circulation@TimesRecord.com
His master’s voice comes via a beeper
By: DARCY A. COPPONI
Times Record Staff
07/01/98
Darcy_Copponi@TimesRecord.Com
BRUNSWICK — Although 16-year-old junior firefighter Dana Kennedy won’t be on call until 7 a.m. Thursday, he keeps his beeper on 24 hours a day, every day, during the summer. His crew’s official schedule is 24 on, 48 off. They’re prepared to answer every call, from the most common — false alarms — to the most frightening — structure fires. “Obviously, you know, if we’re getting a call saying there are flames coming from the roof, you know it’s pretty serious,” said Kennedy. “It can be scary.” Kennedy, who recently got braces and holds the top and bottom set together with neon-green elastics, actually became a junior firefighter when he was 14. He said he noticed that his dad’s new job as an on-call firefighter was pretty interesting. So he signed up. It took him eight months to learn all the trucks, but he was trained and riding on the lead “attack truck,” Engine 3, in no time. That’s when he got his comfortable, navy blue uniform, which he said does not include bell bottoms. Now, almost two years later and much to his surprise, he’s taking the basic Emergency Medical Technician course and expects to be licensed in September. “I always told myself, ‘Well, I could never do that. Oh my God, you see people dying and stuff!’” he said. “But as it was, I enrolled in it and now I’m riding the rescue like I told myself I never would.” Kennedy’s first roll on one of the fire trucks was to the new Brunswick High School, just one week before school started. “My first one was real bad,” recalled Kennedy, who will be a junior there this fall. “I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ You know? This is like the end of the world. I was just pretty nervous and shaking while I clipped up my jacket on the way over. But it was a false alarm.” Kennedy’s first working fire was a mobile home fire, which he says are the worst because it doesn’t take long to destroy them. “For trailers, what you immediately have is an overwhelming sense of fear,” he said, his brown eyes serious behind his glasses. “But by the time I got there, it was pretty much knocked down — under control. There were hot spots, you know, when you kick over a pile of clothes where there’s hot coals underneath. I went to that one with my dad.” According to Jeff Emerson, full-time firefighter and advisor , there are about 10 junior firefighters on board right now, but there is room for 12. The juniors have to be between 14 and 18 years old and must fill out an application and have parental permission. A junior firefighter’s main purpose on a fire scene is to set up and maintain self-contained breathing packs that the firefighters need to wear when they go into a burning building. The juniors also run to get things the firefighters need from the truck, and help with any task that isn’t really dangerous. Kennedy said he wants to go to Southern Maine Technical School for a bachelor’s degree in fire science, become certified in Firefighting 1 and 2, pass the written and agility tests, then work for Brunswick. “I don’t want to go huge,” said Kennedy. “Some people like to go to Boston or New York — but to each your own. I like the variety here, rotating job slots. And in smaller places you get to know the guys and you get to know them real well.”
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