October 4-10, 2020 is Fire Prevention Week, which commemorates the Great Chicago Fire. That fire occurred Oct. 8, 1871, killing 250 people, leaving 100,000 people homeless, destroying 17,400 structures, and burning 2,000 acres. This year’s theme is “Serve up Fire Safety in the Kitchen.” Cooking, unattended or not is the No.1 cause of residential fires in America. When I left the job in 2010, 3.7 out of every 10 fires in Chesterfield County were caused by cooking. Interestingly, we talk about this issue more, but the statistic remains high. When you put all of the right ingredients for a fire…

My wife and I went to a movie last night, at Regal Cinemas-Virginia Center Commons. I give all of the details because it was the only theater in our area that was showing “My Brother’s Crossing.” Some may say, Don’t you know that there is a pandemic, and you choose to go to a movie? Sadly, we walked into a movie theater that was practically empty. We had a front row parking space and no line to wait in. We had Auditorium 2 all to ourselves. You heard me, not another soul in the theater where we watched this movie.…

I have had two rare privileges in my life, compliments of a friend from the Coast Guard, to ride with the New York City Fire Department. The first ride was my friend Mickey and me riding on Engine 75. Mickey’s dream in 1981, and even before, was to be a New York City firefighter. I think it was in 1985 that Mickey’s dream came true and he was hired. Another part of Mickey’s dream was to be a firefighter on Rescue 3 in the Bronx. Fast forward to 1998 or 1999. I had the opportunity to take two others on…

My wife and I were out and about the other day, and she wanted to go to Marshall’s. As we were sitting at the light, on Meadowdale, I noticed flowers and what not, on the other side of the intersection, indicating that someone had probably lost their life. I said to Becky, “I wonder what happened there?” Becky had actually seen this on the news, and knew the details. Let me start by saying: I did not know the people involved in this horrific crash, but I took time to pray over everyone involved. As I heard the story of…

As some may still be dealing with the flooding that occurred over the weekend of Aug. 15, I would ask, did we learn anything? Anytime that 5 to 10 inches of rain falls in a relatively short period of time, there will be flash and/or long-term flooding. It is not often that we experience this heavy amount of rain, but it has happened, meaning that we must always be prepared for it. Prior to this weekend, the last big rain event was during Tropical Storm Gastone, which stalled over Central Virginia. We saw some of the same effects on that…

You may say, “Pete, you are a day late and a dollar short,” but I thought that I would write about tropical systems that occasionally visit us in Central Virginia. The rains of Hurricane Isaias are falling, as I write this. While serving as a firefighter, I always wanted to be on duty when a weather event was occurring. I cannot remember all of the named storms that I worked through, but the most memorable were Fran and Isabel. Both of these were 30-call days, running every type of call that you can imagine. As I watched the path of…

As I was thinking about reminding my readers about the dangers of leaving a child or pet in a hot car, I read about an 8-month old died in a hot car. People in Chesapeake do not read my articles, so I can only impact the ones who do. My heart breaks over a death of this nature. It was completely and unequivocally preventable. There is no excuse for leaving a child or pet in a non-running vehicle ever. Temperatures have been soaring, making the temperature in a non-running vehicle high enough to kill a person or a pet. There…

Life since March has been much more different from any one of us could have ever expected. As you may or may not remember, I was in Africa, from March 2-14. Within a week of getting back home, national borders began to shut down all around the globe. For countries with substandard healthcare, the best solution was a complete lockdown of the entire country. Limiting the movement of people was the best way to slow the spread of COVID-19. Four months later, we don’t know who or what to trust. Is COVID as bad as some say, or is this…

Itried to write this article last week, but it was not flowing well. This article is not going to solve the issues that are tearing away at the fabric of our nation, but I did want to weigh in. We have watched as monuments are torn down, schools and other public buildings are renamed, and the history of our nation appears to be going through a paper shredder. Instead of wholesome and meaningful debate, the issues have been politicized and polarized. Many of our major cities, led by liberal mayors, have become places of mayhem and lawlessness, Though this has…

You have probably heard someone say, “you are adding fuel to the fire.” This is a metaphor for when the words that we say or write ramp up an already heated conversation. This is not the fuel that I will be writing about in this article, but the literal gasoline that many add to a fire though they should not. Gasoline is a flammable liquid with a low flash point and a low ignition temperature. In other words, it takes very little heat to get gasoline to burn. There are many people, including off-duty firefighters, who have been burned badly…