The Big Picture For The Week of March 17, 2013

This past week I took the Medical Unit Leader class at the Arizona Wildfire Academy. The class is a second step (the first being that you become at least an EMT) to running the medical unit on a fire large enough to have a medical unit. On small fires like what we have (fortunately) had here there is no medical unit unless someone gets hurt and then we would just tend to whatever the firefighter needed. Typically on very small fires people wear several different hats.

One path for an EMT or paramedic is to go through the process to work on a fireline, ready to respond to any medical emergencies or non-emergencies that come up. From there someone who is interested could then pursue becoming a medical unit leader which includes the class I took. Many of these types of positions are held by people who have retired from police or fire so they are often young relative to retired people.

If I am reading correctly the pay for a medical unit leader at a Type 1 or Type 2 Incident was $28.16 per hour last year (EMT basic was $25.08). Most days are 16 hour days and a full assignment is 14 days. So a medical unit leader could gross $6307.84 (again if I am reading correctly) per fire and perhaps work on a half a dozen fires in a fire season. For an EMT basic it could work out to $5617.92 per fire.

This is something that these people love doing. It doesn't make sense to do this and not love it. When I talk about alternative streams of income in retirement from monetizing a hobby the context is something you absolutely love. Often something you love is something you devote many years to. I have been involved with our fire department for ten years now and became the chief 14 months ago. My ongoing involvement with the department and then my stepping into my current role comes about because I love doing it. Similar to the stock market it is something where you are always learning and that is appealing to me.

I have said before I don't want to retire from managing money but it is reasonable to think that the 60 year old version of you will view things differently than the 35 or 40 year old version of you. Fire has evolved into a potential back up for something unforeseen but I am already ten years into it and have not tried (or needed, thankfully) to try to make money from it. This is exactly what I have in mind when I write posts along these lines in terms of needing to put time in, not expect any shortcuts and truly loving the task of your hobby (mine being firefighting).

The above is very hard work. Anyone doing a job at the fireline (like a line medic) even if not actually digging a fireline or working with a chainsaw has to be red carded which means being able to hike three miles with a 45 lb pack in 45 minutes. There is hiking in very steep terrain (one fire a couple of years ago took us over two hours to find so we were hiking up and down hills for two hours before starting to fight the fire). Not all assignments will last two weeks. There is a performance element to being asked back to future incidents and it helps a lot if you are likable.

The instructors for our class were a group that works together on Type 2 incidents including a retired doctor who is 75 or 80 years old. He worked as an ER doc, retired and then got interested in  these types of wildfires. His role is at the fire camp not out on the line. He said that the work keeps him younger, requires him to think (although the vast majority of medical issues are very simple for an MD), allows him to keep learning and allows him to interact with younger people. He appears to be fit and trim, does not tire easily (based on his involvement in teaching our class) and doesn't mind sleeping in a tent for two weeks at a time. While I am not sure if he takes pay or where he slots in on the pay chart if he does take pay, obviously any retired person would benefit on multiple levels from $5000 or $6000 for two weeks of long days in a fire camp while sleeping under the stars in Idaho in the summer.

I've written before about people who carve out these unique solutions in the hope of motivating other people to find the solution right for them.

The picture; we had three of our firefighters take the chainsaw class at this years academy.