Argentina Team Update #7

Day Six

This was the longest day of the trip by far. It still had the same number of hours in it, but we were just awake for more of them. We got up, had breakfast, and headed out to the fire station so Darren could give a tutorial on how to use a lot of the systems on the fire truck. He actually drove that truck while it was in service at Clackamas Fire. As soon as we arrived at the fire station, a fire was called in and we got the address from Sebastian. We pulled up to the scene in time to see the fire fighters stretch a hose line into the building and extinguish the fire. Apparently, a couple of fellas were drinking and smoking and lit their room on fire. A neighbor broke down their door and helped them to safety. After wrapping up the scene, we met the fire fighters back at the station and commenced the tutorial, which went well.

We went out to lunch and then had a couple hours of down time before leaving for Alberto Gabba’s house. He is the man who used to be in Sebastian’s position and originally requested the fire truck. We had a long three-hour drive, followed by a visit to the local fire station and then dinner at Alberto’s house. Unfortunately, we still needed to drive another 30 minutes to our overnight accommodation and here I sit at 12:30am, finishing up this update before I sprawl out on a futon. My son would say that today was a day of “side quests” but we all understand the importance of developing and maintaining relationships down here. Alberto has already been talking about scheduling more training in several different areas near his location. It’s very interesting seeing how this training seems to be expanding before our very eyes. I feel fortunate to be one of the people on this frontline that is an eyewitness to something potentially huge in the making.

Goodnight/morning!