Home » Feb22
In the world of hometown heroes, it is not the celebrities or athletes who are the real inspiration. Not even close, if you stop to think about who really makes sure normal citizens are able to live life as "normal" as possible - everyday!
Hometown heroes, these are the tireless men and women who participate in keeping our streets and homes safe and who might even rescue us, or our pets, in times of danger. Fire fighters, police officers, emergency medical technician, these are the nameless heroes that deserve the real recognition.
Police Officers
In the world of the streets, cops keep residents safe in many ways. Sure, we often see them stopping folks on the side of the road. It's true those red and blue flashing lights can put alarm in even the calmest person's demeanor. Police officers, we don't know what rank they are or what they are even stopping us for sometimes, but we do know there is a good chance we are about to get a ticket.
Or, maybe not!
Recently, I spent the evening from 9:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. riding with two police officers; Officer Matt Stogner and Officer Travis Huckaby. I walked away (tired needless to say) thinking how easy it would be to hang out with these guys on a regular basis.
Their regular basis, however, is not like a "regular" person's "regular basis."
Not when it involves M14s, Glocs, and getting out of a warm car to face a person that might not be too happy about being stopped anyway.
"I think that the biggest misconception that people have of police officers is that we are all racist people," Huckaby notes. "Every night I hear how racist I am because I pulled over someone of the opposite racial background. My common answer to the violator who states this is 'if you don't like to be judged, please don't judge me because I wear a blue uniform.'"
Officer Stogner is the primary SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) team leader for his police department division and was a detective for over four years before recently deciding to get back into the patrol end of things on the police force. And, if there is any doubt, he knows how to take care of himself his M14 and another rifle riding in his squad car right next to him will remind you. Matt is also a point guy (with the M14) for the Duncanville SWAT team - that to his roommate and working colleague, Officer Huckaby's Wing Guy (with the pistol), which means they work as a team during any SWAT incidents backing up one another.
However, Stogner noted, Huckaby was recently moved up to point guy as well, meaning he will be getting a new partner soon.
Luckily, I didn't see any SWAT on my ride along!
Indeed, Stogner and Huckaby are friends at work, but they are also roommates. They met at work and have been roommates for one year.
Stogner tells stories that indicate he is much older than just his 31 years. He has been shot at, had to shoot, and when he was a detective, he also had to work cases that involved child abuse, "That's the worst part of my job," he says sadly.
Huckaby, 26, is the lead singer of a band in his off time. The band is made up of police officers and a fire fighter and he waits for the day when they get their first CD recorded.
While the night in question is slow, there is no doubt still too many stories of nights that were busy and a bit dangerous as well. Tonight, Stogner was called to a major accident (no injuries) and ate dinner before heading out to patrol the streets, pull a few people over to give them warnings and observe [for a few moments before escorting them back into their apartment] two teen boys throwing rocks at the upstairs neighbor's window.
"I thought it might be a robbery," he says. But luckily, it was just two kids having fun.
Stogner and Huckaby meet up several times during the night to talk about "the streets" and their beats. Each officer also has a computer in their car enabling them to keep up with fellow officers - who has pulled someone over, who is answering a call, who might be in danger.
"We stay out to be visible," Stogner says. "We can do the reports in our cars now, but 90% of the time we are still working and doing our reports."
Huckaby spends about an hour of his night dealing with a small drug bust.
"I originally pulled the guy over for no license plate lamp," Huckaby says.
"The guy ended up having marijuana and lying to me about it."
Huckaby arrested him and took him to jail for processing.
Before the night is over, at around 3:00 a.m., there is an all unit alert from dispatch about a man who says he is going to shoot someone. First directed to a residence then to a drug store and finally to a gas station where the man is in the bathroom with a knife. Dispatch has indicated "he has a knife, but says he won't pull it."
Lucky for him since so many officer on duty that night have commenced to the gas station to deal with the matter.
Mainly a disagreement between some neighbors, names the officers all recognize, the matter is cleared up and it's just another day in the life.
Other things that Huckaby talks about is the time he gave a 21-year-old CPR after he had drank so much he was vomiting. He died anyway.
Foot chases are common too; Huckaby has had a few of those. He talks about once when he did have his finger on the trigger after going to a call where he walked into the house and there was blood everywhere.
Turns out the man living there had been cutting himself, Huckaby met him in the backyard, and the man was aggressive to say the least.
Huckaby believes the guy was schizophrenic and was actually coming at him when suddenly the man stopped, it saved his life.
When Huckaby was first on the SWAT team, he was at a house with the rest of the team and given a bar to break in a window. Laughing now, he says he hit everything but the window several times before Stogner yelled, "Hit the window."
When the window was broken gas bombs were thrown into the house, but Huckaby had a problem, he didn't have his gas mask on yet. He put it on - wrong - and needless to say, that won't happen again.
By the end of the night that I have been observing, Stogner and Huckaby are tired, they work four days one week and three days the next in 12-hour shifts, and the bulletproof vest, and weapons they carry are heavy. Averaging a large number of calls a night per officer, it can get busy.
At 4:00 a.m., Huckaby is still trying to finish the paperwork for the marijuana bust earlier in the night, but it's all in the day's work it seems, as these guys rarely have a moment to breathe once their night gets going.
But, the reports aren't the worst part of Huckaby's job as he notes that "seeing kids that are brought up to hate law enforcement or any kind of law [is the worst part]. These kids never listen to reason and do not understand that every action in life has a consequence, be it either good or bad."
There is always a good side too and for Stogner, the best part of his job is "SWAT." He adds that he decided to become a police officer because of the excitement of the job and to belong to such a big brotherhood.
For Huckaby, the best part is "the feeling you get when your actions save someone's life. That look or hug you get from the public after you know you completely affected their lives in a positive way."
Stogner can't see himself doing anything else, "this job has given me the pleasure of meeting so many great people," but Huckaby says, "I initially went to college to become a basketball coach and history teacher. That's what I would of been doing if I wouldn't of woke up after thinking about this career and decided just to go for it. Now, it would probably be playing music for a living."
Fire Fighters
For fight, fighters their days can get long and the night even longer considering many work 24 hours on and 48 hours off like fire fighter Melissa Wisely. A recent typical day started out with her taking the position of riding the seat on the engine.
"That means," Wisely explains, "Whoever is "riding the seat," is usually an officer and is in charge. After breakfast, we received a call for a major accident. As we arrived on the scene, one of the paramedics on the rescue approached me and said that we had a "heavy rescue."
Wisely explains that a heavy rescue is when people are pinned. That meant they needed a truck company.
"I called dispatch and requested a heavy rescue," she continues. "As a precaution we laid a line [meaning charging and having a fire hose ready] and continued to attempt to extricate the patient."
When the truck company arrived the used the Jaws of Life to get the patient out. On a good note Wisely says the person did live as her injuries were not life threatening.
It was a Sunday, which Wisely calls a "day of rest" - no school, no big cleaning projects, no hydrants to paint so she decided to get on the stationary bike to work off breakfast! They went to the grocery store, which they do every shift while also cooking three meals a day for the folks on duty. While some stations might have a full-time cook, some don't and they take turns cooking.
After lunch, they got a call for a house fire. It turned out to be a small electrical fire in the attic of the house and, afterward they had an additional two more fire calls, which were not major.
However, they did have dinner late after all the excitement - they normally eat around 5:30 to 6:00 p.m., on the night in question they didn't eat until 7:00 p.m.
"After dinner we had a nice break," she says. "Nothing and it's 10:00 p.m. right now."
I talk to Wisely later and she says there was more excitement that night, around midnight.
"Same house as earlier. It had been set this time and since it was late got a good start. We didn't get back to the station until after 3:00 a.m. Not an average shift. I was very tired today!"
While this might not have been an average day, Wisely has had even more interesting ones. Like the time she tells me is her most memorable experience.
"On May 5, 1995 I was working at a different station. Not my usual assignment and there was chaos during a severe rainstorm with flooding throughout the city. We were checking on cars reported to be floating on some streets to make sure that all of the occupants had safely reached high ground. As we were wading back to the engine, the water started flowing faster and rising. I had to grab a stop sign to keep from getting swept away. The two other guys made it back to the engine. They started driving closer to get me. As one of them reached out to grab my hand, I got swept away! He jumped in after me and together we went downstream. We safely landed and quickly got back on the engine. That alone would be a memorable experience."
However, Wisely chuckles as she continues her story.
"The night was young! We were the first arriving company on a "fire" at a large building. The lower floors were filled with smoke and the captain on the engine decided we had to go to the roof to open a ventilation hole. We were still soaking wet from all the other water calls. It took us about an hour to climb the stairs to the roof. Nice workout? Turned out the underground parking garage had flooded and a transformer blew up, but there is more. At around 3:00 a.m. we had a "fire" call at a house. When we entered the front door and started through the house, we fell thru the floor. Not far, but enough to knock us out of whack. I got steam burns on my legs and had smoke inhalation. They made us go to the hospital. That is where we were when our shift ended. Pretty exciting day!
Wisely doesn't even recount those experiences as her worst day either, that was actually when she was at a house fire and got hit in the head by an attic staircase.
"Didn't know it at the time, but I fractured vertebrae in my neck and it still gives me trouble," she finishes.
Chris Tancred, who has been a paid firefighter for 15 years and a paramedic for 17 years, first got into the profession after witnessing a car accident and helping pull the driver out of the car.
"I decided from then I wanted to do more. I went to school and obtained my EMT and then my Paramedic certifications," he explains.
No day is the same for fire fighters and Tancred explains his day might consist of everything from checking the fire engine to fire inspections to saving someone's life.
"Any and all work on projects or around the station stops immediately when we are dispatched on emergency calls that could range from a structure fire, car accident, sick person or a rescue of some type," he says.
He too works the 24-48 hour schedule, but also works at a hospital as a paramedic in the E.R. several days a week too.
Wisely says the changes she has seen since she began fire fighting is the two in/two out policy, which is a safety law adapted in 1998 meaning there has to be two firefighters on stand-by for rescue of an interior fire attack team.
Tancred talks about the changes he has seen, "When I started as a firefighter I was a volunteer and back then we still rode on the tail board of the engines to the fires. We also had three quarter-inch boots and coats. We also were lucky if we had air packs to go into the fire. Now we ride inside the engines and wear full bunker gear and never would think of going into a fire without an air pack."
Wisely feels the comradery of fellow firefighters is special, it has to be as they watch each other's backs, knowing the dangers are there and just around the corner.
"There are many unpredictable dangers related to this job," Tancred explains. "When fighting a fire we have to always be alert to potential dangers such as roof or wall collapses; at the scene of car accidents we always have to watch out for other drivers who are not paying attention and pose a huge danger to the guys working the scene. With EMS calls, not only might we deal with potentially violent patients, there is the chance that we can be exposed to dangerous, infectious illness. These include everything from HIV to Hepatitis B or C to meningitis."
Wisely agrees, "Every situation is unique."
Tancred also notes there are some misconceptions involving fire fighting.
"My daughter came home yesterday and said that she had a discussion with her teacher. Her teacher was talking about firefighters and stated that they were paid just enough for the time we actually work. [The teacher] said that we worked for 24 hours and then were off for 48 hours. But that most of the 24 hours were spent watching TV, sleeping and playing games. This could not be further from the truth. We spend most of our days doing training, inspections, preplans, hydrants maintenance, and running emergency calls. Each captain and shift is responsible for certain projects."
Wisely says too that during a 24-hour period of work she might get anywhere from zero to eight hours of sleep, fire fighters aren't allowed to hit the snooze button when an emergency calls.
While there are some experiences that remind heroes like Wisely and Tancredo why they chose the profession like, "Being able to make a positive impact on the community" there is also the downside as Wisely says the worst experience she can think of is when she sees someone die. And, how many people has she seen?
"Too many," is her only response.
Emergency Medical Technicians
As for Emergency Medical Technicians, again they are too often overlooked.
"EMT and firefighter certifications are two different things. Most firefighters are also EMT (Emergency Medical Technician), which requires additional certification. Some cities require that all fire fighters are also certified at paramedics (EMT-P)," Tancredi says.
This advanced training includes several hundred-clock hours of classroom, lab, clinical rotations, and a 240-hour "internship" with a functioning EMS crew.
"As firefighter/paramedics we run both fire calls and EMS calls in a typical day," Tancredi adds.
EMTs and Paramedics provide limited medical care, sometimes life-saving care, in a prehospital setting, which can include splinting broken bones, providing pain relief, providing CPR or advanced cardiac treatments for people who have suffered cardiac arrest. "Paramedics staff the rescue," Wisely adds. "They answer all calls pertaining to injuries or illness."
In the words of Officer Huckaby who decided just to go for it and become a police officer - indeed, these hometown heroes in every city go for it every night - a move that means we "regular" folks don't have to.