I know I hate when that happens we would be going down the road and then they will cancelbut im happy that no one is hurt , dying or loseing their home
view these as an exercise. Think about what the size up would be, where you should position, the manpower needed, the resources needed. If you get cancelled before you arrive then GREAT! that means that everyone's safe and things are ok and you are that much more prepared for the next call.
While I know that every new member is excited and wants to see some action you have to think about what is the best for the community. A false alarm is much better than a 4 alarmer. Learn to control your adrenaline and calm yourself down and things will be much easier. Eventually you will get to particate in the big one and when that comes you best be prepared. Use this time wisely and treat all false alarms and cancelled calls as a learning experience. Go over the tactics you would use with the rest of the crew and plan on what to do when the real one hits.
That is policy here. Every false alarm is veryfied by at least 1 engine company. I know I have been to several calls were the business or home owner wanted to cancel and when we got there to verify the false alarm there was actually a fire, or smoke in the occupancy.
The best one I can remember was in a multi family occupancy were a bathroom "fart fan" burned up and set the void space on fire in between to apartments.
Permalink Reply by John on September 28, 2010 at 5:59pm
I have never hated getting cancelled on a call, at least at that point we no that nobody is hurt or property being destroyed. I do agree that continuing on to the scene non-ER just to verify is a good idea tho.
I do not mind typically getting canceled on a call, if we get canceled then there is normally nothing to it. Its the calls that something is actually going on and we dont get to go that I dont like.
I will have to comment on the "I dont get excitited crowd" comments. I have been doing this job for 14 years (8 of those 14 career) and I still look forward to every run. Yea some leave alot to be desired but If In my opinion if I start out already thinking the call is BS then I wont be ready mentally and physically when the real thing goes down. The day I start to loathe calls is the day Ill quit. Just my opinion, no offense intended.
Boy I also hate when auto alarms get cancelled but we had an incident when the alarm got cancelled and reactivated and when we got there the building was smoking there flames on the inside. We have to respond to those types of alarms even if they get cancelled.