As I sit here writing this post, we're about 36 hours after the tragic fire in Bronx NY that so sadly took 12 lives. Most of us cannot even imagine losing one family remember or even one neighbor. Yet, one family lost four members, a brave soldier from our Armed Forces, home on Christmas leave, lost his life trying to rescue others, plus another seven poor souls.

The probable cause of this conflagration? A young child, approximately three years old, playing with the knobs on the stove,…

     First - We want to thank all of you who have stopped by to visit our new website. Whether you have hit every page or you jumped to read the blog or to listen to our podcasts, we are grateful that you took the time to stop by and see what Dalmatian Productions is all about.

     As the title of this post indicates, we all must evolve in some manner to maintain and hopefully, improve our…

So ... it's been a long time since I wrote something.

 I moved to Görlitz in February and shortly thereafter went to the fire station.

The comrades are very nice and it is really fun here.

Unfortunately, it is a big difference to my old guard ... the training times are bad because I usually have to work at this time and in addition, the stakes are much less than I am used to.

Also the range of use is different ... in the past, traffic accidents were the most common and now it…

Ask twenty different people and you will receive twenty different opinions on rather they feel volunteer firefighters or career firefighters are the better professional.  So who really is better trained, better equipped, and even better qualified to answer the public’s calls for assistance? In reality, if we could look past the differences, the fire service as a whole becomes stronger and provides a higher level of service to the public.  After all, isn’t that what our ultimate mission is?…

Just over 1-1/2 years ago, I planted a "seed." What did I "plant?" It was my podcast, "5-Alarm Task Force." Although I was only able to serve in the fire service for eight, short years before an injury forced me to leave, I have never let the fire service leave me. Since 1985, I have tried to stay up-to-date with the growth and evolution in firefighting, leadership, funding, education, etc. One way or another, I kept pace.…