Andy looks back over long career
The longest-serving firefighter in West Sussex has reflected on a career spanning 50 years, including serving alongside his wife and two sons.
Andy Horner joined Selsey Fire Station as a retained firefighter on March 1, 1973, and is now a crew manager there – but over the past five decades, he has served communities across the county.
He has attended notable incidents such as the fire at Uppark House in 1989, the 1994 Chichester flooding and the Selsey Academy fire in 2016.
Andy said: “A friend I played football with told me that he joined Selsey Fire Station as a retained firefighter. I didn’t know too much about the fire service and had never considered it as a career but I went to visit the station, and the rest is history!”
It was only 18 months later
that Andy became a wholetime firefighter. He went on to serve in Worthing, Horley and Chichester, as well as working for the service’s training team.
He met his wife Bernice in 1977, when she was a fire control room operator at Chichester Fire Station. They married the following year and have three children, Bethan, Nick and Pete – and both sons have followed in their father’s footsteps.
Andy said: "I will never forget my first call – responding to an incident at the Methodist Hall. My sub officer got me to crawl through the building, keeping my face to the floor, and talked me through the technicalities of the fire. I came out of the building coughing and spluttering everywhere – thankfully the equipment, kit and processes we use nowadays are vastly different.
"Back in the ’70s, we wore black plastic half-leggings that were held up with metal clips and attached to a belt that carried an axe – in fact, it was the same kit that soldiers wore in the war. We also had black cork helmets and no fire gloves.
“When I first joined, there were no female firefighters, in fact it wasn’t until I joined the training team that a female firefighter joined. The service has benefited hugely from becoming more diverse, and it has been my greatest pleasure helping to develop the hundreds of new faces that have come through the fire station doors over the years.”