r/Firefighting • u/Peaches0k Texas FF/EMT/HazMat Tech • Jan 22 '25

General Discussion Reasons For Calls

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Saw someone ask what all we do besides fire. Here’s a list the shifts add to for dumb calls. It was started a few months ago

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543

u/FederalAmmunition Jan 22 '25

Structure fire that turned out to be a fish tank light reflection on the wall

I love the fire service

151

u/Jebediah_Johnson Walmart Door Greeter Jan 22 '25

We had multiple callers reporting a car fire on the interstate.

It was a classic car wrapped in Christmas lights.

35

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '25

I think one time a year we should be allowed to slap the shit out of a caller.

4

u/Doomgloomya Jan 23 '25

If this was a thing I would feel like Marshall in HIMYM waiting, not wanting to waste the one slap I have and possibly missing a truly deserving pt.

49

u/nosce_te_ipsum Jan 22 '25

This just made me super paranoid about some of the new Philips Hue colors and patterns I've been running. Simulating a fireplace look with a throw-glow light made to wallwash, I can now imagine some idiot calling my own department to my house because they're nosy.

24

u/Remarkable-Average85 Jan 23 '25

Anyone in a cold climate has had the "Smoke showing" that was just the dryer exhaust vent right?

2

u/Impressive_Change593 VA volly Jan 23 '25

slightly more understandable is the turkey/chicken house doing the same thing

1

u/thatonegirl213 Jan 23 '25

Called to the inlaws, passer-by called,house when smoke was coming....FROM THE CHIMNEY IN WINTER!!! They were surprised to see us. 😂

16

u/lostinthefog4now Jan 22 '25

Had a reported structure fire that charged an entire 2500 sq ft house with thick black shitty smoke. Turned out to be the plastic light /hood structure over a huge fish tank, probably a 200 gallon tank. Did not extend into the structure at all-just the plastic lid. Serve-pro had some cleaning to do….

1

u/Chicago_Avocado Jan 26 '25

200 gal is a pretty big tank. Normally that would need the floor reinforced.

1

u/lostinthefog4now Jan 27 '25

Finished basement-concrete floor.

15

u/KGBspy Career FF/Lt and adult babysitter. Jan 22 '25

I know of a fire that got called in due to red curtains being blown out a window on a nice day.

3

u/ShooterMcGrabbin88 Hose Humper Jan 23 '25

Had some lady that was visiting my neighbor who was from Arizona beat on my door at about 2:00 am screaming that my house was on fire.

It was the dryer vent.

2

u/KGBspy Career FF/Lt and adult babysitter. Jan 23 '25

I say every friggin day....people are idiots. Homeowners that don't know where their main panel or water main is, people that know their cellar floods all the time yet they're too cheap to get a pump and hose from Home D so they call us instead to do it, people that don't seem to realize that....a little beep once a minute from a CO detector isn't CO and if you read the back you fucking morons you'd see that it means "low battery" or "replace detector", the list goes on and on. 18-24 months and I'm done.

10

u/tanner_bee Jan 22 '25

“Sparks falling from a light in a parking garage”

Turns out to be water droplets refracting from said light

9

u/AdultishRaktajino Jan 22 '25

Got a “huge grass/wildland fire” which was just the sunset reflecting.

5

u/User_225846 Jan 23 '25

The whole sky is orange to the west of RP

12

u/Indiancockburn Jan 23 '25

Dumped a structure fire response for an individual playing a YouTube video of a fireplace on TV for ambiance.

31

u/sucksatgolf Overpaid janitor 🧹 Jan 22 '25

There is an infamous call in my department back in the 80s where we went for a fire in a garden style apartment on the ground floor. The guy who was first in is a known basket case/ cowboy/ lunatic. I dont know what the reasoning is on why they didn't stretch a line or why he was by himself (he was never an officer or IC). A lot of the specifics have been lost over time, but this guy tossed like a 150 gallon fish tank on a couch and clothes on fire. Incident was over after that.

26

u/Njquil Jan 22 '25

God I fuckin love stories like this that get passed down through generations and snowball bigger every time it’s told.

One guy threw 1200 pounds of water from a fish tank onto a fire? The same guy was also clairvoyant and somehow knew the apartment had a big ass fish tank in it?

10

u/sucksatgolf Overpaid janitor 🧹 Jan 22 '25

🤣 yeah that math ain't working. Tipped it over? 12 gallons? I dunno. Maybe it was built in? That was popular in the 80s.

5

u/MrMedic971 Jan 23 '25

Yeah, I was wondering about that too. Who needs a hose when you’ve hired the Hulk and put him on the engine?

3

u/BevvyTime Jan 23 '25

567 kilos…

That’s… a lot

1

u/Chicago_Avocado Jan 26 '25

Water is almost exactly 4kg per gallon. 100gal tanks are rare, but weigh over 400kg

2

u/AlwaysBLurkin Jan 23 '25

It was a tank of piranhas!

6

u/Dynamo_Fantastique Jan 22 '25

We got banged out for a structure fire that turned out to be fog.

6

u/TheAmishPhysicist Jan 23 '25

Had a call for a fire in a restaurant. It was a roasted chicken place that cooked over an open flame, that was visible from the street. The kicker was it was roughly 6 pm and customers were walking in and out.

3

u/madchemist617 Jan 23 '25

I could see someone driving by and calling in this as a house fire https://youtu.be/DustMUjfk58?si=ylUaPUlzd1dgQsi_

3

u/sr20rps13 Jan 23 '25

Reason why I hate working around October and December.