By STEVEN RAY HERNANDEZ 
Editor
Editor@sbnewspaper.com
For most of Mother’s Day morning, 56-year old Jorge Gonzalez of San Benito spent time hanging out on his porch with his mother Reyes Gonzalez and his three brothers, who were visiting from out of town that day. It was a day that started off with smiles and laughs. However, it was how they would eventually spend their afternoon that will most likely haunt the family for years to come.
Sometime around 2 p.m. on Sunday, the Gonzalez family noticed a white cloud of smoke coming from a back shed area. Unfortunately, by the time the family figured out their water hose was not long enough to reach the fire, it had already engulfed the entire back area, and it was spreading quickly.
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I am one and those are my personal experiances as a fireman
Ya right! Thats when you fell off your bunk at the fire station and woke up.
Go home bat….you’re drunk. I can’t even translate what you just wrote…but I’ll try.
I’m not a firefighter with San Benito but I will tell you I have experience as a fire fighter. Sit around waiting for a fire? Let me tell you something…have you ever pulled someone’s child from a mangled car in the middle of the night praying they have a pulse…hoping you can it just looks worse than it is? No cause you were at home asleep in your warm bed. Have you ever responded to an EMS call cause someone’s grandfather is not breathing and look to you to bring him back while they cry with tears running down their face? No, cause you were at home with your family or significant other. You ever have a complete stranger die in your arms….watch them take thier last breath and then have to explain to the family later that you did everything you could do??? I hope not…Being a firefighter is not about waiting around waiting for a call and wondering what you’re going to eat. They miss birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, and family gatherings to be there when help is needed. Educate yourself bat.
Yes the fire was extinguished and yes there were fire trucks there. But people lost everything and then they look at these men and point the finger. These fire fighters are not at fault. It’s thier leaders…minimum staffing in San Benito is dangerously low! These fire fighters in San Benito are leaving to go elsewhere because they are not being listened to. 20+ firefighters have left in the passed couple years because they are told they are replcable and nobody cares what they think or want. Told they will be fired if they talk or expose what is really going on behind the walls of the city and dept. It will all be exposed when someone unfortunately gets hurt or killed due to blatant disregard for safety
I can traslate your first paragrah . “It was a flick in your mind it never happened”.
Seond paragrah, yes your not a fireman so stop your whinying and at list be a MAN!
to add to my previous comment….I mentioned 7 firefighters on duty per day. Here’s a break down of those 7 firefighters.
2 – drivers (1-for each station)
2 officers (captain at station 1 and leutenant at station 2)
3 firefighters ( 1 at station #2 and 2 at station #1)
– Drivers do not enter fire. They are assigned to thier trucks and must stay with truck while at scene.
– Captain and leutenant are in charge of scene and normally captain is not front line.
– that leaves 3 fire fighters at the scene until help arrives.
This is what the family saw and this is why they are upset.
Refer to NFPA 1720 for minimum staffing to respond to a structural fire.
Firefighter get more pay for just doing nothing and waitng for a fire that will occur thats alot of time. But yea go get tacos and they are up and there before the tacos are ready. Imagine if the fire was a building instead of a small house? $600,000.00 fire engine? Good enough to go get tacos in but not good enough to fight a fire? Instead of scambeling to call someone ? Man what a time to get on the phone instead of anwering a fire. Talk about texting and always on face book? Get gear man like a fire fighter has never trained to do that ? Excuses excuses. Hey what are we going to eat for Lunch? Or do you mean who’s lunch? Will look at the postive side the fire was distinguished and i use to have fun playing a fire fighter when I was growing up.
Another fail and cover up by city and fire department heads. This issue of lack of personnel and response times has been brought years ago by firefighters and union. This family has a right to speak up. They lost their home and not enough man power showed up to help them. I don’t blame the firefighters….I blame their leaders. There is a minimum # of firefighters that should be fighting a fire of that size. San Benito fire has lost many senior fire fighters. The leaders of this city will just sweep all this under the rug and ignore it until it goes away. It’s going to take someone to lose their life before a change is made.
At most your city has 7 firefighters on duty per day. There is no such thing as firefighters “on call” or “standby” they basically scramble to and start calling phones hoping someone will answer when it all hits the fan. When someone is contacted that fire fighter still needs to come to the station, grab his gear and head out to the scene. total time to get help in….20 min at the least. Help from another city? That is not automatic either….yes we have a mutual aid deal with surrounding cities but that doesn’t mean they are on standby either. Surrounding cities need to be contacted once it is determined they are needed. If a truck is readily available then they send the help needed. It’s a process that does not happen at the drop of a hat.
Educate yourself and hold these people accountable. This family is on the right track.