PRECEDE: Becoming a firefighter is a tough and rigorous process and yet thousands are applying this week as Fire Rescue Victoria (FRV) opens its doors for a new round of recruits. So many apply because it’s one of the most rewarding careers you can have, says FRV’s top officer for the South East. Gazette reporter Corey Everitt spoke with Assistant Chief Fire Officer Paul Foster about his decades in the service and why he thinks anyone thinking of becoming a firefighter should have a go.
BREAK-OUT QUOTE: “When you speak to a firefighter, everyone loves their job”
Mr Foster has been a firefighter for 36 years now, that may seem an exceptional time, but for a firefighter that’s rather average.
“99 percent of people who join, they stay 30 plus years,” he said.
“If someone says to me they want to leave, you think jeez you are leaving early, you have only done 28 years!”
Today, Mr Foster is Assistant Chief Fire Officer of Southern Division 2.
He oversees the brigades of the South East from Pakenham, Dandenong, Cranbourne, Frankston, Mornington to Rosebud.
He has put in his fair share of years at the wheel of a firetruck or behind a hose and now takes a leading role at FRV. Such work has taken him all over the country.
This week he will be seeing many applications from across the State as the FRV opens up for recruitment between 1 to 8 July.
Children idolise firefighters for their heroism which makes many aspire for the role as an adult.
These windows of recruitment are where such aspirations can become a reality.
Applicants will go through a period of extensive tests from interviews to physical exams.
It’s a lengthy process that will whittle down over a thousand applicants to a small few recruits.
Daunting no doubt, but FRV and Mr Foster don’t want people to dismiss their childhood dream, but rather inspire people to pursue it wholeheartedly.
A lot has changed in firefighting over the past several decades, but Mr Foster remembers his recruitment to be not much different to today.
“When I joined in the 1980s there were still thousands of people who applied to join and only a very few got selected,” he said.
“I was very fortunate to have gotten through the process the first time I tried.”
He got through, but he came from as humble a beginning as any other.
“I had never been inside a fire station before I applied, then I went to Richmond with a guy I knew and thought this looks alright,” he said.
“I really didn’t know too much about the fire service at all when I joined.
“I had a few mates who were firefighters back in the 80s and they seemed to be enjoying themselves.
“So I thought gee I want some of that.”
After his training, he would be placed at Windsor Station, then and still today one of the busiest stations in Melbourne.
Despite jumping straight into the action, he quickly got some of that joy his mates were talking about.
“When you speak to a firefighter, everyone loves their job,” he said.
“No two days are the same, some days might be a bit quieter but you might be doing training at the station.
“When I was on a different level on trucks, some of the stuff you got; you might help a baby locked in a car and the mum is forever thankful, you might drag someone out of a house on fire.
“There are so many things you can do but each one of them is helping the public.”
The job is as demanding as it is rewarding, lives can be at stake and the FRV need the best of the best.
But the FRV isn’t some elite club, they want more people from all different backgrounds and trying out once isn’t the end.
“Some people get it on their first go, other people take 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 goes because it is quite challenging,” Mr Foster said.
“If you do have a go and miss out, have another go. We are recruiting very regularly now, once or twice a year.”
“I encourage anyone who is thinking of joining up, especially we are looking for people from diverse backgrounds, we want to represent the community.”
Being a firefighter is much more than just getting a cat down from a tree, FRV will many times join paramedics in responding to medical emergencies, search and rescue, even sometimes not even on land itself.
New recruits train for a number of months at FRV’s Craigieburn facility, which equips new firefighters with the range of responses they will face.
Not just in the classroom, but in a variety of practical settings, the facility even has its own street of mock houses for drills.
Moving in the FRV isn’t just vertical, but has horizontal pathways of specializations.
“I wouldn’t say it’s a job, it’s more a career,” Mr Foster said.
“You can choose to be a firefighter at a station and be very happy, you can go for a promotion or you can specialise in areas such as marine response.
“We have boats, urban search and rescue, we have high angle rescue where we rappel off the side of buildings.
“The big ladder trucks, you can specialise to be the operator of one of the trucks.”
There are 85 FRV stations, not just in the city but in regional centres. You can go just about anywhere in Victoria.
Some present their own unique dynamics, such as places like Pakenham on the urban fringe.
There is only one FRV station in Cardinia, with jurisdiction over a sliver of urban sprawl through its centre. In all directions is CFA country and working together between the two is a constant.
“In the middle of Melbourne and the CBD, of course we have trucks every 400 metres,” Mr Foster said.
“The difference here is we rely on the CFA a hell of a lot.
“It just wouldn’t work if we didn’t have volunteers to support us.”
It’s a symbiotic relationship arising out of metropolitan Melbourne’s evolution.
CFA has the history and local knowledge that is crucial for FRV to navigate the burgeoning urban area. While FRV won’t just stay in the suburbs, but join efforts outside of Pakenham and Officer when needed.
It can also arise in wider campaigns like bushfires.
Mr Foster isn’t completely out of action. In extreme situations those in his positions will be take direct command.
For instance, he commanded two strike teams to assist the CFA efforts in Bright during the 2019-20 bushfires. In another situation he was in command in Ararat.
FRV assists in bushfires by being deployed to regional centres to protect critical infrastructure and urban pockets in general, while the local CFA brigades are occupied in the bush.
“In those situations we really value their local knowledge, you know I don’t have the local knowledge of Ararat or Bright,” Mr Foster said.
“And that applies to a lot of areas around here whether we are down the back of Rosebud, Cranbourne, it’s a very strong relationship.”
Another facet of the relationship is the overlap in member, many FRV staff will volunteer in their own CFA brigade off-the-clock.
It can also be a stepping stone for volunteers to take on a full time role.
“There is nothing stopping a volunteer firefighter applying to be a firefighter in FRV, we would encourage it,” Mr Foster said.
“A lot of the staff here did have a career as a volunteer before they joined as a staff member.”
Whatever background you have, Mr Foster thinks you should ‘have a red-hot go at it’.
“The worst we can say is no, but then you give it a go the next time and perseverance is a pretty good trait I like to see,” he said.
If you are unsure or want some good bits of advice going in, he says the best thing you can do is have a chat.
“If they are unsure, knock on the door of their local FRV fire station in Pakenham, Hallam or Dandenong or wherever you like, just knock on the door and ask to speak to a firefighter,” he said.
“They will only be too happy to chat and they are because all of us have been through it doesn’t matter whether you’re my rank or a firefighter who has been out of the academy for two weeks.
“It’s something I would encourage, if you are thinking of joining, just speak to a firefighter to gain a bit better understanding.”
If you are interested in applying visit firefighter.vic.gov.au
