Thursday, January 05, 2006

Be a Woo-Woo like Leigh

Click the above link. This takes you to the Harris County Emergency Communication Center. Click enter Comm Center. This center dispatches all the fire/medical 911 calls for the agencies listed on the left hand menu.

If you scroll down about 3/4's of the way down you'll see a Windows Media Player icon with the title "HCEC LIVE AUDIO FEED" or "CMMND LIVE AUDIO FEED". Click on either of these two links to listen to the calls being dispatched in my area.

All of the trucks/ambulances at my station are 19's or 29's or 39's. Chiefs are called District 9, District 99, District 79, District 19 and District 29. E stands for Engine, L stands for Ladder truck, B stands for Brushtruck, M stands for Medic (ambulance). We have three ambulances staffed 24/7, Medic 19 and Medic 29. M39 is a backup truck that is staffed by volunteers when the other two trucks are out on calls. Sunday night I drove the tires off of that truck going from one call to another.

Our district is 25 square miles with a general population around 45,000. This is expected to explode to around 100,000 in 2 years. Nearest hospital is 15 miles. Not too bad. We are supported by two air ambulance services and three different police agencies; the precinct, the sheriff's dept and the state troopers. We are not an incorporated district, so we don't have the City of Houston police or fire protection out here. Our fire dept is a combination department, paid and volunteer.

Currenlty, we're experiencing a drought and with that comes alot of brushfires. So, you might see B29 out on alot of calls.

Sometimes I ride on Medic 19 and sometimes I am on Medic 29. Just kinda depends on where they need me. And then there's the occasion where I am supposed to be at home folding clothes or ironing or something and I'm on Medic 39 (hee hee). I so wish I had discovered this industry when I was younger. I absolutely love it.

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