Fire Fighter for a morning
A visit to Manly Fire Station...
On a chilly June morning 10 lucky children got to visit Manly Volunteer Fire Brigade. As we arrived there was a call-out and the medical van raced off to help someone. There was much excitement as we watched the van from the deck, then saw the Silverdale Fire Engine race past about 10 minutes later. After a safety briefing ('if you hear the tones please go straight back to the meeting room as that means there is a call-out') we headed out to the engine bay to look at the fire fighter's uniforms. We noticed that there were lots of different helmets, and Darryn and Dave showed us what the different helmets meant - rookie, fire fighter, qualified fire fighter, station officer, fire chief. Kids got to try on the uniforms and helmets - lots of them pretended to be the big chief!
Next it was on to fighting fires - using a big hose to squirt water and trying to adjust the angle and the width of spray. Raphael had to pull the hose off the fire truck, then Fireman Dave started the water pump. Fireman Darryn helped the kids hold the hose - there's a lot of pressure when the water pumps out so fast!
We were very lucky as the Silverdale crew called in to the Manly Station on their way back from a job, so then the children had two fire engines to look at and explore, and lots of fire fighters to talk to. Thank you to Darryn, Tony, Nick and Dave from Manly Volunteer Fire Fighters for a great morning getting to know a bit about being fire fighters. Whangaparaoa School, our families and community are very lucky to have our volunteer fire fighters giving up time to keep people safe and to help out in emergencies.
