The city department near us have 2 guys one 65 and the other 62 (my dad) and they are their most aggressive firefighters. They woop on them younger guys and I'm sure they'll keep doing it tell the die and its not like they fight one of two a year, they've got quite a few and when we call for manpower here they come and I've got no problem going inside with either of them. Actually the greatest fire moment was when the City called us in to assist them on a double house fire, and I got to go in with my dad as the first attack team. So I thought I'd see what you guys have any around.
Permalink Reply by T.J. on August 27, 2008 at 7:27am
The same thing here, you never want to get rid of those "old" guys because they have a lot of knowledge and they all seem to know their way around a firetruck.
We have several trained and medically qualified interior firefighters (men and women) over 60 but I wouldn't say they are actively interior - they pack up if we're short of staffing but generally are assigned outside. We have some active interior firefighters in their 50's. We have a couple exterior firefighters in their 70's. Our Chief was saying just the other day that our average department age is 41.