Some Recently Reported Events Have Been Expanded
* * *
TWO OF THE VICTIMS THAT WERE critically injured in Monday night's sawmill explosion in British Columbia have died. (See Tuesday's Firegeezer REPORT HERE.) One was a 43-yr.-old mill supervisor and more recently a 24-yr.-old man died last night.
The initial investigation is looking into a possible sawdust explosion as the cause. Although these are very rare, this was the 2nd one in British Columbia in the past three months. The Globe & Mail has more DETAILS.
* * *
CHARGES AGAINST THE "HOME ALONE" MOTHER WHOSE FOUR CHILDREN perished in their burning mobile home Sunday morning (Firegeezer REPORT HERE) have been increased from negligent homicide to 2nd-degree murder. The Advertiser reported:
Shaqueta McDade, the Rayne woman who left four of her children unattended when they died late Saturday in a mobile home fire, has been charged with second-degree murder and is now being held in prison on $1 million bond.
According to Rayne police, Judge Jim Cunningham set McDade's bond at $250,000 for each count of second-degree murder she faces.
* * *
JUST A LITTLE MORE THAN 2 MONTHS after the famed Heart Attack Grill in Las Vegas had its first on-scene H/A, another patron dropped on them this past Saturday. The patient, described only as "a woman" was transported by LVFD paramedics and her condition has not been make public.
The Las Vegas Sun reports:
Owner Jon Basso said Monday that he wishes the customer a swift and full recovery. But, he added, the woman got exactly what she asked for: a brush with death.
"We attract an avant-garde clientele — thrill seekers, risk takers," he told the Los Angeles Times, adding that his restaurant is a "bad for you but fun" restaurant that "attracts people who don't really take good care of their health."
"She was eating, drinking, smoking, laughing, dancing, having fun," Basso said of the restaurant-goer, who fell unconscious Saturday night. "But when you treat your body like that day in and day out, eventually your body is going to give out."
The Heart Attack Grill is a hospital-themed restaurant that belly laughs at doctors' orders to steer clear of excessively caloric and fatty meals.
Waitresses wear skin-tight nurse's uniforms, and Basso dresses as the cardiologist on staff, complete with doctor's coat and stethoscope. Diners are called patients. And on the menu: "Flatliner" fries cooked in lard, shakes made with pure cream, and four flavors of "bypass" burgers, as in single, double, triple or quadruple bypass.
For a fuller description of the controversial diner, see the Firegeezer photo and video report HERE.
It has recently been announced that Guinness Book of Records got in touch with "Doc" Basso and told him that his quadruple-bypass burger would be entered in the next edition as the World's Most Caloric Sandwich, checking in at an impressive 10,000 calories.
* * * * * * *
Fewer Fires = Fewer Firefighters, Right? Wrong!
No commentsFresh Excuses Leave The Same Results – A Commentary
This past week brought reports from Washington State and Missouri of the ongoing destruction of the American fire service. In Missouri we see that because there are fewer fires they need fewer firefighters. Maybe their mayor should let NIST know.
This formulation of public policy is rampant across the country these days. We had X fires and Y firefighters in 1975 and now we have 0.75X fires so we only need 0.75Y firefighters. Certainly this is faulty thinking and bad policy. It's dangerous and counterproductive and simply not the way things work in the actual world. But all arguments to the contrary can be squelched in so many minds by invoking the mantra of efficiency.
South Missourian News
Efficiency is a noble value insofar as it counters the unfortunate tendency to waste the plenitude of our world. But it has been fetishized by a culture that values success in business (read: gotta get paid) above nearly all other values. The American public, we are told, wants a government that "runs like a business." Never mind that government cannot run like a business. Its products are non-exclusionary and its methods, if they are to serve all members of the public equally (read: democratically), cannot be made profitable. Along the way to running government like a business a lot of public administrators became obsessed with the notion of efficiency. It's a fantastic banner to hang out in front of the taxpayers.
City managers and politicians love this "run it like a business" dictum even if they don't themselves believe it and even though its nonsensical. This is where this prevalent notion that fewer fires necessitate fewer firefighters comes in. I suspect that the fire service is the most democratic of all local-government services. Its members hold an unparalleled commitment to service and it is quickly and readily accessible 24 hours a day by the lowliest of society and the richest in equal measure. Not so when most cuts are made.
If a city closes a station that makes two runs a week that may be a reasonable move. Dropping a company to the dangerous three-person minimum can never be a reasonable decision. And cutting stations and staff because you have "fewer" fires is irrelevant when you do have fires, which are inevitable. It is important that the fire service recognize that a lot of these decisions to cut resources can be contextualized in a larger, more powerful, line of poor reasoning and bad thinking. Only then can we really understand what is happening to the fire service beyond the immediate concerns of this year's budget and that city's staffing.
………. Patrick S. Mahoney
* * * * * * *