They say firefighting can run in the family, and that’s certainly true for Erin and Fionn Brown. Both sisters began their career as on-call firefighters with Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, alongside their work in their local community store.
And they now want to raise more awareness of the pressures firefighters face, so local communities better understand the work they and their colleagues do. However, they say to perform at their best, they know keeping well is essential. And that’s where we come in.
“Raising awareness of the support the Charity offers is absolutely essential – they’re supporting us, while we support communities,” says Erin.
Fionn was first inspired to become a firefighter following a tragic accident involving her partner at the time.
“Working in the emergency services was never something that had crossed my mind, but when I was 17 my ex-boyfriend at that time was in a car accident. He was left paralysed from the collarbone down,” she says.
“It was the on-call fire station near us that got turned out to him – the same one myself and Erin went on to work for – and because of how quick they responded, he’s still alive and still him mentally which is fantastic.”
Fionn and Erin did a lot of fundraising following the accident, some of which was in aid of us at their local fire station, and it was those events that inspired Fionn – and later Erin – to join the fire service themselves.
While Fionn went wholetime with Tyne & Wear FRS soon into her career, Erin went wholetime in Scotland a year in – and continued working on-call at the same station she started in.
“The store we worked at was really supportive of my work as an on-call firefighter when I worked there,” says Erin. “While I didn’t often have to respond to calls while I was working, they knew all about the work I did there and supported it. They’d always be accommodating of things like my Monday night drill night.
“When I was working there, seeing firefighters in store – even if they’re just there shopping – always got a lot of recognition. Customers wanted to find out more, so seeing a presence there more would always be beneficial.
“If you see firefighters in your community, and reps for the charity, it strengthens that connection between the community and their local firefighters.
“We actually had a death in store very sadly. A customer had a heart attack and passed away in the shop at the tills and a lot of the staff went to the local fire station where they were offered CPR training after that.
“Our local fire station is really accommodating, knowing it would help a lot of people who, at the time, had felt quite helpless – not that it would have made a difference in the circumstances.”
She adds: “It’s so important to have that community connection to your fire station, for moments like this, they’re such a huge support.”
Both sisters hope by sharing their story, they’ll help to raise further awareness in their communities and others like it of the work on-call firefighters do.
“It’d be a really good thing to raise awareness of the work and pressure on-call firefighters do and face every day within communities – it’s about getting it back into the community more,” says Erin.
“A lot of people don’t understand that a fire station isn’t always full of wholetime staff – a lot of them, particularly in Scotland, are run by on-call staff, so to have that community support – particularly from employers – is so important. It is a second job at the end of the day.”
And Fionn adds: “The Charity understands us, it knows what we go through day to day, and the support we have is therefore tailored to us so well.”