Hertfordshire County Council’s Fire and Rescue Service is looking to strengthen its line up by signing new on-call firefighters.
Half of Hertfordshire’s fire engines are crewed by part-time firefighters, on call to respond to emergencies alongside their normal jobs, but the fire service needs to recruit more local people to train as firefighters to ensure a full crew is on standby near every station at all times.
Chief Fire Officer Darryl Keen said: “On-call firefighters are a vital part of our team, working and training alongside the full time crews to deal with emergencies. On-call firefighters come from all walks of life – we have plumbers, IT consultants, florists and financial advisers to name but a few – all ready to drop everything and pull on their firefighting kit when their community needs them.”
“We hope this campaign will raise the profile of this vital role and get more people to realise that this is something they could do and to think about the rewards of being a firefighter alongside their normal jobs.”
On-call firefighters need to live or work within four minutes of a fire station and be on standby to attend emergency incidents. In return they are given full training and a basic annual retainer as well as payments for call-outs to incidents. They are required to attend the station for training with colleagues for three hours one evening per week for which they will also be paid.
To find more about being an on-call firefighter go to www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/