It was Thanksgiving Day, and only two of us were working: Kyle and me. Our whole plan that day was just to take it easy and try to relax. Neither of us were happy to work on a holiday, but we would get off in plenty of time to enjoy the night with our respective families. While driving around to just kill time, I received a call from the radio saying that a backyard caught on fire. I laughed a little and just thought: “What an idiot… time to be a hero.” I was calm, focused and mentally prepared to run into a burning house. All of a sudden, the radio said the address of the fire; It was one of my neighbors. I panicked, hoping the fire wouldn’t spread to my house. I drove to where I was told the fire was at, but I didn’t see anything. Then this man came from around the corner of a house holding a bucket of water. He was covered in sweat and seemed terrified. The man yelled “help!” He then ran toward the back of the house and disappeared around the corner. I ran around the house and was shocked at the sight of three acres completely covered in flames. I scanned all the backyards that were ablaze and there wasn’t a single water hose in sight. The fear quickly subsided as I remembered that I had a fire extinguisher in the trunk. I sprinted to my car, grabbed my fire extinguisher and returned to the fire. The whole time I was thinking: “I wonder what award I’ll get for saving the day.” I turned the fire extinguisher toward the flame, and for about 5 seconds the fire was under control. Then my 1ft long fire extinguisher was suddenly empty. I just stood there coughing from the chemicals and trying to bring my fire extinguisher back to life. (It didn’t work.) I ran back to my car to grab my traffic vest in an attempt to stomp the fire out. While I was working on one end of the fire my partner Kyle arrived on the other end. Kyle showed up in his sunglasses with a calm look on his face. “Yes! He has a plan,” I thought. Then I saw where his sense of calm came from. In his hand was a 1ft fire extinguisher — the same type of fire extinguisher I had a few minutes prior. I then realized Kyle had the same false sense of calm I did. Kyle walked over to his side and began to spray the fire near to him. A few seconds later his extinguisher went dead, and I could see the confusion on Kyle’s face. He started to shake his fire extinguisher a few times and try to spray it again. Nothing happened, though. Kyle then threw his fire extinguisher and began stomping on the flame just like I had been. The man with the bucket, Kyle and I were doing our best to keep the fire under control, but it was a losing battle. I saw part of the fire get close to a house but I couldn’t get to it. No one could because we were separated by a wall of flame. Then out of nowhere one of my neighbors, Jeff, came outside with a hose and stepped into a sea of flames. Soon that part of the fire was out and all that was left was smoke and the burned ground. Jeff then made eye contact with me. “Hey Josh. How’s your Thanksgiving going?” he asked. I was completely confused at how Jeff could be so calm in a situation like this. “Uh, it’s going… well,” I replied. “Oh, that’s great,” Jeff responded. He proceeded to help Kyle and I put out the rest of the fire, and in a matter of seconds it was pretty much under control. The fire department arrived shortly afterwards and put out the rest of the flames. Jeff then walked over and thanked Kyle and I for our hard work. Kyle and I laughed about the situation and enjoyed the rest of our Thanksgiving shift.
Originally posted on my blog (https://ourstoriesfrombehindthebadge.wordpress.com/)
