We all know that when the crew finishes a roll everyone wants a cold beverage. The most quietly asked question among crewmembers on the drive home is “do you think they’ll let us get a drink tonight?” It’s understood why fire fighters want to have drinks after a hard roll. It’s a ritualistic endeavor. For thousands of years humans have engaged in conquest, warfare, and triumphs only to celebrate as a group with drink and merriment. This behavior is literally written into our DNA. It is healthy as well… to a point.
There are dry crews, there are wet crews, and there are “sometimes we allow drinking” crews. Hell, there are smoking crews too but that’s an entirely different article. I have been on all of these crew types and have a feel for them all. I do not personally have a problem with any of these crew setups and recognize why each has chosen their respective SOP’s.
DRY CREWS
The dry crew is usually structured that way for one of two reasons. First, there might have been an incident on the crew in the past and the organization just doesn’t go there anymore. Or second, they don’t even want the option of setting a legion of 22 forest weary animals into civil society with free range on booze. I’ve seen this a lot with younger crews. Maturity levels definitely play a roll in this decision.
My Rookie year as a Hotshot was a dry crew year. The crew was not always this way but in a year previous an incident took place that changed the SOP’s for a short while on the crew. The story goes that the crew was traveling home after a Southwest roll and some of the boys let loose. The rules were simple, “show up at the trucks at 7AM and we won’t have any issues”. On any crew this rule is hard and fast and must be understood completely.
Even though the instructions were clear, one individual awoke laying on a bench in a Circle K gas station. A child was poking him with a red licorice stick and an uneaten corndog laid on top of his civis. He had lost his phone and quickly found out the hotel was 25 miles away. Amazingly he made it back to the buggies just barely after the cut off time. But that wasn’t all… another individual slowly regained consciousness and discovered themselves in a hospital bed with no recognition of how they got there. This hungover Hotshot pulled the IV’s out of their arm, ripped the monitors off their fingers, grabbed their clothes, and bailed. It was later found out that he was hit by a car while walking across the street from the bar. He was packaged up by paramedics and awoke the next morning to find himself bruised and battered.
After this event the crew overhead went through a drawn out, overly demeaning internal audit. Basically an overhead bitch-fest which included bureaucratic pencil pushers asking repeatedly “what were you thinking?” To appease everyone involved they just went to a dry crew and said “that’s that.” A move I can appreciate.
WET CREWS
The wet crews can have varying personalities. Some tend to be older it seems, married guys who just want a beer with dinner. If they have a lot of retention year after year, you get to know the crew’s tendencies when they go out. Maybe they have a one drink rule which I’ve seen. Maybe they just buy a six pack at the gas station and chill at the hotel. It could be that the crew is split. Half the crewmembers lay low while others tie one on. I will tell you, the Supts on these crews have one less thing to worry about when they can be certain their folks can handle themselves like adults.
Other crews just like to party. Plans will be made to travel home and RON in certain known fun towns. The casino nights with shots of Patrón flowing like a broken hose lay. One crewmember loses $400 on blackjack and another hits green on the Roulette wheel for $4K. On one roll I was detailing with a crew to fill quals until a task book got punched. We stopped over night in a small “fun town” after our day 14. I was friends with the Supt outside of work so the plan was to just go find a dive bar burger and a beer together, let the crew do their own thing, ya know. We successfully accomplished that. It was a nobody bar with no one there but a content bartender. Then a squadie found us… a couple shots later and a saw found us. We ended up moving locations to find a patio bar with a social fire pit. We all gathered around and ordered a round of beers. Now for those that know me this part becomes even more hilarious. When I’m in public I have the mentality of the Lonesome Dove character Captain Woodrow F. Call. “I hate rude behavior in a man, I won’t tolerate it.”
As everyone settled in, a young gal next to me turns and with slurred speech and smeared lipstick asks, “cOouLd zyoU buyee me a shdrink”. I laughed out loud and replied, “Nope”. “You azzshole” she barked as she leaned like a Pondo in the wind. She slowly turned around and whispered something in a dude’s ear and the strangest thing transpired. He swung around like a whip that wasn’t called out in the hike line.
“Why won’t you buy my girl a drink!?”
….wait, what?
“My girl says you wont buy her a drink! Why the F*ck not?”
I was just off a long fire roll and didn’t feel like drawing out the inevitable so in the tone of a nightly news anchor I simply reported to the man, “your girl is acting like a drunken whore, it’s quite unattractive.” I smiled widely because I thought it was hilarious. I was reveling in my own humor when a tiny fist jacked me squarely in the nose. Silence overtook the patio. The dude stood eyes wide waiting for me to do something. The gal stood in amazement that I hadn’t moved. My buddy behind me became aware of the hushed air and looked over at me. “Yo, your nose is bleeding…!?” I replied, “ya man this chick just jacked me in the nose. She has other men buy her drinks and then fights for her boyfriend.” The silence ended. Bouncers and other people in the bar came rushing towards us as they ironically came to the drunk girl’s side and hurled insults and shoves in our direction. “Time to go”. We calmly exited the bar back onto the sidewalk like a Quentin Tarantino cut scene... “Wanna get some tacos?”
There is still one rule that rules them all. Show up to the buggy on time, and be fit to work. As adults, this mission was easily achieved. There are always stragglers though. I’ll cover this below, DON’T BE THAT GUY.
DON’T BE THAT GUY
Every once and a while there is a crewmember that just can’t handle their alcohol or the newly found freedom bestowed upon them. I’ve seen this on numerous occasions. The one bad apple that ruins it for everyone else. This is a great way to get fired or to have the crew turn on you. On one occasion it was the last roll of the season and we were traveling home to shut down. The same rules were in place. “Be in the buggies and ready to go by 07:00.” I was in the Supt truck with my coffee ready to depart the Best Western parking lot when I could see crew members start to rush around. Then a squadie looked in my direction, I smiled. He slowly walked to my truck window to deliver the news.
“{Name redacted} isn’t here. He’s in his room but wont get up. What should I do?” I responded, “I’m rolling out of this lot at 07:00 with or without him, what do you think you should do?”
He had 5 minutes to get to the trucks. Two crew members and a squadie went to the front desk to get a room key to try and get him up. With 1 minute to spare they came out empty handed. They told me he drunkenly insulted them and they gave up. “We’re moving”.
I stopped at a local coffee shop to get a refill and his squadie came up to me and asked if he could go back and try again. This squadie was a very genuine and kind human so I told him if that’s what he wanted to do he could. He drove his buggy back to the hotel and tossed the kid over his shoulder like a log round and shrugged him into the back of the rig.
I continued driving down the freeway until my phone rang. The squadie said the crewmember was being belligerent in the buggy and there might be a problem. We chose an exit and pulled over. Quite simply I just got out of the truck and walked back to the buggy like I was about to murder someone. I sternly and loudly reprimanded the crew member and put him in the chase truck. He was fired as soon as we got back to the shop. He didn’t have his phone, wallet, or keys. Rough way to end the season. Don’t be that guy.
Another time I was on a fire and a crew had hit their 14 day mark. The demob process was done and they found a park to sleep in outside of fire camp. The crewboss told the overhead that they could go to the bar across the street and have one with dinner before coming back to the park to sleep. The problem was that they were not the only ones to move to this park to get away from the hustle and bustle of camp. The overhead team was also in this park along with a smattering of others 🙋♂️. It probably would have been fine until the crew didn’t “just have one”. Crewmembers started to quietly come back to camp and find their sleeping bags one by one. But the shit hit the fan when one young crewmember walked into the park and started yelling like he had just won some “most drunk ever” award. He screamed about how awesome he was, how he loved everyone, how hot the girls were at the bar, and every other obnoxious drunk memory he had. The next morning
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Hotshot Wake Up to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.