The Nisqually earthquake of February 28, 2001, was a remarkable day in Lacey, Washington especially for local fire fighters. At the time, Lacey Fire District had more staffing than we do today but ran only about 4000 a year and a busy day was a 12 to 16 calls a day; all of which are more than half of today’s call volume. We had a good relationship with the city, and for the most part we never really thought about the particulars of the city, the contract, the city manager, or any of that stuff that seems to overshadow most of our past today. In many ways, that historical day is really overshadowed by one more day’s events that would occur in mid-September of that year.
Recently, a local publication reported that fire fighters abandoned their posts on that crisp February morning and so did many police officers. I am here to say having worked that day as a fire fighter and remembering it vividly, that none of that crap happened and I am left wondering if the intent was really to discredit us as cops, fire fighters, or emergency workers, or just to add interesting material to the publication. Who cares, bottom line: It never happened.
When you put on a uniform at the start of shift and look in the mirror to make sure your badge and brass are straight and to confirm mentally that you’re ready for “the morning hitch”, there exists a quiet thought that this could be it. I know down deep that I could put my ass on the line or order the same from a fire-fighting brother and that I or we will go into a building and never see the light of day. I have not met a cop who wouldn’t do the same thing. So when I hear that we “bugged” out on February 28, just after the earthquake to check on ‘personal interests or family’, is wrong and ultimately says more about the accuser than the fire fighter.
When the Nisqually earthquake hit, our first order after we took cover and waited for the shaking to stop was to roll the apparatus out of our then aging masonry structures in case the aftershocks caused them to fail. As some areas had lost power, it took a few moments to get this done by manually opening doors at some stations. By the time the apparatus had been rolled out, the first off duty responders started coming in. Unlike many areas, many Lacey Fire District #3 employees live in their city of employment. Within 45 minutes, every single apparatus the department owned was staffed or being moved into position to offset response in areas of heavy call volume. This all went down as the City of Olympia had significant areas of road failures, elevator collapse downtown, and people stuck in elevators throughout the Capitol Campus. Lacey also had multiple gas leaks, a trailer fire in the Nisqually Valley and well over 100 calls by 3pm that day including treating sick and injured children from the local schools.
Off duty Lacey Fire District fire fighters, both volunteer and paid, came in as far away as Lewis and Pierce County to respond to calls. NO ONE abandoned their posts that day and to do so would have meant immediate termination with the union demanding it and definitely not defending it.
Just because you read something in the mailbox or on the Internet, just remember it doesn’t mean that you no longer need to use a little common sense when evaluating its accuracy or content.