As the pager goes off, I do what I’ve always done, reach down to it and turn it up to find out why they are calling us and what unit(s) they want.
This time it’s a house fire. I feel relief, ever so slightly. It’s not a car accident, not this time.
They try to prepare you: 200 hours of training, along with 2 years on the department; working with the different tools during the training hours, along with going with the others already on the rescue squad; and going to the different calls to observe, standing back about 20ft or so with the commander.
But nothing really prepares you for the first time you see someone dead; or about to be.
The first call I went on -I don’t think it would’ve been so bad if she hadn’t been eighteen. A car accident on Scothmere Rd. I’ll never forget it.
We did the normal: met, got suited, headed out. Even having gone with them on a few calls this one was scary -to go and have to be one of the ones having a job to do and having to do it well so that whomever was involved in the accident will have a better chance to see another day.
The cops and EMS were already there. We all jumped out and began assessing the scene.
Thank God for the adrenalin rush that took over, I think I would have been sick right then and there if it wasn’t for that adrenalin rush.
We got to work quickly, to get the young woman out of the car. The passenger side was wrapped around the tree on the side of the road. The girl inside was still with us, but barely. She was covered in blood. They already had the air ambulance on route. We got the door open and got her out only to be put in the helicopter and rushed off.
Even now, five years later I can still remember her face.
After getting back to the hall I had just enough time to get my suit off before I was in the bathroom, heaving my guts out and shaking.
Thank God for Carl; that guy helped me a lot that night. After the debriefing he had stayed there with me and we talked. He said that I had done well, we got our job done, and even if she didn’t end up making it we still did the best we could do. I ended up going home an hour later.
Next day, I found out she had died. That was hard. I had called Carl up, and we had talked for hours. He was a good brother. All of the men at the hall are good brothers. He still helps me out if we go to a call and a young one dies. Those are the ones I find hardest, the ones who are young and don’t make it.
Why do they have to die young? How can we make certain those teenagers walk across the stage on their graduation day? Do we raise the driving age? But if we change the driving age, is it really going to stop those car accidents? Should we be like Germany, and not give them a licence until they are eighteen and have pasted drivers ed? Maybe we need to make drivers education mandatory. Maybe. Maybe it would help having more people coming to schools, talking about car accidents and how we can prevent them? Maybe we need to make the “Defensive Driving” course mandatory. Might help, might be fewer deaths, might not.
I don’t know, but for now I will keep training, and going on calls to do my job to the best of my ability to try and get everyone to live, to help complete strangers out. For now that means going to this fire.
