False alarm

[frogfish]

Brian you sure did the right thing considering whats happened in Chi town in the past You coulda saved that poor cow

 

[the possum]

That said, I remember a Mad Magazine comic feature from the early 60's..... A little kitty got stuck in a tree. The frenzied boy was crying and upset. His mother called the Fire department. Strong male role models wearing impressive gear and a ladder truck showed up. They pulled the cat to safety. The boy was happy, his mother may have given one a peck on the cheek- I don't recall...but as everyone waved goodbye to the truck pulling away from the curb, the kitty jumped out of the boy's hands and stepping in front of the rear wheels...the boy watched in horror as the kitty, well; that was Mad in its hayday!

Oh my god, dude! That actually happened with a local fire department! No kidding. I think it was an old lady's cat, though. Another local volunteer department once showed up at a fire, with no water in their tanks.

 

[munk]

We've an old firetruck no one knows how to work. It's a beautiful truck. Our auto mechanic can't figure it out. So it sits and collects dust and we use our two other trucks.

One of them is a donated State forestry truck and the other a County vehicle.

Before my time there was a burn over- you know what I mean- I don't remember the right phrase. Anyway, it happened to an old army Deuce and a half? And the two regulars survived in the cab with O2 masks. The guy in the back, who'd been on the hose, dove into the tank and survived there. Had this happened in the forest it would have been a different ending, but the prarrie fires are fast and furious. There was also an infamous incident where some scholars took refuge in a cave system during a fire. There are many caves in the limestone cliffs around here. ( and COUGARS Too!) The fire sucked all the O2 out of the cave and killed them.


Hollowdweller sent me a disk with a wonderful song about the loss of a dozen firefighters on the Mo River a long time ago. Fire jumped over a safety zone and burned up from the River, cutting off their escape. The leader survived by lighting tall grass, but the main body of the crew ran uphill towards some rocks. Most of them died. There's a marker somewheres about this I'd like to find.

Two things I don't trust- fire and water.

munk