missed
the guys I missed. The one you know, House.
Just that environment, you got agood, enjoy it man, just enjoy

(01:31:54):
it. Dude, I, I love it.
That's that's probably one of the best answers I've ever
heard. And it's funny because as
you're, you're telling the storyof the quickie mark, you know,
stop, Hey, stop the quarter story real quick, right?
Whatever that super senior saltyladder captain that you were
talking about, I'll never forgetbecause I booted on his truck.
It was like we again, one of those straight up 24 hours,

(01:32:15):
we're getting freaking nailed all night long and it's 3 IA
little after 3:00 in the morning.
And he's like Steve, one more God damn call.
We're going jack-in-the-box and getting fucking yeah, hell yeah.
And then I I had mentioned at that point I never had a
jack-in-the-box Taco. And then you went.
And so then we went right, But Istill remember that right.
And it's funny because he boughtit for me too.
You know, it was just like, thatwas my first.

(01:32:37):
So it was, it was good all the way around.
Like so the crews fucking hacking it up because they're
like, Oh my God, I can't believeyou've never had jack-in-the-box
Taco, because from the East Coast, there's no fucking
jack-in-the-box, right? And it's just like and the, and
it was a horrible fucking night,but it was a one of the best
memories I've had. And I tell you a lot of the
stuff that that I do and, and the way that thing comes from

(01:32:58):
him because he just, you know, Imean, this is the guy that had a
sharp shuttle in his little Fanny pack, you know, pouch or
whatever. And it's just like, and then he
had ALS guy, yeah, BLS guy. And he literally in that Fanny
pack had nothing to do with calls like and and it's our
shuttle he kept in there a Snickers.
Well, I didn't know that. Oh.

(01:33:18):
Yeah, yeah, actually I thought it was for medical.
Yeah. No, he literally inside the
sharp shuttle was a Snickers putin there.
And it was just like, hey, man, when we're getting this shit
kicked in, he's like, you know, and he always tell me he's like,
hey, man, keep yourself something on this truck that we
get on a campaign deal before the canteen truck gets there,
man, Like whatever. All the way down to that.
And then he started that he was the crew bonding guy.
Yeah. He'd be like, hey, man, let's go
get milkshakes. Crew bonding.
Hey, let's go. Let's go do this like crew

(01:33:39):
bonding, you know? I know everyone that grew up
underneath him because most of them are captains now and every
single one of them still hold onto that.
Yes, and I've I've heard it and it's funny because I know where
it came from. I love it.
It's it's like just enjoy it, man, Just have a good time and
like he, he's he was that guy. Like you said, man, like Jack
the box tie. Oh God, I gained weight when we
worked there just back. Oh, dude, I love it.

(01:34:01):
All right, so we'll get to the last question.
So this is my favorite question.If you could snap your fingers
right, zero sweat equity, insta gratification, you could change
one thing in the American fire service.
What would it be? But why would you change it?
Oh, that one's rough. Like I have you.
You, you told me that one was coming.
And I'm like, I don't know aboutthat one.

(01:34:22):
And the the American Fire service as a whole.
Hey, just let's how it effects, you know how it effects you
directly Because this is this iswhat you would like to change.
Get rid of, implement, whatever the case might be, doesn't
matter. It would.
You're you're king of the day. King of the day, Yeah, I like
being king of the. I like that thought

(01:34:45):
wholeheartedly. It would have to be the if I
could, I'm going to just say it.I'm just going to say it is the
passion, the attitude. So you want to increase
decrease. I, I think if, if, if I could
stab my fingers no problem is when that guy shows up day one
on that truck, when he leaves at253032 whatever, he has that

(01:35:09):
same passion for what he does. Fuck yeah, there you go.
Because we lose it and we had everybody goes through the goes
through those waves, right? Life happens.
And like, I generally, bro, thisone, this one jammed me up, man.
You said, you know, because you said give me questions like,
hey, just kind of think about it, right?
So I'm not sitting here just going right.

(01:35:29):
Like like that one jammed me up.And it was like I started going
down the operational path, the equipment path, the safety path,
like all these different things.And I'm like, I go, that's ever
changing. That's ever changing for
everything that we do building construction vehicle, you know
the whole thing, everything we do that changes.
But the one thing is that passion.

(01:35:51):
I'm a very passionate guy comes out anytime we have you know,
the people are listening to thisgoing like this dude just talked
for days. So I'm like, yeah, I could
because I'm passionate and it's take that passion from that day
one firefighter and I want them to leave at the end of their
career, healthy, happy and that same passion for what they did
for all those years, for all those people that passion and

(01:36:14):
know that they help the people along the way.
And those waves, those ups and ups and downs of I don't want to
go to work today. What do you mean you don't want
to go to work today? You know, I always say it like
guys would do unspeakable thingsback in the day to get on the
job. Do you know, like have that
passion and drive because I've seen too many people leave this
place disgruntled, upset. And it's like for what?

(01:36:39):
Yeah, we all hey, upstairs, headquarters, HQ, cheese, blah,
blah, blah, administration, whatever, right?
But it's that passion and I think a lot of that disconnect
that we feel is for the loss of passion because now it's a job.
Now it's a job. I want you to have the passion
that this is not a job. It's part of my life.

(01:37:03):
This is this is not who I am, but it's what I do, right?
And it's that that passion for that job and that caring the
whole thing. Like, man, I don't care who you,
you'd be the biggest scumbag on the fucking department.
No matter whether you're trying or not, you help so many people
along the way that you don't really realize that public
image, right? That that perception.

(01:37:25):
So when you leave here, have that same passion and do your
best. Just that's it, man.
Just you have the passion to do this job.
Maintain that. If I could snap my fingers, no
bitching, no complaining. No, you know what's debate about
this is maintain your passion for what you're doing because
love it. This is not an occupation where

(01:37:47):
you can, in my opinion, this is me really like this is not an
occupation. You should come in and punch a
clock and not have a passion forit.
Too much at risk, too much to lose yourself, your guys and
gals in the truck. You know, you felt like the
whole thing like have that passion throughout your career,
and I just wish we could figure out a way to get rid of the

(01:38:10):
negative. It sucks, man, you know, I
you've been there, but it's justlike if you get upset, ups and
downs, you know, it's kind of like that, that, you know, the,
the marriage, the relationship to whatever.
Like you have your ups and downs, but if you don't keep
that passion going, like you lose sight of what's going on
and why you're here and what you're doing.
And it's just like have that passion, they whatever after 20

(01:38:32):
plus years that you had to stay one.
I love it. No ones ever said passion and I
love how you explained it because you're right.
Imagine the cultural difference everybody would have across the
nation if we could magically again through FM fucking magic
right? Figure that out.
The snap of the finger be fucking incredible.
You know, you'd have a bunch of guys that did a bunch of good

(01:38:52):
work and they enjoy their retirement and they're like you
said, they're fucking happy. They're passionate.
They're, you know, it's a, it's a good deal all the way around
for everybody. Like I said before, like we're
it's the greatest job. It is like.
Hang out with your boys, you know, play pickleball,
pickleball, video games, shoot the shit, talk shit, have fun,
eat, you know what I mean? Like that, that's what you know,

(01:39:14):
going back like that's that's it.
It's that passion and it's that that dinner table that what we
have. And it's just like, don't lose
sight of that. Like there's ups and downs and
across the country, right? Like I I know guys from all over
this country throughout the years.
You get to having these conversations over a pint.
You know, you know, in Colorado Springs, you don't remember in
our fallen brothers and sisters,like that's a huge opportunity,

(01:39:36):
but it's all the same man, from the biggest of the big boy on
the East Coast to the smallest of the small.
You know, where I'm from, like it's all the same shit.
Like Tyrone fall under this like, and then you, you just
lose that passion. It's like, don't do that man and
leave disgruntled. You did good work regardless of
the circumstances. And everybody's got budget

(01:39:57):
staffing apparatus. Quit all that shit, right?
We deal with it all. But what are we, what are we
here to do? Figure the fuck out and just
leave? I I just, I've seen too many
guys leave. Upset or later in their career,
they're angry. They're whatever.
Just keep that. If I could bring that passion
back that you had 30 years ago. Hell yeah.
And like I said, and then again,everybody benefits because

(01:40:19):
they're going to enjoy their retirement, you know, and
they're just go look at their career as all those positive
things that they influenced. And I mean, it's in the system
that we work in. You're talking literally after
25 years, hundreds of thousands of calls that you have
personally ran. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's not
a exaggeration. So it's like the amount of
people that you affect in in anysort of manner.

(01:40:41):
So dude, it's awesome. So we've been yapping for almost
2 hours, brother. I know we could go all fucking
night long. So we're going to kind of wrap
it up here, but is there anything that you want to leave
the audience with before we signoff?
Besides, stay fucking passion 'cause I love that, right?
That's wide. Open not I just, you know, be,
be engaged in the profession. I mean, you're here, you got

(01:41:03):
here. You put in a lot of hard work,
continue to move forward becauseif you don't, who's going to?
Yeah. Exactly.
Like that that, you know, the next man up theory, you got to
be the next man. And for you, for the senior guys
out there, mentor, train, develop your folks, give in
everybody everything you have, because you don't know when that

(01:41:25):
that bad day is going to happen and it's going to happen.
It's not if it's when, as we allsay, you know, but just be
engaged in it, pass it on and and just continue to move that
bar higher and move forward. All right, well, we'll, yeah,
we'll just leave it with that. I mean, what a what a great
episode. Again, I want to thank you for
taking all this time every day, inviting me to your house and

(01:41:47):
being able to sit down and scrap.
And I know everyone that listensto this is going to benefit
something, which is why we exist.
So again, thank you for your time brother.
Appreciate it. Thank you.
Thank you, Sir. And we'll catch you guys in two
more weeks. All right, have a good one.
Thanks for tuning in. If we in the fire service would
set our egos aside, stop hating on each other, and focus on the

(01:42:10):
important things like our crews,our department, fireman health
and fitness, and the people we are sworn to protect, imagine
what this job would be like. See you in two more weeks.

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