The house tone went off. Durant Cephers quickly zipped off his shoes and pulled on his knee high steel-toed RBI retardant boots waiting by the fire truck. Then in a few seconds came his nomex hood, inner and outer layer protectant pants and jacket. He jumped into the right rear bucket seat. The firefighters were headed to a fire alarm on the third floor of new construction. It had taken about a minute from the time the alarm sounded until the fire truck pulled out into the street. Durant is assigned to the East Battalion, Engine 204 on Prince Street in Old Town, Alexandria.
This had been one of six calls already that day including several medical emergencies, which account for about 70 percent of calls nationwide — a motorcyclist who lost control, a neighbor reporting a woman in distress. It might have been a little lighter than the usual due to an afternoon training session, necessary to keep up with the rapid pace of new equipment and technological developments. When Durant was a probie he had been assigned to a busy station with a lot of night calls that were sometimes spaced so that some nights you got no sleep at all. Although calls probably average about 10-11 per day at his current location, the most calls he remembers in a single day were last fall when they got 32 due to high winds, power outages, and flooding. He says, "You can sort of predict what kind of day it might be by the unusually cold or hot or snowy weather."
Generally it takes six months to be certified a firefighter but 6-7 steps to move up to be a driver who is usually a medical specialist. Durant's specialty is pulling hand lines to the door, entry into buildings. And of course there is always a buddy check before you enter a building. But there are new developments in the field all the time. He says you have to move fast to keep up. Things are state of the art, including lighter gear. For instance, one development in the 10 years since he started his career is the rollover stabilizer that equalizes power so that a fire engine can’t roll over when it is going fast.
Durant first thought about becoming a firefighter when he was young because his father was a contract firefighter assigned to Bosnia, Africa, and Afghanistan. As a child he thought it would be hanging out all day and rushing into buildings to save people. "As it turns out," he says, "it is really more complicated because you are ambassadors to the community, helping people, explaining to children what it is all about as well as keeping on top of your job."
He began his career 10 years ago working two summers out west fighting fires for the U.S. Forest Service. He spent four years in Iraq as a contract firefighter. He says, "The difference is that in Iraq you didn't have many resources, sort of like a rural fire department where it was just you with no hydrants and you just carried your water with you, but here in Alexandria you have a lot of back up for everything." He has been at East Battalion for almost two years.
On a normal day Durant rises at about 6:30 a.m., eats breakfast and then waits. There is physical training and cleaning up the station, performing designated duties, and the firefighters eat lunch and dinner together. He works 24-hour shifts on alternate days and then is off for four days and the rotation starts again.
Durant says, "What I understood about this job was the tip of the iceberg but as I learn more and more it is exactly what I want." He is working on moving up the different technical disciplines. Durant says in addition to the complex technical knowledge the skills you need are resilience, ability to adapt to a changing environment, compassion and patience and physical training.