Monday, March 2, 2009

Physical Agility Test!

Jeff's physical agility test for the Fire District 9 was on Feb 21st. I have not posted anything about the test because I was waiting until I got pictures of all the torture Jeff had to endure.
When Jeff first arrived, Lieutenant Michelle (something) showed all the candidates the course.




After the tour of the course, Jeff's first event was the "Black out maze" event where he put on his SCBA (mask) and put his hood over the top to simulate being blind. He then had to crawl around on his hands and knees following a wall to get out of the maze.

Chad, a volunteer firefighter hooking all the candidates up to the safety rope for the aerial ladder climb which was Jeff's second event.
My stud of a husband doing the aerial ladder climb which was 65 feet.

Standing around at the beginning of the combat course. First he had to do a stair climb with a high rise hose pack (40lbs), 5 flights up and 5 flights down. Then he did a unrack/rack roof ladder.

The "Simulated extension ladder raise" event was next. The weight of the bag was 60lbs and Jeff had to use a hand-over-hand motion to raise the bag 35 feet.

The "Forcible entry" event came after the ladder extension. Here he had to use an 8lb. sledge hammer to drive the I-Beam five feet to his rear (He said no matter how hard you hit it, it would only move a couple inches at the max).
After the I-beam he had to weave through a set of cones to a charged hose line and drag it out 75' and spray the water.
The last event was the "Victim rescue" event and he had to drag a 165lb dummy a distance of 100ft.


At the end of the combat course exhausted and felling like he wanted to puke. Just for reference his turnouts weigh around 10lbs, the air pack weighs about 30-40lbs. So at the max when he was doing the dummy drag he was having to carry 215lbs, basically his own body weight.


On the following Monday (Feb 23) he received his acceptance letter for the Fire District 9 Volunteer Recruit Academy. Great job bubba! I am so proud of you for making it one more step toward your goal. (The only thing I am not excited for is that starting in a week Jeff will be gone Monday nights, Wednesday nights, and Saturday all day for the next six weeks at the Volunteer Recruit Academy, so I will once again feel like a single Mom, but I know it will all be worth the sacrifice in the end.)

5 comments:

Me said...

What a stud!

browerfamily said...

Awesome! Did you watch the whole thing? Was is timed too? Do you have to go through all this volunteer stuff before you can be a firefighter? Tell him good job.

Crystyne said...

No I didn't go watch, I wasn't sure if anyone was allowed to go watch or even how long he would be there. He had to do all this in under eight minutes. No you don't have to do all the volunteer stuff to become a career firefighter, but it can't hurt when he does apply for a career position.

EternaLeppert said...

Congratulations!! What a great job! All of that in under 8 minutes? I can't even begin to imagine how you prepare for something like that. We're so excited for you guys!

nicole said...

Congratulations!! I'm so excited for you guys. Now the tough time start, huh.