Want To Be A Detroit Firefighter?

Last week, the Detroit Free Press wrote an article on what it was like to be a Detroit police officer.  This week, they write about being a Detroit firefighter in that bankrupt town.
From the DFP: It was the middle of the night. The house was being swallowed by flames. Firefighters were rushing inside.
And out of nowhere, a man appeared and stood in front of the burning house on Detroit’s east side, staring at the fire like he was enthralled. Was he the one who started it?
Firefighters say arsonists often return to the scene of their handiwork to admire it. Firefighters have taken photos of the crowds gathered at various blazes, and they later notice that some guy will be at each of them, gazing out from the crowd with that same entranced stare....
For the firefighters, the state of the city is apparent in their broken-down rigs, the supply shortages and the ongoing collapse of the neighborhoods surrounding their firehouses. Add to that the pay cuts, their shrinking ranks, the equipment problems and the ensuing low morale, and life is tougher than ever for a Detroit firefighter, many of whom work side jobs on days off to make ends meet.
Yet even though most of these men could get the same job for higher pay in better-equipped departments in the comparatively quiet suburbs, nearly all of them insist Detroit is where they want to be....
The fire alarm rang. Rollover accident.
It was 10:58 a.m. on a Tuesday. In 41 seconds, the seven firemen went from sitting in chairs, watching TV and talking to wearing full gear and driving their two rigs to the scene.
The car was on its side about a mile away, they were told. Someone could be dying inside. But the rig’s route was dragged to a crawl several times because a whole lot of Detroit drivers ignore the loud sirens, the honking horn and the sight of a huge fire rig barreling toward them. Some just won’t pull over, while others, for inexplicable reasons, actually pull from the side of the road directly in front of the truck.
“This is normal,” Gehart said, hounding the driver to hustle.
They found the car on Harper, where the street splits into the I-94 service drive just east of Cadieux. The small red Ford Escape, its front end smashed in, was lying on its side.
As they hopped out of their rigs, the engine truck started sputtering and coughing like a beat-up junk car.
“Sounds like a speed buggy,” Plieth said. “The engine’s messed up. The rats don’t have enough cheese.”  ...
The most notorious was a well-publicized lack of toilet paper in firehouses last year that had kids from the nearby school, local businesses and residents donating toilet paper rolls to the firehouses in a city so broke and dysfunctional that elementary school kids provided this essential supply better than city government could.
The firemen at Engine 58 still have some of that donated toilet paper. But they buy their own paper towels. Plus their rags. Their food. Their soap. They even buy their own bandages. None of these things are supplied regularly anymore. Gehart collects $10 out of every paycheck from the 36 firefighters at Engine 58 to pay for it all.
http://www.freep.com/article/20130901/COL46/309010041/detroit-fire-department-bankruptcy-engine-58-50