It’s true. Our guys don’t have anything to do and a 911 call gets the fire truck guys out along with an ambulance. Kinda nuts.
If the people who needed ambulances didn’t weigh 350+, they wouldn’t need 5 guys to move them.
Generally speaking, a fire station has 5 guys — 1 officer, 1 driver/pump operator and 3 firefighter/paramedics. Usual staffing is 2 on ambulance, 3 on engine/truck. When the patient needs advanced life support, the two paramedics work in the back of the ambulance and a third is transferred to the ambulance as a driver.
...but too often these days, they are dealing with people so big that they can’t get up once they have fallen. A friend of mine destroyed his back trying to get a 400 pounder out of a bathtub.