Free Republic

CLINTON, N.C. (WNCN) — A fire station in North Carolina was left nearly unable to operate after a group of four people broke in and hauled off with crucial equipment. According to the Sampson County Sheriff’s Office, one of those four suspects has been identified and charged since the May 14 break-in and theft took place in Clinton. Deputies responded to the Piney Grove Fire Department where they discovered a “substantial loss in equipment.” The sheriff’s office said the gear taken from the station is valued at more than $100,000. After the theft, the department had to place one engine...

OLYMPIA, Wash. (KOMO) — A man was arrested after police said he threw "softball size rocks" at firefighters who were responding to an active fire in Washington state. "In the last few weeks there have been several incidents of individuals interfering with Olympia Fire Department personnel responding to emergencies," the Olympia Police Department (OFD) wrote on X Thursday. The suspect was booked for third-degree assault, police said. Charges have also been referred for suspects in other recent incidents, police added. In their initial and brief social media news release, police did not mention the alleged assault happened at a giant...

Recent reports reveal that the celebrated “all-electric” or “zero emissions” fire trucks, being lauded from San Diego to Portland to Albuquerque, are not as environmentally friendly as advertised. Each of these new fire trucks, purchased with the assistance of federal funding, is equipped with a diesel engine to ensure functionality when the electric battery is depleted. This revelation highlights a significant discrepancy between the marketed image of these trucks and their actual operational design. The report indicates that each of these supposedly zero-emission trucks includes a diesel engine to guarantee that it can still pump water or drive if the...

Los Angeles Fire Department has 115 employees who live outside the state of California, including one who lives in Alaska and five more who live on the East Coast. With a few firefighters making more than $500,000 a year and a median home listing of $1 million in the city, whether Los Angeles should have a residency requirement is being discussed internally, according to a report and ongoing city council discussions. About 15% of the firefighters live within the city limits, a figure that prompted fire officials to consider requiring firefighters to live closer to the area they protect in...

Fire Chief Brad Liggett, 55, died suddenly on Saturday, the city of Freeport announced Sunday afternoon. Liggett served the Freeport Fire Department since July 2019. He worked previously for the city of Beloit Fire Department for 30 years and served as Beloit's fire chief for 16 years.

We can either be known as the ones who helped lead the charge to freedom, or we can set the vaccine mandate precedent for other agencies and watch our freedoms end,'’ stated Roll Call 4 Freedom, an organization comprising hundreds of police officers and civilian employees.. Firefighters and police officers in Los Angeles have positioned themselves on the front lines in the battle against coercive COVID-19 vaccine mandates, joining together to demand freedom from forced inoculation in a “monumental fight to preserve our Liberties.” Founded by stakeholders with the Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD), “Firefighters for Freedom” has partnered with...

DUDLEY, N.C. (WNCN) – Neighbors in Wayne County are still shaken but hoping for answers after an explosives bust earlier in the week. “At one time years ago, we would deal with people finding dynamite in old pack houses, but what we found Sunday I’ve had very few experiences like that,” said Maj. Richard Lewis of the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office. “They had enough explosives over there to blow Dudley off the map,” said Linda Jones. After raiding a Dudley trailer, deputies arrested Corey Bernard Manuel and Monica Lynn Hunt on felony charges of manufacturing and possessing a weapon of...

The House Judiciary Committee unanimously passed a bill which would permanently reauthorize the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund Wednesday, the day after comedian Jon Stewart gave impassioned testimony in support of the bill in video that quickly went viral. The bill will now go to the floor for a full vote in the House of Representatives, where it is likely to pass. It's unclear whether Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will take up the bill in the Senate, although Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Wednesday that he was "imploring, pleading, even begging" McConnell to bring the bill...

Workers in Johnson County could have hundreds of additional dollars taken out of their paychecks annually to help pay for roadwork in the county and an expansion of the county jail — work expected to cost more than $130 million in the next five years. The Johnson County Council unveiled an income tax increase proposal to fund $110 million in road, bridges and infrastructure improvements across the county, mainly due to the construction of Interstate 69, and an estimated $20 million jail expansion project that would address a frequently overcrowded jail that the state has ordered the county to fix....

When emergency apparatus roll out of fire houses across the state, lights flashing and sirens blaring, odds are the first responders on board aren't on their way to battle a blaze. Instead, more often than not they are called to medical emergencies, a trend fire officials say is mirrored across the country. "There was a time when fighting fires was all we did," said Goffstown Fire Chief Richard O'Brien, President of the New Hampshire Association of Fire Chiefs. "Now we are more along the lines of all-hazard response systems." "It seems more people are calling 911 for medical needs," said...

A Berkeley, California man died last December after paramedics were delayed nearly an hour because of an unruly protest against police brutality, recently released records show. Berkleyside, a self-described “independent news site” serving the Berkeley area, reports that the 62-year-old Alvin Henry Jones Jr. would have normally received treatment in minutes. However, due to a nearby #BlackLivesMatters protest, paramedics were instead ordered to go to a local fire station and await a police escort before attempting to rescue Jones. It took 52 minutes to get Jones to a hospital, after which he died two days later. Paperwork filed by the...

Detroit's Under-Funded Fire Departments Use a Soda Can For a Fire Alarm Where absent money leaves gaps, ingenuity fills in. Nowhere is that more true than in Detroit's fire departments, where, as Detroit Free Press reporter Tresa Baldas shows us, a soda can full of jangling coins and screws alerts the Motor City's long-suffering heroes when there's an emergency. The system is brilliantly simple: A soda can full of rattling metal is balanced on top of the fire department's printer at the end of the tray. When the printer spits out an emergency alert, the paper knocks over the can....

Volunteer fire departments all across the U.S. could find themselves out of money and unable to operate unless Congress or the Obama Administration exempts them from the Affordable Care Act. 'I thought the kinks were worked out of Obamacare at the first of the month, Central Florida volunteer firefighter Carl Fabrizi told Sunshine State News. 'Man, oh, man, this could potentially destroy some real good companies in Florida.' The U.S. Department of Labor takes the term 'volunteer' literally, but the IRS says volunteer firefighters are technically employees if they're on the job more than 30 hours per week, making them...

Texas woman sets snake on fire, snake sets her house on fire The woman was frightened by a snake outside her house, so she doused it with gas and had her son set it on fire. That plan didn’t work out so well. A Texas woman burned her own house down during a heated battle with a snake. The serpent frightened the lady while cleaning outside her home Wednesday night. She doused the limbless reptile in gasoline and called over her son to set it ablaze. The plan backfired. Her son tossed a lit match at the creeping reptile but...

NEW YORK -- Police and the fire department are investigating a suspicious vehicle parked with gas canisters inside it near Union Square in Manhattan late Thursday, MyFOXNY.com reported.

Fightin Words debuts on US Web Talk Radio, featuring a candid interview with Minneapolis firefighter and paramedic John Ackerman regarding the city’s incestuous dependence on “local government aid” which continually threatens the funding of essential services and the safety of the tax payer. We examine how local government aid works, how it affects the budget process, the history of the 911 system, and how it all combines to model society’s incremental trend away from individual sovereignty toward utter dependence on the state. Also, audio from the Can You Hear Us Now rally at the local NBC outlet in the Twin...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 17, 2008 – Serving in the Marine Corps Reserve while working for the Jersey City Fire Department, Leonard DiStaso said, he always felt the department supported him in his military service. However, after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, military service took on a whole new meaning, and the Jersey City, N.J.,fire department stepped up its efforts to support its employees who serve in the reserve-component military, he said. “9/11 affected our department and city deeply, being we are simply a five-minute drive to the World Trade Center site, and the department responded on that morning,” DiStaso,...

“Whaddaya gotta do to get fired in this town?” It’s a great question, asked by a co-worker of mine (emphasis on “worker”) shaking his head over the latest Department of Public Works story in the Herald. This time it was five city workers hanging out at the Northern Avenue Bridge, watching satellite TV and throwing steaks on the hibachi. After opening the swing bridge once a day, they’ve got nothing to do, all day to do it and the taxpayer’s dime to do it on. My buddy, like every taxpayer reading that Herald story, knows that despite the obvious waste...

Wednesday, March 26, 2008 AP March 26: A firefighter inspects the scene where explosions blew the manhole covers off an underground electrical vault in Los Angeles. March 26: A firefighter inspects the scene where explosions blew the manhole covers off an underground electrical vault in Los Angeles. LOS ANGELES — A hospital spokeswoman says a Los Angeles firefighter has died of injuries from a series of explosions that blew the manhole covers off the top of an underground vault. Deborah Ettinger says the firefighter was pronounced dead after being taken to Centinela Freeman Regional Medical Center Wednesday afternoon. Another firefighter...

November 5, 2007 -- "New York City's ports are becoming easier targets for terrorist attacks now that the FDNY has blocked anti-terror training to an elite firefighter unit that patrols the city's 560 miles of waterfront, officers for the division say. Ronald Podolsky, a lawyer for the FDNY Marine Division's officers, told The Post that the department is "preventing" division members from receiving the supposedly mandatory training - even though their vessels contain equipment to detect biological, chemical, nuclear and radiological attacks."