‘Never seen devastation like that’ – Calgary firefighters on Fort McMurray

They may have almost 60 years of firefighting experience between them, but this was different.

“In 34 years, I’ve never seen devastation like that,” said Danny Freeman Tuesday, a Calgary Fire Dept. captain who recently returned from the front lines of Fort McMurray.

He, fellow captain Tom Caves and 27 other members of the local department arrived in the city early Thursday morning after an eight-hour bus ride and got straight to work.

After a day of pre-planning, getting accustomed to the city and fighting some hot spots, a critical report came in.

“The radio was full of reports of the fire coming down across the river, seven spots was one time I’d heard, coming across into downtown,” Freeman said. “We weren’t going to lose downtown, there was no way.”

“We stood shoulder to shoulder all the way.”

While Freeman was on the front lines, Caves was responsible for surveying larger areas, tracking wind and making sure they had the resources they needed and his team had plenty of its own challenges.

“Changing winds was a huge one for us,” he said. “That changes everything for you, all of a sudden it’s coming from you at a different direction.”

Freeman said there was also communication issues, as well as the blaze growing all of the time.

“I had two radios, two cell phones, we were trying to communicate, Calgary couldn’t communicate with Edmonton who was standing right beside me, so we were hand-signalling, there was so much coming at you so fast and for so long,” he said.

The team operated on three to four hours of sleep a night.

“We were cool with that, there was guys that wanted not to quit at all,” Freeman said.

The Calgarians recall coming face to face with an out of control fire wall that had to be knocked down by water bombers, while at another site in Anzac, they had to evacuate because the fire was growing and they ran out of resources.

“There’s nothing worse that firefighters hate to do, is to back off and find safe ground, that’s usually what we don’t do in Calgary and it’s not something that we’re used to,” Caves said. “It was very hard for us to do.”

The duo also worked on the Slave Lake fire in 2011.

“It’s vastly different in that Fort Mac is so spread out and Slave Lake is relatively concise,” Freeman said. “In 34 years, I’ve never seen anything like it, there’s just no rhyme or reason. A house here that’s not touched and the rest of the neighbourhood’s gone.”

Since their crew returned, other firefighters have taken their place, along with additional resources and Calgary Emergency Management Agency Chief Tom Sampson praised his local members.

“I could not be more proud,” he said. “The work that people are doing is absolutely incredible, it brings tears to your eyes quite frankly, it’s incredible, I’m proud to be an Albertan and I’m proud to be part of what they’re doing.”

Caves said when dealing with such a massive challenge, it’s teamwork and discipline is critical.

“You go back to your training, you have to organized ahead of time,” he said. “All the crews up there that were working together had tremendous respect and admiration for the support that we had.”

For an emotional Freeman, it reinforces his pride in civic duty.

“Community’s what it’s about, your neighbours, you look after them,” he said. “We went to Slake Lake feeling like that, we were going to do that and wow we did. They all come and looked after us during the floods and we’re back there again looking after Fort Mac.”

“It really makes you feel good about the human condition, we all get beat down by the human condition, but man if you go up there, you’re pretty happy with it.”