Same age as me then mate! Yeah, if you wouldn't mind answering a few that'd be great.
Firstly, what made you want to go into that area?
Secondly, do you find the position is insular? As the Police supposedly is (socialising and marrying within the force etc.)
Thirdly, from what I've read 2 days, 2 nights 4 days off seems to be standard. Is that what occurs at your station? And if so do the days and nights rotate or are you on the same days and nights every week?
Fourthly, how long does it take to qualify as a trainee?
Also, it would seem that becoming a 'retained' Firefighter is the area most would want to get to, is that accurate?
Congrats on being a commander by the way.
He is 23 years in the fire brigade, not 23 years old!
Yes, I'm 41, joined in 1990 so come February next year I'll have 23 years service.
As to your questions:-
1. I applied to join the police and the fire service at the same time. The fire service replied back first so they got me on the application process before the police. My father served 27 years in the fire service so I had always been exposed to it from an early age. Initially it wasn't a 'I really, really want to be a firefighter!!' type gig but it eventually ended up that way once I got further into the application process and started asking my father more in depth questions on what his job actually entailed.
2. Insular?. Hmmm. I would say that is perhaps a bit of a strong descriptive in reference to the way things are within the service today. It may have been slightly more that way 10-15 years ago when it came to certain aspects but it isn't so much now. That said, as a member of a watch of individuals whom you work, eat, sleep and play with for a huge amount of your time you do indeed become a very, very tight knit bunch. 'Like brothers' or 'one big family' is something you will hear used to describe us and it sounds 'corny' but when you get down to it then yes - it actually
is like that. There aren't many jobs like ours, it's actually quite difficult to describe. We do on occasion get into some fairly hairy situations ( albeit where the risk is managed to the best of our abilities ) so working with guys you trust implicitly with your life does bring about a bit of a unique bond, much like the military does. We do a lot of socialising together too on our days off which most definitely strengthens that bond a great deal.
3. There are a few different duty systems in place throughout the UK. The one you describe is the one that used to be most common although it is slowly being replaced by other types. It is however the duty system that I currently work and yes, your days rotate in a 'rolling' fashion. So if you are Tuesday, Wednesday day shift then Thursday,Friday night shift you will be off Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Then start back the following week on Wednesday day shift etc. Rinse and repeat. You end up catching a run of working weekends every alternate month or so, which isn't an issue for most folk. The duty system I'm on as described has the advantage of being able to plan well ahead in advance for doing things though. Ask me if I am working a particular day of the year in 2020 and I can answer you in seconds. I could expand on some of the other types of duty system such as day crewing, day crewing+, LLAR etc but it would take too long to go into any degree of detail.
4. It can take up to 36 months to qualify as a fully trained fire fighter but you are encouraged to take ownership of your own development during this period and as such you can work at your own pace, subject to operational considerations and most finish their trainee period before 36 months. I certainly encourage my guys to set their own time scales for their development plans and as such my previous trainee finished his development period early and obtained his SVQ. My current trainee is well on track to achieve this also.
5. The retained issue is a tricky one. You would think someone who has already obtained experience within the job itself as a part timer would be a stick-on for a full time job but it doesn't work that way. The biggest reason being is that if a retained fire fighter (RDS) is accepted into the whole time duty systems then ultimately that means that his retained place must be filled by a new entrant to maintain crewing levels. This is in this day and age with employers being concious of budgets, very difficult to achieve as many employers won't allow their employees to simply drop everything for hours at a time to answer fire calls. RDS recruitment is something that most UK services find very difficult to achieve and maintain as a result. Therefore they are reluctant to move their retained guys into whole time positions.
There are some services within the UK who will allow direct transfers from the retained into the wholetime service meaning they 'skip' the whole application process. This isn't always a great idea. Lastly, some wholetime guys run as wholetime/retained on two different contracts. They are on duty as wholetime fire fighters as normal but on their days off they carry pagers and are called in to crew retained appliances when required. The whole RDS>>>Wholetime issue is a huge can of worms in some respects but again, most of the issues that can crop up regarding that would take a whole thread to discuss.
We recruit jointly with Lothian and Borders so although I can't point you at any info my own service has as far as recruitment goes, here is a link to an L+B document that has identical info that you may find helpful:-
http://www.lbfire.org.uk/downloads/LBFRS_CareerBooklet.pdf
We in Scotland, are going through a transition period at the moment to a single Scottish fire and rescue service which is scheduled to start in April next year. I have my own reservations about this but I will hold judgement on it until not only it happens but a few years down the line from then.
Thanks for the congrats, a crew commander is a thankless task in some respects but one which is very rewarding and that I enjoy immensely.
I heard it's incredibly hard to get into the fire brigade, to the point where they routinely just fail you on your first application to weed out those who are serious or not.
It has always been a very thorough selection process and is indeed a difficult career to break into. Required fitness levels are very high and the technical aspect of our job would simply amaze some outsiders. Hence the required 'brainpower' for prospective entrants is also at a high level. It's not all about kicking doors in and dragging hoses about. I'm based at a technical rescue station and have been involved in this area for many years. As I said, outsiders that we show around the station are usually gobsmacked when we show them the high tech kit we operate with regularly.
