well, we caught a fire... of sorts

Not really, but it's been so slow around here that any amount of smoke and flames must, by default, count as a fire. I was working on the ambulance and we caught a call in the far end of a neighboring territory. Twenty minutes later we were cancelled. We caught another call even further away, only to be cancelled off of that one as well. Heading back to our station, my partner declares "I think we lost power steering". Well, that can be a pain in the backside, but it's manageable. I am unimpressed and ask him if he still has brakes. I have been in a truck where the serpentine belt burned up and lost power everything- the brakes are a biggie. He checked, and we had brakes. We made the turn onto the street our station is on, and he was really struggling to get the truck maneuvered. I caught his expression as he hit the brakes; they were going out. He grabbed the radio and put us out of service. As we rounded the curve at a whopping three m.p.h., I caught a glance in the side mirror- we were blowing blue smoke behind us. "I think the engine's blown" I said nonchalantly. We limped her off the roadway in front of our station. As we stopped, smoke enveloped the truck. My partner got out and tried to open the hood.

As he did, the engine burst into flames. I got on the radio and notified dispatch that our truck was on fire. My cell phone started ringing off the hook. I saw that it was one of the supervisors- I answered it and said "yes it's really on fire, call ya back!" and hung up on him (sorry!) I grabbed an extinguisher and passed it to my partner who doused the flames. They would go out, then like trick candles, flare back up, taunting us with small flickering fingers. We coated the engine with the extinguisher, and took all the equipment off the truck. Supervisors showed up. A tow truck had to come haul ol' smokey off to the shop. They say she fried the brain of the truck, and is probably down for the count.

It wasn't exactly the "fire" we were looking for.....