STATter 911

In 1974, when Oxon Hill VFD didn't have pagers and some other companies did, we learned we were at a bit of a disadvantage in getting out the door quickly. The companies with the voice pagers often received a jump when some shifts at Headquarters (later Communications) would send the pager tones a little before the call was announced on the radio. The voice message would be something like "box alarm", "truck" or "engine".

At Oxon Hill our alerting system was a buzzer connected to the siren circuit that would ring in our homes and apartments. It usually went off between the two radio dispatches of a box alarm.

We soon realized if you listened to 46.12 regularly, you could start to recognize the pager tones. We knew the tones for District Heights (PGFD 26) and would sometimes get moving when the voice message was "truck". Truck 26 ran most of our box alarms.

Anything to get a jump. Nothing new here, as you will see when you check into William Carey's initial offering for his new blog, Fire(fighter) Behavior. It is well worth checking out, as is always the case with Bill's writing.

Bill also talks about firefighters starting to get moving on the street numbers. I can't tell you how many times we jumped on hearing a "3400" address, thinking it was Brinkley Road. Of course two-thirds of the time we were disappointed because it was Dodge Park Road. In PGFD land the address is dispatched first.

My fun as a dispatcher was to handle a box alarm for a 7-11 store. I would always say after the three beeps, "At the 7-11". Then there would be a long pause. I knew that firefighters in every station in the county were poised ready to head for the apparatus. Only after the pregnant pause, would I transmit the street address. I figured, even if only for a second or two, I was certain, for once, I had everyone's attention.

Here's what Bill says about the purpose of the site:

To provide a point of critical thought about certain acts and events in the fire service while incorporating behavioral education and commentary in a referenced format.

# posted by Dave Statter @ 2:30 PM