– By Bob Wade, Night Team Leader/Supervisor–ARC of SE Wisconsin–Milwaukee, WI.

This diary entry is from April 25, 2008.

It’s 5:30pm, Friday evening, and I’m just waking up from a 30-minute nap after a long day at work. I can’t sleep, even though I only had about an hour and a half of sleep on Thursday night, after responding to two overnight fires, before having to go into work this morning.

I need to get outside, into the van and put away all the supplies I picked up from the Chapter on my way home from work earlier.

There’s a big storm coming and I need to be ready for it. We are currently under a Tornado Watch until 8:00pm here in Milwaukee County.

5:35pm:

I’m putting on my shoes and from across my police scanner I hear, “Fill out the assignment!” via the Milwaukee Fire Department Dispatcher.

Fire on the south side!

My DAT cell phone rings as I’m looking up the address on my computer. “We have a working house fire in the 1200 block of S 13th St!”

“I’m on my way!” I respond.

I’m going to have to leave the mess in the van as is and try to put everything away after I get to the fire.

As I’m racing to put my gear on, I hear yet another call, “Working structure fire…Reports of one man trapped inside!” across my police scanner. The address is way up on the far north side again, on N. 91st Street, just to the north of Brown Deer Road; it’s the exact same street as the 3:30am lightning strike fire call earlier this morning.

“I’ve gotta come up with a good game plan here,” I think to myself. “A fire on the far south side and another one on the far north side…

“How am I going to do this?”

I’m not even out the door of my house yet.

The duty worker calls again, three minutes after her call for the first fire and tells me about this second one. I was told that “The south side fire may be nothing…the north side fire may be the more urgent of the two.”

“That’s great information, good to know. Thank you!” I tell her.

I remember that my teammate Geri told me that she’d be available to help out Friday and Saturday if I needed it. She lives on the north side.

I jump into the van and quickly call her and ask her to respond to that one.

Jim lives to the West of me about 5 miles or so. I’ll call him and ask him to go to the north side fire with Geri.

Jan lives in Greendale (far SW side of Milwaukee) and she can meet me at the south side fire.

My DAT cell phone rings again: “You can cancel on that north side fire…It’s a false alarm,” the duty worker states.

“Whew!”

I put the van in gear and call Geri and Jim off that north side fire, as I take off to the 13th St fire. I thankfully get to pull all of our resources down to the south side fire now.

I arrive at the scene about 15 minutes later and notice a large perimeter set up by the Milwaukee Police Department. I have to park a block away and walk in. The fire is at a structure on the northeast corner of S.13th & W. Cleveland Avenue; a usually sprawling intersection has come to a standstill.

There’s a Taqueria vehicle parked on the southwest corner of the fire scene selling fresh, hot food to those passing by and there are on-lookers everywhere.

It’s quite hot and humid and I estimate that we have at most an hour before the predicted cold front and severe storms go through, so it’s imperative that we get our work done quickly.

I walk into the middle of the intersection and greet two police officers who tell me that there are occupants from this house/tavern and they are somewhere around there.

Up on the roof of this structure, I see and hear firemen cutting holes into the roof with their saws.

I find a man standing just outside the police tape and ask him if he lives in that house. He says,

“Yes…Me and my roommates live there.”

I introduce myself to him, shake his hand, and tell him why I’m there.

“I’m from the American Red Cross and the Fire Department has asked me to come out to see if you might need any assistance,”

I say to him. I ask him if he would mind if I got some information from him and after he agrees, I start the interview.

William was at home when he started to smell smoke, then saw fire. He ran out of the building without shoes on. He doesn’t know how the fire started. The owner of the tavern downstairs is out of town and the bar was closed.

I notice a Battalion Commander from the Milwaukee Fire Department walking towards us. It’s Chief Wendtland. He’s also Chairman of the American Red Cross Board of Directors here in Southeastern Wisconsin and if I can say that anyone’s a hero in this world, he is one to me.

He says hello, we shake hands and he starts to ask William some questions, trying to determine the cause of the fire.

William’s roommate walks up to us; he’s another “William.” I tell him why I’m there and let him know that we will assist them any way we can, in terms of helping them find a place to stay and with any immediate clothing or other needs.

I see my teammate Geri walking through the intersection. Jim and Jan arrive shortly thereafter. I brief everyone as to what’s going on there and it’s back to the van for a pair of shoes for William #1. I’m able to pull the van up closer to the perimeter of the fire scene at that point.

From the interview, we have the names of the four occupants from the house. A couple of them are inside the bar across the street.

The skies begin to darken.

I’m finally able to put away all the supplies I picked up from the Chapter. I decided to stock the van up to the hilt for this weekend; one thing that I do not want to worry about is running out of supplies.

My teammates are out talking to our clients and I get a chance to pull the weather radar up on my cell phone. Wow! This storm is just on the horizon and it’s going to hit with two lines of storms!!

Everyone comes back to the van and I’m informed that our clients do not have alternate places to stay so we go with the hotel option for the weekend.

The storm moves over us as we begin to fill out the paperwork.

I’m looking out the driver-side window and see a large bolt of lightning strike the ground behind a building up the street. “Boom!!!”

MFD has finished their work and the firemen run for their rigs, then depart the scene. Some of the onlookers are still standing out in the elements watching what’s going on, even though the rain is coming down in wind-driven sheets with bright flashes from the lightning bolts above.

I’m still parked, pointed east in the westbound lane of Cleveland Avenue, right at the intersection, with my emergency lights still flashing. The traffic is like rush hour.

I decide to back up and pull into the parking lot of a tavern, which I’m right next to, just to get out of the way.

We wait until this first line of storms pass, then Jan and Jim go into the bar, meet with the clients and give them comfort kits, clothing, client assistance cards and have them sign the vouchers for the two hotel rooms we give them for the weekend.

The rain has let up and I finally get a good view of the burned structure from the tavern’s parking lot across the street..

The firefighters punched a pretty nice hole into the front of that building and then there were plenty of holes cut out up on the roof; now there’s this rain, which is pouring down into it.

Our work is done there. Jim and Jan depart for their cars. I wait until I see Jan get to her car and notice that she’s walking back towards me again.

“I’ll bet that she locked her keys in her car.” Sure enough, she has.

That’s not a hard thing to do when you’ve just arrived at the scene of a fire and you know what you have to do. There are so many things racing through your mind, such as your training, your gear, where the clients are located and your ability to feel and express the compassion that people might need. There are people talking at you from every direction. The stress level can get very high. The skill of thinking on your feet becomes one of your most valuable assets in the midst of these calls, but the most important foundation for our confidence comes from that notion of teamwork.

The highest level of client assistance comes through the culmination of ideas from the entire team. Everyone sees things at disaster scenes through their own individual eyes and minds. My teammates see things I don’t and from angles I haven’t even begun to imagine.

The van is our conference room, where the ideas for and solutions to all problems are solidified and constituted.

We laugh and cry with our clients in the van. The floor of the van is covered in spilled tears from the pain and suffering of the many that have passed through there. It is sacred ground.

Jan’s husband arrives at the scene and gets her home.

I drive up to them, say goodbye and head on home. I need gas!

While I’m at a red light, at the intersection of S. 35th Street and National Avenue, I look over at a boarded up home, which I was called out to one early morning back in February. I remembered how I had just met the family from that fire again earlier on this very day, at yet another fire.

My team was called out at 3:30am Friday morning after lightning struck their apartment building; it turned into a pretty big fire. One of the families recognized and remembered me before I did them. This was the second time in three months that the Red Cross provided assistance to this family, through no fault of its own, I feel compelled to note!

As I turn on to the 35th St. Viaduct Bridge, the heavens open up once again and that second line of storms hits with a much more powerful vengeance! The wind is so fierce that I have to place a firm hold on the steering wheel so as not to get blown out of my lane. Lightning bolts tearing through the night sky, from cloud-to-ground, with sheering wind and rain, cause my heart to beat faster. It’s raining so hard that even I-94 is flooded with standing water. With the windshield wipers on full speed, I can hardly see.

I finally make it to the gas station at 92nd & Bluemound Road. The storm is still roaring. I have my police scanner on full blast as I’m standing out in the raw force of the winds, which are blowing right at me underneath the overhang.

I wouldn’t trade this job for anything!

…Bob

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