Surviving low call volume

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Permalink Reply by Andy Entwistle on July 15, 2009 at 12:13pm

You aren't as small as you think - we run fewer than 200 calls a year, every year. Admittedly we don;t wait in the station, we respond from home. So that helps. But the math says your district must be averaging at least a call every other day if not more. You have the time on your hands to do a time study - what time of day and day of the week do most calls come in. Ask for that shift. In the meantime, I hope your leadership is working on drills and training to help you stay sharp. As far as politics, let it go. Unless you are truly being inconvenienced or denied your due, stay out of it. Pick your battles. How are your other volunteers handling it? Is this some new drop in calls? How long have you been there? This can't be a surprise to you.

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Permalink Reply by FF86 on July 15, 2009 at 1:01pm

Thanks for the response. I've been here for about a year. For most of that year I was getting my Firefighter I cert, so I guess I didn't really notice the lag due to being busy. We average a call a day, but many of those come during the weekday when we have career staffing and the others will come in bursts of like 3 or 4 and then nothing for several weeks. We actually have members who have been on for upwards of 5 years and have never actually seen a fire or held a charged line outside of the burn to get their Fire I certification when they first started.

There's actually a pretty low sense of moral among the volunteers at the moment. One of the longer serving captains told me that right now its the worst he can remember in his 10 years. I guess I'm just having trouble sitting around doing nothing for 12-24 hours at a shot when I'm on duty.

Thanks for the suggestion on analyzing call times, I'll probably do that when I'm on-duty again.

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Permalink Reply by Raymund Niere on July 23, 2009 at 8:08pm

I agree with you Andy, stay out of politics and work on drills and training instead.

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Permalink Reply by Justin on July 15, 2009 at 12:38pm

yeah 400 isent all that slow. we average 200 and thats with fire and ems combined. like andy we respond from home but a few of us hang around the station. in our down time, and trust me theres alot of it, we hang out, show the probie or jr's a few things.

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Permalink Reply by Reg Mathis on July 15, 2009 at 2:05pm

FF86,

Are you a vollie, or FT?

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Permalink Reply by Captain703 on July 15, 2009 at 2:47pm

We average on a good year about 300 calls so don't get too discouraged. Maybe you should look at some time off and take a vacation. We too have the double standards problem with our Chief and Trustee. It can be pretty rough. Just keep in mind people do depend on you in their time of need. Just hang in there bro.

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Permalink Reply by Christian M Hartley on July 15, 2009 at 7:26pm

down time = training time. Build a prop with some material that may be donated or left over from other projects - vertical ventilation, confined space, and entanglement props could all be combined into a single 6'x6'x4' prop. Make the roof portion removeable so when someone cuts the roof you just slide out the old plywood/OSB and slide in a replacement one. Just a thought.

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Permalink Reply by strtcopr on July 15, 2009 at 7:38pm

Get a hobby and enjoy

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Permalink Reply by FETC on July 15, 2009 at 8:27pm

Can I ask why are you running set crews and living in the station for 12-36 hours for call volume that low. With that volume you should be ALL responding for the experience(s) and from home. The volume doesn't dictate the need for full-time response times and has actually caused hardship on the set-crews, and overall less actual experience for responses missed due to the set crew system.

Around here we have a VFD that runs upwards to 1200 calls without any set crews. Is this a requirement from your Fire Chief? I used to be on a VFD that did around 400 a year and we had zero station coverage until the pager went off.

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Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on July 15, 2009 at 8:32pm

Are you required to put time in at the station, or is it strictly on a voluntary basis? I'm wondering if the bitterness is directed toward that requirement, or the fact that there aren't that many calls.

If it's the required manning at the station that is getting you down, I don't know that there is much you can do about that. However, if it's the fact that you aren't personally responding to calls, just remember that when you are sitting in station idle, no one's house is burning down. No one is trapped in a car wreck, or having a heart attack.

We thrive on activity that allows us to put our skills and training to the test, but there's a flip side - someone else is suffering. I like to keep that in mind when we are quiet.

We have about 130 fire calls a year so I know what it's like.

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Permalink Reply by Padre Pete on July 16, 2009 at 6:17am

BINGO ! Joe, You and FETC have nailed it. Yours is the question that we need answered. Why indeed? Without knowing who makes 86 hang around his station, analysis is only speculation. Keep The Faith.

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Permalink Reply by Aaron Whitford on July 15, 2009 at 9:25pm

hey mate,

im with the Marton VOlunteer Rural Fire FOrce in NZ. Last year we hit 20 calls and this year only 2 calls. it sucks but how i deal with it is just do other things. However the local urban brigade in marton hit 355 or something calls last year

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