Fire Fighter Profiles

FIRE FIGHTERS

FIRE NEWS

Aniak fire chief Pete Brown trains the girls how to fight fires.

Team members have rescued survivors of plane crashes and snowmobile accidents. They have revived grandmothers in cardiac arrest. Just this past December, they began a search to find the body of a fifteen-year-old boy. He fell through the ice and drowned. They are still looking for him.

Creating the Team

The idea of recruiting teenagers was the brainchild of Aniak fire chief Pete Brown. He is a retired Vietnam medic. According to Brown, everyone knew there was a tremendous need for an expanded Emergency Medical Services (EMS) team.

The eight adults in the department couldn’t handle all of the work. Brown started recruiting high school kids. Most of them were girls.

Team members have to make 90 percent of the meetings. The meetings are ongoing training. They take place twice a week for two hours. Tobacco, alcohol, and drugs are prohibited. And although these high school heroines are on call 24/7, they have to maintain passing grades.

Brown is proud of the girls. He says their level of training and competency is on par with adults. He goes out on every call with the Dragon Slayers. He is selective about what each girl actually does on each call based on experience and age. Still, it’s obviously a job with risks.

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