As if the public's perception of volunteer firefighters as rabble-rousing, beer-swilling Howdy-Doody's fascinated by lights and sirens wasn't bad enough, I received this today in my in-box from "The Secret List"....

Hey.... In today's "ain't we proud" segment, a New York Firefighter was shot and wounded by another Firefighter who was drunk, in their upstate New York firehouse. FF Tyler Drake, 21, of Alexandria Bay, was accidentally shot in the right arm around 1900 hours Sunday inside the Moyers Corner FD Station. Drake was taken to University Hospital in nearby Syracuse and his injuries were not life-threatening. FF Stanley Memmelaar, 26, of Moyers Corner was charged with first-degree reckless endangerment, second-degree assault and driving while intoxicated. Memmelaar was handling his .45-caliber handgun recklessly when it discharged...although he had a valid pistol license according to the cops.
FF Tyler Drake could have been killed.
Take Care,
BillyG

This has absolutely nothing to do with their status as firefighters, volunteer or otherwise, and everything to do with an almost fatal lack of maturity and a complete and utter lack of common sense or judgement. Considering that alcohol was a factor, that's not a surprise. I've been to Moyers Corners, and these guys are professional almost to a fault, and it's a tremendous disservice to them as a group that they will be judged by the actions of one idiot.

We have enough guys risking their lives and dying on the job without a near-miss from a drunken jack-a** brandishing a loaded (LOADED? In the station? Why????) weapon in some skewed takeoff of a Fellini shoot-em-up. Yee-haw.

It's time kids......time to ban alcohol in the fire service completely. I'm certainly no teetotaler, so don't judge me as some uptight prudish schoolmarm, but I would no sooner come to my job loaded as I would hand a five-year-old the keys to the family car and tell him to drive himself to school.