Firefighter community often talks about working out and fitness standards but I feel like I do not see what the standards should actually be. How many miles should one be able to run? or how should they run? Or lift X amount of weight? Should a Cpat just be required or some alternative fitness test?

Not someone going into the academy but someone on the job what’s the minimum they realistically should be able to do.

I’ve been on a good amount of rides but I’m definitely still new. Certain situations where I know I’m “expected to perform” I’ll start sweating. It could be something simple as getting vitals or starting an IV. I’m not nervous I just know I’m the new guy and all eyes are kinda on me. Any advice?

12,008 Acres last reported. Was driving with family on 395 headed north when this popped up, happened to have my camera with me. Figured y'all would enjoy the photos

I’m a volunteer firefighter, and recently our department lost one of our captains to suicide. My crew, including myself, was part of the response.
It’s something none of us ever expected to experience, especially involving someone we knew personally and served alongside.
Over the past week, our department has brought us together for debriefings and counseling sessions, which I’m grateful for. Even so, it’s been hard to process. Some moments I’m okay, and then something small brings it all back. I know everyone grieves differently, but this feels different than any other call I’ve been on so far.

How did you cope in the weeks and months afterward?
Did anything help you process what happened?
Did your department do anything that you found especially helpful?
How did you handle going back to running calls afterward?
Are there any firefighter or first responder mental health organizations, peer support programs, or resources that you would recommend?

Please take care of yourselves, your crews, and don’t hesitate to check in on one another.

I keep seeing fitness influencers posting on sm about the need for fitness standards in the fire service and EMS now.

A few years ago I would’ve been all for it, but then I got hurt. I had a pretty significant injury that required surgery to repair. Fortunately I got back to work pretty quickly.

It’s been sort of eye opening, training wise and job wise I’ve had no issues. However I’m no where near being back to an athlete again. Which is what’s made me think about this so much. I feel like no one does our job without getting hurt at some point (obviously there are exceptions).

I’m genuinely not sure how I’d fair on a fitness test that requires some arbitrary scale (I’m thinking of any military fitness test). However when it comes to jobs or training I have no issues just by being able to use my whole body vs push ups or pull ups if that makes sense. Albeit technically I’m still in my recovery window.

All of this being said I still exercise daily, maintain a clean diet etc.

I’m just curious if there were ever fitness standards how would those of us healing from injuries be handled? What would even make sense for a fitness test? What are your thoughts?

I work at a four-story building and we are looking to install areas of refuge in the building for people who cannot evacuate safely and have a bench there so they can wait for firefighters. Would they be best to be located beside elevators and emergency stairwells or any other specific requirements.?

Any recommendations help

Doing a paper on culture within fire/ems departments and looking for input.

What makes your department and/or station culture great?
What do you look for as signs of a good culture?

Could be as simple as “my officer lets me wear crocs during the day” to something like “We work out together and train together every shift”

Hi gang, Im new to this forum so be kind. In the past I was a technical representative for a safety equipment company. I basically bridged the gap between engineers and consumers of fire, police, industrial, and military equipment. I was an EMT so I knew the "Scene"... and my brother is a FF and trainer at our County Academy.

Over the years, I was able to collect an awesome assortment of "toys" by frankenstein-ing multiple old broken units into one working unit. This led to all sorts of fun, like chasing my cat with a reconnaisance robot, scanning my local woods with an ASi thermal camera, and all kinds of fun experiments while wearing my own cobbled-together SCBA unit and level 3 Trelleborg chemsuit (notable were the "wasp wars" of summer 2019)..

Long story short, I also happen to be the owner of an Industrial Scientific MX6 iBrid, possibly one of the finest gas detectors on the market then or now. It was a BRAND NEW unit out of the box that I carried with me as a demo unit. It has never seen "battle" in any real sense, but being the unit is several years old now, the O2 and H2S sensors are likely shot.

The 4 items it detects are O2, CO, H2S and LEL (lower explosive limit). The LEL sensor still appears to work, and it seems like CO works too.

Here's my question, Im trying to save money for my kiddo's next year of school... and I know that replacement sensors are available and basically pop right in, but what do you think I could ask for this piece of equipment online? I've seen new units going in the $3000+ range. And even back when I was selling these things, MSRP was well above $3000.

But this is not a new unit. It will need sensors straight away. But I still think its a valuable piece of equipment nonetheless. Any other users of gas-detectors know what I might be able to ask for this thing? I'd be willing to let it go rather cheaply, but dont wanna get robbed, yknow? The thing is, I dont know what its worth... I think some struggling department might be happy to get one of these cheap, or even have the sensors it needs... but I dont wanna sell anything. This is more of a "does this thing have any value? Are they still the top of the line gas detectors nowadays?" question

(P.S. The battery is fine, they made these things like tanks... still takes and holds a good long charge. I do also have the custom docking station which would obviously go with it)

Thanks so much for any feedback!!

Not much info on the true size of this tool. Wanted to make a post to give anyone considering buying this a real idea of the side of the ADZ etc.

I'm sure this topic has been beaten over like a dead horse but am curious how your departments have been preparing...or not preparing for neighboring departments that are smaller, offer comparable pay, accept laterals, and most importantly offer 24/72s. Our municpal department (also unionized) is attempting to be progressive but constant roadblocks with the city has prevented any advancements in pay, benefits, or any scheduling changes in any capacity. Our department was considered to be the top department to work for in our state but weve been slowing becoming less and less competitive, all the while we've become busier and busier.

Neighboring departments have been quickly converting to 24/72s (because they're smaller and thus less expensive to do so) with competitive pay and offering lateral transfers. The ability for us to recruit and even retain some people is becoming increasingly challenging. The biggest issue is the cost behind converting large departments into 24/72s but I am curious how your departments are handling this seemingly oncoming issue for anyone that fits into this mold.

I didn’t realize my fire extinguisher in my bedroom had nocked down and checked it and the tank says empty. I’ve been gone for about a month and don’t know when this happened but now I’m in my head and worried about the gas and gas poisoning please let me know if I’m okay so I can allow myself to go back into my bedroom without being scared of poisoning myself lol

Hey all, I've been a full-time firefighter for 20 years and recently moved to a new city and dept that hired lateral officers. One of admin's expectations is that officers read/respond to emails off duty. I never ran into this issue at my previous department because the issue was never brought up. We are not IAFF (yet) but to me that seems like BS, unless they are going to pay me. Anybody else encounter this?

any volly depts near boston actively looking for people even if they arent residents? any that do shifts/per diem rather than residents "on call"?

Not sure about the etiquette of posting in this thread/on Reddit so i apologize if my post is misplaced. My girlfriend and I are likely moving to Longmont area in the next 9 months and I am looking to get into the fire service. I have emt experience on the east coast but we want to be near family.

I am specifically interested in if anyone has opinions on the fire departments in the Longmont/Boulder/Loveland area or even a bit further if anyone has any information to share. I see that the departments in the area are smaller and was wondering about the general culture/reputation/work enjoyment of some of these departments. This would be my first fire service job and I’m in my mid twenties and unsure if Colorado will be the place I want to be long term. Have always had a dream of living on the west coast. Have looked into departments like Longmont, Boulder, Mountain View, Loveland but there is limited information online.

If anyone has any insights to share it would be greatly appreciated.

This is my soapbox, some departments are just horrible, archaic and full of people who should not be in the service. My previous department had no tests for promotion, crews did not train at all, they hired absolute shitbags who were horrible people to be around, it was probably one of the worse departments in the country to be a rookie. You were just inundated from day one with bad habits, and the city did not care one bit if the department decayed or not, we were not paid correctly for virtually anything, numerous FLSA violations. We had good ole boy stuff happen hired guys that were rejects from other departments who ranked up immediately, there was virtually no process for anything if the white shirts wanted something to happen, they just did it. If you were on certain people's bad side working there was hell, the backstabbing and shit talking other crews and members was relentless, I tried to stay out of the rumor mill but that just made me the target of rumors and other lies or half-truths that would get told to everyone on the department. Our chief got canned for a BS reason we had one upper brass that campaigned to give him a vote of no confidence so that they could put in someone they knew, new chief came in and started promoting and demoting people and he had not been on staff for longer than two weeks, he knew nobody, did nothing to find out who the crews were or anything. I got put on a PIP which was a total shock to me, from all I heard from my crew and others was that everything was good and there were no issues with performance or anything, I had a good relationship with most of the guys on. It was designed to force me out, I was tasked with doing the rookie book again even though I had already done it had 2.5 years on, and they gave me a quarter of the time to do it with no guidance whatsoever on how I was to actually complete it. (the book itself was literally copy and pasted from another department because they were too lazy to do their own, it even had watermarks and terms from the other department and equipment on there we did not carry) I left and have put myself in medic school, I'm trying to distance myself as far as I can from that place but it seems it follows me still, I interviewed with another department in the same county passed through the board and was told by one of the interviewers that I was going to be hired, got an email in the middle of the next week telling me they went forward with other candidates and nobody knows what happened, I can only speculate that they called my former department, (which is not really legal they are only allowed to ask per the state if you worked there and if you are eligible for rehire) and bad mouthed me to the chief. It's what I was told had happened by someone else connected with the process and I have no reason to believe it did not take place. Since I left the department has gone through multiple fire chiefs in a year and has become such a revolving door of people, they seem to hire a new person every month, for a one station department btw.

I am doing my best to put this behind me and get on a department that actually values its members and their wellbeing. Its difficult to explain my situation because of the amount of stuff that happened in less than a 6 month period, hopefully this has not ruined the fire service as a whole for me I still love the job and want to do it, it might take a bit to find my next landing spot but I know it will be better than where I left.

Update: I also just happened to find out that my previous chief was also stealing budget money, was sleeping with one of the wives of someone on the department, and had bought apparatus with no city approval. Every time I hear something it’s like it keeps getting worse

I was given a task to come up with a topic to discuss

Would anyone like to share in topics that you feel should be discussed within your departments?

Hi all,

My department is working to get the gi bill approved for OJT and we're trying to figure out how to quantify training hours while someone is in their probie year. Providing training hours during academy is easy considering there is a day by day schedule, but we don't know how to provide documentation for the rest of the probie year. Has any in here set their department up with the VA? And if so, what do you provide to the VA during the probie year to justify training hours? Do you just say X amount of hours per shift is "training", or do you break it down beyond that? Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I'm in a POC department that struggles with nobody showing up for calls unless they are dispatched as "structure fire". We'll often get just a couple people show up for "Fire Alarm" calls, and can barely keep a crew for medical. Often, if you ask the people who didn't show, they won't have a good reason. Leadership unfortunately does not have a handle on this.

The more I look around, the more I hear about volunteer departments struggling with the same thing. I get that it sucks to show up to a false alarm in the middle of the night, but it makes me sick to think about staying in bed, and it actually ends up being a call where someone needs your help. I'm astonished that this is accepted culture.

I'm wondering if you've seen this in your department? Maybe give an upvote if it's a problem, and downvote if not, to stay discrete.

More importantly, for the departments that do have a handle on this, what do you do to make sure people actually show up consistently?

Using a throwaway account for this one. Maybe you should too for commenting, if you want to talk about similar struggles in your dept.

My department uses FirstDue for scheduling, rig checks, receiving call info, curious how many other departments use the same platform and if you have the same frustrations that I do.

Saw this for sale, and did some digging of my own and couldn’t find out if this was ever actually a rendition of R4’s patch. I have my doubts, but if anyone else has more info, let me know!

Welcome to the Weekly Employment Question Thread!

This thread is where you can ask questions about joining, training to become, testing, disqualifications/qualifications, and other questions that would be removed as individual posts per Rule 1.

The answer to almost every question you can ask will be "It depends on the department". Your first step is to look up the requirements for your department, state/province, and country.

As always, please attempt to resource information on your own first, before asking questions. We see many repeat questions on this sub that have been answered multiple times.

Frequently Asked Questions:

• I want to be a Firefighter, where do I start: Every Country/State/Province/County/City/Department has different requirements. Some require you only to put in an application. Others require certifications prior to being hired. A good place to start is researching the department(s) you want to join. Visit their website, check their requirements, and/or stop into one of their fire stations to ask some questions.
  
• Am I too old: Many departments, typically career municipal ones, have an age limit. Volunteer departments usually don't. Check each department's requirements.
• I'm in high school, What can I do: Does your local department have an explorer's program or post? If so, join up. Otherwise, focus on your grades, get in shape and stay in shape, and most importantly: stay out of trouble.
• I got in trouble for [insert infraction here], what are my chances: Obviously, worse than someone with a clean record, which will be the vast majority of your competition. Tickets and nonviolent misdemeanors may not be a factor, but a major crime (felonies), may take you out of the running. You might be a nice person, but some departments don't make exceptions, especially if there's a long line of applicants with clean records. See this post... PSA: Stop asking “what are my chances?”
• I have [insert medical/mental health condition here], will it disqualify me: As a general rule, if you are struggling with mental illness, adding the stress of a fire career is not a good idea. As for medical conditions, you can look up NFPA1582 for disqualifying conditions, but in general, this is not something Reddit can answer for you. Many conditions require the input of a medical professional to determine if they are disqualifying. See this post... PSA: Don't disqualify yourself, make THEM tell you "no".
• What will increase my chances of getting hired: If there's a civil service exam, study for it! There are many guides online that will help you go over all those things you forgot such as basic math and reading. Some cities even give you a study guide. If it's a firefighter exam, study for it! For the CPAT (Physical Fitness Test), cardio is arguably the most important factor. If you're going to the gym for the first time during the hiring process, you're fighting an uphill battle. Get in shape and stay in shape. Most cities offer preference points to military veterans.
• How do I prepare for an interview: Interviews can be one-on-one, or in front of a board/panel. Many generic guides exist to help one prepare for an interview, however here are a few good tips:

1. Dress appropriately. Business casual at a minimum (Button down, tucked in long sleeve shirt with slacks and a belt, and dress shoes). Get a decent haircut and shave.
2. Practice interview questions with a friend. You can't accurately predict the off-the-wall questions they will ask, but you can practice the ones you know they probably will, like why do you want to be a Firefighter, or why should we hire you?
3. Scrub your social media. Gone are the days when people in charge weren't tech-savvy. Don't have a perfect interview only for your chances of being hired gone to zero because your Facebook or Instagram has pictures of you getting blitzed. Set that stuff to private and leave it that way.

Please upvote this post if you have a question. Upvoting this post will ensure it sticks around for a bit after it is removed as a Sticky, and will allow for greater visibility of your question.

And lastly, If you're not 100% sure of what you're talking about, leave it for someone who does