By Christian Burkin
The Record
STOCKTON, Calif. — A training session at the Stockton Fire Department’s Engine Co. 2 on Saturday might have looked a little clumsier than it should to any passersby.
That’s because most of the participants weren’t firefighters.
There were firefighters there, but they were guiding four teams of politicians, journalists, nonprofit leaders and regular citizens through stations allowing them an intimate, though brief, taste of real rescue work.
They crawled into smoke-filled metal shipping crates to extinguish burning wood and furniture, ripped cars apart with rescue tools, and stumbled through pitch-dark rooms in blind searches for bodies.
The aim of the invitation-only event, called Fire Ops 101, was to give “people who influence the community and who make political decisions” a basic understanding of fire operations, particularly how many firefighters are really needed to perform them, said Stockton Fire Battalion Chief Michael Lilienthal, a department spokesman.
Fire Ops 101 was funded entirely by the Stockton chapter of the International Association of Firefighters, said Capt. Greg Vitz, a union board member who organized the event. It cost the union about $10,000 — which included food, T-shirts and a plaque awarded to each participant. The roughly 100 firefighters who helped prepare and execute Fire Ops 101 volunteered on their own time, he said.
“Our goal today was to show you how extremely important it is to staff our fire engines with four personnel,” Vitz said. That’s in the interest of both public and firefighter safety, he said.
Fire Chief Ron Hittle said that though the department does not feel particularly embattled, staff reductions do come up now and then.
“At our budget discussion they always want to know why we have to have four on an engine,” Hittle said. “Because there are some (departments) that have three.”
“It’s easier to show people than to explain it,” Hittle added.
Stockton City Councilman Clem Lee said the demonstrations were persuasive. If the goal was to affect his budgetary thinking, he said, it worked.
“It has to,” Lee said. “How could it not?”
In particular, Lee noted the difference between an older, 70-pound pair of the Jaws of Life and a newer, lighter one.
“That’s the kind of equipment councilmembers think: It’s easy to get by with the old stuff,” Lee said.
Copyright 2007 The Record
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News