San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
Firefighters train Mexican ‘bomberos’
In late November, five members of the Rancho Santa Fe Fire Protection District donated lifesaving equipment and training to bomberos in La Paz, Baja California. Rancho Santa Fe’s crew joined professional firefighters from Sycuan Fire, San Miguel Fire and Bellevue, Wash., on the trip, which was made possible through coordination with the nonprofit Firefighters Crossing Borders.
“From my perspective being in the fire service for 18 years, I’ve never experienced anything like this,” said Rancho Santa Fe Fire Battalion Chief Paul Roman, who coordinated the inspirational weeklong trip and traveled to Mexico with Rancho Santa Fe Fire’s Captain Paul Lorenzo, engineer Scott Young, firefighter/paramedic Blaine Nelson and firefighter/paramedic Corbin Martinez.
Gerardo “Jerry” Padilla, a firefighter/paramedic from San Miguel Fire Protection District and Carlos Virgen, a battalion chief from Sycuan also served as leads on the trip.
“The fire department in Mexico is anemic at best,” Roman said. Baja’s capitol city of La Paz has a population of about 300,000 residents in the metro area with just three fire stations serving the city. By contrast, the city of Oakland has about the same number of residents with 16 fire stations.
To cover the Rancho Santa Fe Fire Protection District, a 50-square-mile area of over 34,000 citizens, there are six fire stations with three firefighters per station working a shift. In La Paz, there are only two firefighters per shift and the city barely has any fire hydrants and little funding.
Roman said in Mexico, they have fires every day — in speaking to the bomberos he said they see an average of eight to 16 fires a day. The number of structure fires they respond to in a day surpasses what the majority of fire departments in San Diego see in a year, Roman said.
The bomberos had “massive experience” in dealing with a lot of fire, but Roman said they didn’t necessarily have all of the tools and training they needed, and they could be putting themselves in danger.
Roman, a battalion chief since June, started working on this project when he was still a captain. He wanted to connect with a formal group for the trip, and it took him nine months just to find the Firefighters Crossing Borders. San Diego Fire & Rescue Fire Engineer Marcela Decasas is on the board of directors for the organization and coordinated with
La Paz through the nonprofit.
Roman’s grandparents were Mexican nationals, and growing up, his father spoke Spanish. While he never learned to speak the language, the majority of his family on his father’s side is from Mexico. Roman’s main motivation was to take some of the younger firefighters in Rancho Santa Fe to La Paz, to give them a different perspective and show them what their training means.
In La Paz, the bomberos had received a firetruck donated by the city of Chula Vista, but they didn’t know how to use it. Roman and the Rancho Santa Fe firefighters spent a year putting together a weeklong truck academy for them.
The Rancho Santa Fe Fire District supported the project by donating safety gear, tools and equipment, such as the Jaws of Life. The Rancho Santa Fe Professional Firefighters Union also supported them by providing plane tickets, and the Mexican government paid for the Firefighters Crossing Borders group’s lodging and food.
The training academy was hosted by the city of La Paz, and a large group of firefighters came from all over the Baja region to participate — both volunteer and paid bomberos.
Rancho Santa Fe firefighters trained the bomberos on how to use the tools and equipment found on the truck, and Roman personally provided training on the complex operations of the truck such as the outriggers and how to maneuver the vehicle and its 100-foot ladder.