Day 11 – A Tour round the city

In the morning we had a call for an automatic alarm at the Allen Parkway Office Building. A toast got stuck in a toaster and started burning. We ventilated the 26th floor with a fan and reset the alarm.

Later that day Captain Ponce picked me up at the station and gave me a tour round Houston with all the things a German firefighter can be interested in.
We started our tour with a reported house fire that Captain Ponce had received on his pager. He had to go there, because he is the Public Information Officer for the Hispanic community in Houston and the fire was in a Hispanic neighborhood. The AC in the attic had a short and set the entire roof on fire. The Captain had to give some interviews and took care of the family that lived in the house.

After that we continued our tour to the fire museum. The fire museum is located at old Station 7 and they show some old engines and other exhibits that relate to the Houston Fire Department, for example a part of the World Trade Center, because after 9/11 the HFD sent a rescue team to search for victims in the collapsed towers. At the fire museum I had the privilege to sign on the bay door, which is an honor for all fire fighters who are guests of the HFD. At the museum I also took the chance to take a picture with Captain Ponce who made it possible for me to come to Houston. In the gift shop of the museum I met Kevin Greene who designed nearly all logos of the different stations. I met him before at Station 6 and this nice guy invited me to pick two shirts and a bag of HFD for free.

Of course I had to have a picture of my generous patron.

On our way to the 911 Emergency Center Captain Ponce and I stopped at the Minute Maid Baseball Park to watch an inning of baseball. Due to the fact that both of us find baseball rather boring, he took me to a visitor platform at the 60th floor of an office building in Downtown Houston. The weather was clear and we had a nice view over the entire City of Houston.

The 911 Emergency Center is located outside of Houston and it’s a well secured object. The “floor” where all the dispatchers of Fire, EMS and Police are sitting is at least seven times bigger than the Kreisleitstelle Recklinghausen. The whole building is very impressive and I was given a nice tour around the Emergency Center.In the afternoon I returned to Station 6 and we made a few first responding runs and an apartment fire that turned out to be a BBQ in the backyard.