From: patti keiper pattik1
Sent: Thursday, December 21, 2023 1:18 PM Subject: Prep
Chet Kelly hurried in Captain Stone's wake as they made their way to the side of the power plant garage that had the stand of offending overgrown pine trees.
Ben eyed up Kelly. "Why is it that wildfires move towards the thickest trees?"
he hissed, sucking in a slow breath on his scba's air supply.
"So we firefighters can become lumberjacks, Cap? I guess our door chopping skills need brushing up."
"Is that a pun, Kelly?" Stone oggled, jerking a gloved thumb over his shoulder as a prompt.
:Uh, yes, sir. Joking under pressure just a bit. As if the hot seat's not hot enough."
Next to him, Marco snorted, and flipped his charged hose safety line over a parking curb. "At least, out here, there are no ceilings to tear down."
"Brownie points!"Chet celebrated, swiping soot off of his faceplate.
Beside them, their assigned air bottled plant worker guide said, "This grove has eleven trees. There's a power tools shed around the corner."
"Time, nine minutes three." Stone said, eyeing his watch and their regulators volume dial. "Chainsaws won't work in oxygenless air like this. Axes will do, gentlemen."
Their power plant guide eyed them up speculatively. "They're young trees. Maybe twenty eight years old. Not as dense of sap wood for pines as they could have been." The fire crew were now well inside the electric yard, so he reported their progress to the main control room over his radio.
Scott Mason shared his update, too. ##Ramping down the piles, Ross. ##
he said to his man with the firefighters. The eerie hum from the forest of high power towers lessened to a low rumble they couldn't hear but could feel on their skin through their clothes.
"God I hope we can save this transformer station. " said Ross, the worker.
Stone smiled at him. "We can if the sparks get no fuel." he encouraged brightly.
He tossed a handful of nickles and a light bulb out towards the nearest tree.
No bulb glow appeared nor did any shaking plasma erupt from the wet grass Marco had hose dampened liberally.
"Will this E.M. field effect our H.T.s?" Chet asked, pulling out his axe from his turnout's chest carry strap.
"Not so long as there's no static electricity build up on the ground. No chance of that now. Soil's been throughly soaked. There's no more magnetism. It would be pretty hard to short anything through the radio casing in these plastic bags." Stone replied, hefting up his handy talkie in emphasis.
A deep roar rose, and slowly died away, from the largest fire's ridge across the river from their location. The firefighters and the plant tech watching them, froze at the sight.
A fire devil twisted up hundreds of feet slowly into the lurid air at the crest of the burning hill.
Captain Stone let out his breath and reassured Ross. "That's just super heat, not a flash over. Oxygen's too thin to flare into sheets and balls now. Let's get to work!"
Quickly, Kelly and Stone made short work of the first tree, chopping it down. They dragged, then rolled it into the river. "Let's clear the rest of these after our buddy here becomes the tree current checker." Ben grinned, leaning into Chet's face.
Soon, on the ninth tree, the loose change exploded upon contact, making the four flinch as steam rose from the powered patch of lawn.
Ross chuckled. "Kill number eight, Scott." he transmitted to Mason on H.T.
##Done.## said his supervisor.
A G.E. lightbulb, thrown into the same spot, impacted and tumbled to a dark standstill.
Chet crowed his relief at the disappearance of the hidden hazard. "Seeing is understanding what you're looking at, boys!"
"Thank you, boss!" Ross replied to Scott Mason, waving at a yellow lit, fish eye camera nearest to them, mounted far above their heads, on the aerial catwalk .
Chet bounced on his boots on top of their dry tarp path that they were laying down as they went. "Think we can roast a few marshmallows in between trees, Cap?" begged Kelly. "My sweet tooth's kicking in."
"That's adrenalin." admonished Marco to his station mate. "Just because you can, doesn't mean you should." he said, unsuccessfully fighting a smile.
Stone nodded in agreement. "When we get back to the big house." he promised, beginning to bite his blade into the trunk of the safety cleared pine tree. "I'll personally fire up the BBQ myself, for all of us."
Ross shivered, bringing out his nervous caution. "Just in case, guys. About ground gradients? Turn 180 degrees around immediately, if you feel tingling in legs or lower torso and hop directly away from that spot, on one foot or feet together in a shuffled leap, like hopscotch, when you were kids. That building differential potential will break, and you won't get zapped."
Roy DeSoto and Craig Brice looked up from the triage area as a triple blat from the sentry engine warned a heads up. DeSoto's mouth fell open. "That's got to be burning 300 feet high." he fretted, as they both turned around and looked back at the Mine Fire.
The fire tornado was now leaning over the river power plant.
"Yeah, but no O2." Craig analyzed. "Only the stuff boiling off from the river water at the base."
A sharp wind sucked into their backs, as air rushed past them to mix with the rising column of red flames.
"How are they doing down there?" Brice asked nearby Battalian Seven.
"They're working on those risky trees and brush now. I've offloaded another dozen air bottles for their use. If they need an evac, I've got a Coast Guard inflatable with an electric trolling motor on a fresh air feed, that can sweep in to pick all of them up, in minutes. They're moored at the power plant dock on stand by, with a couple of frogmen. Underwater will be our shelter of last resort for this assignment."
said the white helmeted chief.
"Fun.." Craig murmured sarcastically. "But a good plan, sir."
Roy rumbled, restless with worry for the firefighters working down below in the power plant a half mile away. "I'm so sick of this fire."
"Aren't we all." Battalion smiled grimly from his command table next to Squad 51.
"Sorry, chief." DeSoto said, lowering his gaze.
"Nothing to be sorry about. It's the truth in plain ass sight, DeSoto. It's been one hell of a long summer fire so far. But the end's in sight. Eight months have been enough. Met has posted thunderstorm warnings for six o'clock. A hefty squall will meet this fire's leading edge on the beach and it's gonna die." he snarled,
uncharacteristically. "We're all tired beyond belief. Water always wins in the end, boys.
Hang tough."
"Yes, sir.." Brice and Roy replied turning their attention back to their triage equipment inventory sheets.
-
Twenty eight minutes later, Captain Stone, Chet Kelly and Marco Lopez completed their task in clearing the hot yard of trees and brush on their river island.
The team hurried back into the shelter of the main power plant.
Whomp! went the sound of raw fire as a great wall of it breached over the river using the beginning of the approaching rain storm's wind.
"Whooo!" Stone guffawed, as he slammed the outer steel door behind them as they hustled inside, into the control room. "Just in time! There's nothing left outside to burn now. We're safe, the pilings are gonna be fine. There's not enough heat at the bottom of these fire tendrils blasting by to ignite our metal parts."
"What about the power lines?" Marco wanted to know.
Scott Mason shrugged. "They handle fire balls during power surges that migrate down wire all the time. And that kind of plasma is 1000 times hotter than regular fire. We're all good. Thank you, Captain, gentlemen, for sticking your necks out for just a building.
I'm truly grateful.. Really. From the bottom of my-" the man's face contorted, as he clutched his chest, suddenly gurgling. His face began to change bad colors.
Scott pitched forward like a ragdoll into Stone, Marco and Chet's arms.
"Scott?!" Captain Stone cried, as they lowered him, mask, airbottle and all, onto the floor. They swiftly checked him out.
"Damn it!" Ben swore.
"Is it a dry bottle?" Chet asked tightly, as Marco rushed to grab a fresh one from the pile stacked on the control console.
"Don't know. But I've got a pulse." Ben replied, tearing off a glove and feeling at Mason's coratid artery in his neck.
"Is he breathing?" Lopez said, switching out the supervisor's air bottle for the new one in seconds. "This is on and in full flow."
"Yes." Kelly answered, resting both of his hands on the man's abdomen and chest.
"Why is he out cold?" Stone demanded fiercely. "His mask's seal is perfectly fine."
"An M.I.?"
"No way of knowing at this point." replied Cap. He got on his radio to Triage in an instantaneous priority hail. "Station Eight to Battalion 7. We've got a civilian down in no air conditions. We need a paramedic on the line a.s.a.p.!"
Photo: Battalion 7 on HT.
Photo: An older man being ventilated on a positive pressure valve resuscitator.
Photo: Captain Benjamin Stone feeling for a pulse on a victim.
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