Last night was our last live burn at the Academy. For the next month, we are in the classroom. We did four evolutions. I have to be honest and my confidence went down a bit. When you put everything together like we did in a rolling response, and you have people yelling and crowded in small doorways, well it's entirely realistic and your mistakes jump out at you.

My first evolution was engine 2 and our six person team had to bring hoseline up to the 3rd floor. My partner stayed on the second floor and I went to the 3rd floor. At one point, I just kept pulling on the hose and couldn't hear the rest of the team at the top of the stairs - if they needed more hose or not. There was another engine company in place so we had two hoselines. I was able to manage mine but found myself going up and down the stairs from the 2nd to 3rd level to haul the hose. My partner went down a level to get more hoseline. When I heard his SCBA start to buzz I was ready to drop what I was doing when hearing the word from him that he was out of air. That didn't happen since the evolution only lasted a few more minutes. Since we didn't have radios it was a bit more mentally strenuous trying to hear what people needed from upstairs.

When I started to go out with the other guys, at one point I got a bit confused and later on mad at myself. I was unsure if I was in a long hallway or close to the stairs because people were running to get out of the building since we were done and dragging hose with them. My partner was out already and I was focusing on staying with the hoseline, staying close to the wall, etc. and it was a total smoke condition with no light. One of the other guys behind me just then pulled me down and said follow me and then we found the stairs.

I know why I was confused a bit - it was because I went up and down from the 2nd to the 3rd floor to make sure the hoseline wasn't getting caught and I didn't memorize my change in movement. I asked one of the instructors to tell me how I could improve myself and he walked me in the building and showed me where I was, and how even though people were walking out I should have been down on the floor so I could feel for the stairs with my hand and then turn around and go down the stairs like you teach little kids, feet first.

My second evolution was engine company 1 and we basically had to do the same thing but this time when I came out I was down and tried hard to focus on my other senses. I truly can understand now why our captain has said so many times to have a light on your helmet and wedges, etc. I need to rethink my equipment big time, especially my gloves. I did get in trouble for not being able to put my regulator on with my glove on. That is something I will have to practice and practice since my gloves are so big, like oven mitts.

The third evolution was a search and rescue. I was fine until we had to turn around and I was the lead person. I was feeling for the wall on the right but with people pulling hoselines around you and you're crawling around a maze I felt like a total failure. I think about 5 times one of the guys just like picked my whole body up by my SCBA harness and kept turning me around. At one point realizing I shouldn't be in that position I shouted for the guy behind me to take the lead and we did 100% better. Later on the 20 year old apologized for pulling me but I was really glad he was keeping me with him. You can tell how good some of these guys will be by the way they take charge during some of the evolutions. I did make a joke that I was 47 and he was 20 and crawling after two 20 year olds on a third evolution can take some work. But you know what? We were the only team to find the baby on our rescue and we all stayed together.

Our last evolution was setting up the 24 foot ladder to vent a window. It wasn't physical at all but really made us think about placement of the ladder, and climbing it to see if there's a victim right inside the window. Our instructor told us a great story of how someone's life was saved by what the evolution was exactly accomplishing.

All in all our instructors said we all did such a great job...that they had to relight a few times since we got the fire out so quick. One of the students said it was the first time in a long time she saw teamwork and us communicate.

When I came home last night, I couldn't even talk about what I did. I look back at what had made me nervous in the beginning - getting my SCBA to work and to be able to keep up with the younger guys. If I had to change anything about how I have handled the last two weeks of live burns, it would be to be able to get my regulator on quickly, efficiently and at the moment I am walking into the structure.

I was also thinking how strange it is that in all these live burns there was no one assigned to hold the accountability board outside. I think that would be helpful during these evolutions and our training. Maybe that's in FF2.