r/Firefighting • u/SequoiaTree1 🚒 🚓 🚑 • Jul 22 '25
Photos Always check your gear, especially in the desert.
This happened to me today.
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u/Ok_Buddy_9087 Edit to create your own flair Jul 22 '25
And this is why I live where the air hurts my face.
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u/spekledcow part-time/on call Jul 22 '25
100%! Cold is better then scorpions
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u/SequoiaTree1 🚒 🚓 🚑 Jul 22 '25
The air also hurts my face here but it’s because of the heat :(
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u/runnerhasnolife Jul 22 '25
Arizona?
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u/SequoiaTree1 🚒 🚓 🚑 Jul 22 '25
Hotter.
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u/thealt3001 Jul 22 '25
Phoenix is the hottest city in the country other than death valley, which isn't really a city. So... Death valley?
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u/wildcroutons Jul 22 '25
Texas - cockroach. I’m still recovering.
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u/Darth_Waiter 3rd service medic Jul 22 '25
Gotta learn how to ride one like the worm from Dune. Closest we’ll ever get to public transport here
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u/theoneandonly78 Jul 22 '25
My God, that’s terrifying. I was once assigned to a station that would have visits from the largest tarantulas that I have ever seen. Those fuckers I was assigned with found out about my fear of spiders and took great revelry in chasing me with those fucking things. Still some of my best memories!
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u/OneSplendidFellow Jul 22 '25
That crosses a line.
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u/Objective_Lock3293 Jul 23 '25
What line does that cross? It’s a bug
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u/OneSplendidFellow Jul 23 '25
Somebody has a fear of one and you decide to start chasing them with it, I don't want to hear about the dental bills.
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u/BasicGunNut TX Career Jul 22 '25
We can’t leave our gear on the floor by the apparatus because of scorpions in our boots. Probies always look confused when their crew stages their gear in the cab. It’s funny till you get stung.
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u/SequoiaTree1 🚒 🚓 🚑 Jul 22 '25
It was in a bag, velcroed, inside of another bag, zippered shut, in my locker :(.
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u/BasicGunNut TX Career Jul 22 '25
Thats crazy, we always have to kick the garden hoze coil before we wash the truck, because they hide in the coils. Our storage building out back has Black Widows in it lol.
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u/AdventurousTap2171 Jul 22 '25
Oooh, dang, with my luck it'd be a juvenille hellbender stuck up in mine.
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u/Strict-Canary-4175 Jul 22 '25
Holy shit I can’t even think about this I want to crawl out of my skin oh my Christ
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u/Horseface4190 Jul 22 '25
Nope. Nope, to the NopeNope. Noppity Nope-de-Nope. Nopus Maximus. All the Nope. So much Nope, you'll Nope your Nope.
Nope.
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u/Goddess_of_Carnage Jul 22 '25
Nope. Nope.
He a trespasser—he meets a trespasser end.
Weapons are proportional.
Do y’all store gear in floor or did that happen on truck?
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u/SequoiaTree1 🚒 🚓 🚑 Jul 22 '25
My mask was in a pouch velcroed shut, in a bag, in my locker. I found it after we got back from a cancelled call. I assumed it had been on my mask the whole time but I guess it could have been crawling around on me on the way to the call and just ended up there.
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u/Goddess_of_Carnage Jul 22 '25
Even more nightmare fuel.
I’d say it was in your bag.
Yikes.
NGL here, it could have been my cause of death—because I’d have likely ripped that mask off despite what conditions I was in.
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u/Material-Win-2781 Volunteer fire/EMS Jul 22 '25
I'm pretty sure having a scorpion loose inside your mask during interior attack is the nitromethane of nightmare fuel.
<New phobia unlocked>
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u/PTBooks Jul 22 '25
I’d probably take off my street shoes for a drill and come back to find two of them things.
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u/WaxedHalligan4407 Jul 22 '25
I've heard of certain militaries in the middle east where they always store their boots upside down. The mask tho... Damn!
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u/lks1855 FF/EMT Jul 23 '25
Texas - nothing haunts me like that venomous land noodle lurking in the gear room
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u/Powder4576 Cadet Jul 22 '25
Gotta love it when you go to grab your gear and you see something crawl/slither out of it
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u/blenneman05 citizen Jul 22 '25
Are you working in Yuma 🤣🤣🤣
I almost stepped on 1 before my boyfriend pushed me out the way 🤣
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u/Pak_Track Jul 22 '25
We had a mouse in one of the guys’ boot a while ago. I definitely heard a crunch but I don’t think I heard a squeak!
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u/WeakerThanYou Hit it hard from the yard Jul 22 '25
Jesus christ. No fucking thank you to that little surprise.
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u/rizzo1717 expert dish washer Jul 22 '25
This biggest risk to our gear is a hobo sneaking in and stealing shit.
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u/dpinsy14 Jul 22 '25
Guy I work with jumped in his boots for a run one day and squishes a mouse. Whoops. Ick.
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u/GioMorgan_ Jul 23 '25
Wait, that doesn’t actually can get inside the mask right when you put it on?
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u/Cautious_Air_8017 Jul 25 '25
I live in the high desert and was bitten by a scorpion in my kitchen, but after calling a hotline number was told there aren’t any poison scorpions in California. So I hope you are in Cali. My son caught a scorpion and had it in a jar with holes punched in the lid in our garage. The hotline said scorpions call out to other scorpions for help so it’s a good idea to let it go before it calls for more. Boys will be boys no matter their age.
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u/demonduster72 Jul 25 '25
There word you’re looking for is “venomous”, and yes there are. All scorpions are venomous to some degree. The ones that are medically significant to humans just don’t inhabit California as widely as other regions. Most scorpion stings in California are comparable to a bee or wasp sting. The bark scorpion (Arizona Bark Scorpion considered North America’s most venomous and can be found in the south eastern Cali desert), however, can inflict some gnarly symptoms.
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u/Brilliant-Cod4226 21d ago
Snakes and scorpions, not really my favorite idea on how to go. Definitely better than the alligator.
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u/stinggaa Jul 22 '25
We got a rat in one of our admin offices but he leaves everyday around 430