One of Cork’s chief firefighters warns as to leading causes of call-outs over Christmas holidays

By Peter McCarthy, Corkman

Don't drink and drive, put your phone away when you’re driving, don’t leave candles unattended, test your smoke alarms, and keep the festive tree well hydrated – that’s the advice from one of Cork’s chief fire fighters, who will be on call over the holiday period, this Christmas.

Chris Gledhill of Carrigaline Fire Station in County Cork also recommends closing all the internal doors when you leave the house. “Closing the doors stops the smoke from spreading, slows down the fire and gives us a chance to do a better job and to finish the fire much faster,” he told the Irish Independent.

And the most important message of all is that if a fire breaks out in your home you should “get out and stay out. Call us. Don't run in for your favourite toy, don't run in for your Christmas present, you've just got to get out and stay out. Don't worry about getting a pet, don't worry about closing doors, just get out as fast as you can.”

Firefighters in Carrigaline and all around the country will be on call over the holidays, ready at the buzz of a pager to head out to fight a fire or assist at the scene of a road traffic accident. Over Christmas it’s harder to do the duty roster for the 10-member crew at the Carrigaline fire station, Chris said.

“Some of the lads might have family, some might not have any family or they're all grown up. So we try and get the lads off who have kids during Christmas Day. But that's not for everyone. It's just unfortunate, we can't have everyone off call. So we have a crew of five on call throughout the day, the whole day, the whole night. It’s the same on New Year's Eve.”

Those on call on Christmas Day hope they won’t get called out but unfortunately fires and road accidents don’t respect the holidays. Two years ago the Carrigaline crew got called out at 5pm on Christmas Day, when some of them were in the middle of dinner, and didn’t get back home until 11pm.

“We were out at multiple callouts such as AFAs (automatic fire alarms), oil spills, RTCs (road traffic collisions) and small fires around the Cork area. In 2021 we were out at a chimney fire and rubbish fire and we also had a fatal house fire that Christmas Eve,” Chris said.

“In 2019 we were out at 2am on Christmas morning for a serious house fire. We managed to pull the owner out of the house, he suffered from smoke inhalation and minor burns. We didn’t finish up the callout until about 7am. Back home then to do Christmas. We were all sat down enjoying Christmas and the pager went again, after which we were out for another hour for a tree down blocking the road. We got back at about 9.30pm.”

“It doesn't give us much relaxation, but we love our jobs and we are always here to protect our community 24/7, 365 days of the year,” the firefighter said.

The Carrigaline fire station, which covers not only the town but also communities such as Riverstick and Passage West, averages around 230 callouts a year. “We're on 248 at the moment,” Chris said.

Texting while driving has become a major cause of the road traffic accidents that the fire crew attends, he said.

“The texting is bad, it’s gone crazy. Every time I drive the car or when we're driving the fire truck going to a call, we see people texting on their phones, it’s just crazy and it's not just young people either, it's older people as well.”

County Cork’s firefighters as in other counties are classified as part-time retained while city fire stations have full-time personnel but as Chris points out “we're on-call 24-7, 365 days of the year. So technically, we're on-call full-time.”

Many retained firefighters hold down full-time jobs at the same time. The role takes serious commitment but “it’s the love of the job, it's the love of the community. We wouldn't do it if we didn't respect our community and we're there to protect them at the end of the day.”

“We would like to wish everyone a very merry and safe Christmas and we wish the very best for each and every firefighter around the world,” he added.

If you’re interested in joining the fire service crew in your community, Cork County Council is currently recruiting for fire stations in Bandon, Kanturk and Millstreet. For more information, see www.yourcouncil.ie.