January Incidents 2016

This new month and, correspondingly, new year begins on an extremely positive note as the Department is proud to welcome over a dozen new potential dispatchers into the JFRD family. Congratulations and a hearfelt 'welcome' to the true frontline of public safety! 

A most unusual 'incident' was encountered by the JFRD just before the noon hour on Wednesday, 20 January, as a 9-1-1 call came into the Communications Center from a train assigned to the Ringling Brothers Circus, incidentally in town for a performance. The caller intimated that the train was 'broke down' on the tracks near McDuff and Beaver, with a desperate need for water for the circus 'animals.' Naturally and without hesitation, Engine 10-A was dispatched to the location to deliver the life-essential elixir, only for the arriving crew to discover that things were not quite what they seemed to be, with the specific details of the incident quite different upon further review. For one thing, the train had not broken down at all but rather made a routine stop on that stretch of track, a location the circus always utilizes whenever the show comes to town. Most important of all, no animals were in any cars or compartments along the lengthy train, all of the aforementioned having been already taken to the arena the previous day. Instead, merely one solitary car needed to be 'topped off' with potable water, that specific car assigned to circus performers in need of water in order to...now get this...cook their beloved rice for lunch! In any event, the brief hysteria affixed to this call-out, complete with massive media interest (circus animals in danger), did bring about a unique twist to the standard, daily incident call-outs performed by the JFRD around the clock.