Smoke
About lunch time I noticed this pall of smoke coming from the vicinity of the farm behind our home, incidentally I would make an appalling photographic journalist, the fire was almost out by the time it entered my mind to take a picture!
Said pall of smoke presented me with a problem. I hate wasting the time of the emergency services and am well aware of the number of inappropriate calls they receive each year, I was married to a fireman for years and the tales of peoples idiocy still ring in my ears. This is also a farming community and I don't know what farmers burn in the day to day 'administration' of things farming.
My dilemma......to call a 999 or not. I hurriedly tried binoculars, rushed on foot a bit closer and still could not decide where the seat of the fire was or if anyone was attending or controlling it. My decision made on the basis that should I have taken it too lightly and someone got hurt it would be dreadful I called it in. Oh what embarrassment. My second hand fire service training had deserted me, I forgot that this would be a job requiring a predetermined turn out of some magnitude and suddenly this quiet little village had not one but three tenders and an emergency rescue vehicle rushing through it on blues and two's!
Suffice to say three left and only one remained to put out the offending inferno. I was somewhat reassured by the fact that it at least required some attention but have a nasty feeling that this may well have been just a farmer going about his business, albeit on a reasonably large scale. I have visions of some poor soul going about his day quietly until some 'silly city incomer' who didn't understand called the fire brigade and caused mayhem!
I don't think I will be broadcasting locally who called 999!
11 Comments:
Lol BR, that pic was only up for a few seconds without text....you took the words out of my mouth! :o)
Roflmfao! I just KNEW you'd own a pair of binoculars...LOL....i bet you have a telescope too!! Nose*...LOL
Hehe.....pffttt......no telescope! Nose* :o) Love it, so funny.
Remind me to never have my house catch on fire with you to watch over it! :) The photography is great, by the way. I'm like you... get over the shock and THEN snap a picture. LOL!
ugh... I keep forgetting to post my name. It is not anonymous. It is Lisa.
That's a sky that terrifies me. I lost my house in the Malibu brush fire in 1994. I'll never forget it. Anyway, here in So. Ca. fire or even smoke, sends terror into the seasoned So. California resident.
But, I say better safe than risk someone being hurt!
"Blues and twos?"
I worked in a much smaller market when I started out in news (Bakersfield, CA). We always covered fires no matter what size. I've gotten great shots of flames and bystanders. Come on, who doesn't like a good burning building?
I think you did the right thing, you can't be too careful with fire, even it's has been started for a legitimate reason it's so easy to get out of hand.
Paul
WTG, Scottie! Good on ya, girl! You did the right thing. And I like your pic. It allows the viewer to imagine the actual fire. Fantastic! Oh speaking of fires in the news, (BeFrank) Toronto is just around the lake from Buffalo, NY. Buffalo is famous for three things: spicy chicken wings, (sorry, Magz) horrendous snow storms with obscene amounts of snow, and my favourite - Fires. I remember watching the Buffalo evening news and hearing of a "Four-alarm blaze in ..." nearly every night. We joke about it here in Toronto. Once in a blue moon, they have no major conflagration to report and so feature a guest fire. "In our top story tonight, a three-alarm blaze in Fort Erie, Canada ..."
I think you did the right thing! Was he burning trash or something?
'Blues and twos' = blue lights and two tone sirens :o)
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