Firefighter Rhod Gilbert's Work Experience

I'm Rhod Gilbert, stand-up comedian.

People tell me I've got the toughest job in town, but I'm sure I'll find other things far more difficult,

so I'm ditching my regular job and trying something completely different.

This is my work experience.

This week, I'm a firefighter.

This programme contains adult humour.

After a gruelling morning rescuing dead cats, sitting around and playing darts,

it was off to South Wales Fire and Rescue Service to meet Andy Marles.

You could tell been a firefighter for years because

he picked me up like a biscuit and dunked me in the training centre, ready to start my apprenticeship.

As you can see over there, that's one of our training buildings, simulating a fire in there.

-There's firefighters training on it as if it was a real fire.

-Right. I can't go in like this.

No, you don't go in like that.

The closest I've come to fighting a fire is bleeding a radiator,

so my mentor, John, has his work cut out.

Nice to meet you. What we've got here for you is our corporate wear.

-We'll have to have a chat about the shaving.

-What do you mean?

You need to be clean-shaven around this area here.

You can have a goatee or shave it all off, the choice is yours.

If you want to get that on...

I feel like a prisoner, for some reason.

You'll get a right telling off if it's not ironed as well.

Because we are in a uniformed service.

-I'll bring it through and you can do it for me.

-No, you're doing it.

We didn't ask you to be a fireman, you asked to be one.

Yeah, I wanted to be a fire fighter, not a maid!

You'll have to get that tea-cosy off your head too.

-Stick it on a teapot because all you do is sit around and drink tea, I've heard.

-You reckon, do you?

I just hope having a goatee doesn't make me into as big a turd as John.

-Clearly a facist.

-One ironed shirt with creases in the correct places.

Better not be in the sleeves, John.

-They are in the sleeves.

-I don't like that much.

That can be rubbed off as well, can it?

This goatee isn't going to make me into a turd like you, is it?

No.

This is where we'll get our fire kit on.

We talked about the hands in pockets, mate. Thanks.

Boots - steel toecaps, solid metal plate at the bottom as well.

This is our fire helmet, we've got an incorporated torch at the front of it. Leggings and gloves here.

-Jacket?

-It's not a jacket, it's called a tunic.

-Why do you call it a tunic?

-That's why.

Collectively, this is what we call our PPE,

personal protective equipment.

So we're trying to fit you up with the best protection we can give you,

-and through training, knowledge and understanding of the equipment you'll be using...

-TKU.

-TKU?

-Training, knowledge and understanding?

-I love that. You can have that.

-Thanks.

We need to get this equipment on as quick as we can.

Mrs Jones is dangling out of that window, and you're faffing around.

You should have said Mrs Jones was dangling out of the window, you didn't say it was an emergency.

-That's why we're putting our kit on, aren't we?

-Does the phone go or something?

The bells will go down.

-Ah!

-What's happened there?

I've got a pierced nipple and I just got it caught.

What you've got going through there, we need to get rid of, so we'll have to take that out.

I've got some special cutting equipment.

-You'll get somebody to go through this with a circular saw?

-I'll pull it off now.

Haven't you got any anaesthetic?

Arghhhh!

Aaargh!

-It's only been in there a week.

-What's up with you?

That's a normal nipple there, look at that! Compare and contrast. Aargh!

Argh, argh, argh!

Aaaargh!

TKU - training, knowledge and understanding - all put into practice there.

My robo-tit contravened health and safety, but two complete strangers going at my nipple

like a piece of flat pack furniture was an unsettling start to the day.

-It's getting tight, they've got things like this in the Prague torture museum.

-I've not been there.

How come I've got these namby-pamby bright green ones?

These are worked gloves.

They were like yours but I've been to fires.

We're going to move onto the drill ground to do some selection tests

that we give to our potential fire fighters.

We are trying to put you under as much pressure as we can in a controlled environment.

We do get serious out there.

Right? There's no time for mucking around out there.

But it is serious. So if we move over there now.

-Have I got to run all the way down there?

-Yes, all the way down to those blue cones.

Shall I warm up or something?

-If you want a little warm-up, by all means.

-How do you warm up?

Go!

My leg has gone already!

Up the top. Back back to me and then back up.

Keep going.

Faster.

Back up and back to me.

Putting in extra bits now.

Tight...pace.

Down.

Well done!

So we'll add a 10kg weight to that which brings it up.

-All the way up.

-Oh, my nipple!

Extend your arms up.

I told you they were fascists, look at that.

They tried to hide it behind here but there're not fooling anyone.

This is like getting off with a girl in Swansea!

We do what we call a Hose Friday where the firefighters are shown how to run out a hose...

What are you laughing for?

Hose Friday!

So, potentially, they could run out this hose 30 to 40 times each.

-I bet they look forward to that!

-No.

Good. Get your hands moving.

Right the way to the end.

The fire whippet is off.

They call me the fire whippet.

OK, fire whippet, keep going.

Roll it over the top.

Good, place it down and stand up straight.

Stand up straight.

-Stand-up, breathe in.

-Oh, my bum!

That was hard. This kit is very heavy.

That was like one of the worst episodes of World's Strongest Man I've ever seen.

I'm about as fit as a panda comfort eating, and I'm scared of heights

but next it's John's ladder class - climb up, leave go, how many fingers am I holding up?

I'm sure he's just taking the piss now.

But I owe it to my traumatised nipple to carry on.

-How many fingers, John?

-Three.

Yeah, you got that. Let's go for it before I change my mind.

-This is all right so far.

-Yeah, well done.

-Force it in there.

You'd better be holding that rope!

Where's the crash mat, there's not even a mat!

I'm up high enough now, I think. Ah, I don't like it now.

How many fingers am I holding up?

-I've got other things on my mind than how many fingers you're holding up.

-Less talking, more looking.

-Hands off!

-There we go.

-That's not very nice.

-Look to your right.

How many fingers?

-Two.

-Well done!

With Strictly Ladders over, I'm introduced to another tool of the trade. No not John, he is a tool,

but I'm talking about the breathing apparatus.

I feel like I'm on a Ryanair scuba-diving holiday.

Hold your breath, take a deep breath in, excellent.

Just breathe normally.

How does that feel?

OK. Keep breathing normally.

I'm going to press a button now to stop the flow of oxygen coming to you.

Then we're going to take the mask straight off.

Otherwise, if we just take it off, you'll be losing all your air.

Off there.

Nice! Nice in there.

Happy with that?

Yeah, I could be used to that.

We're going to go into the hot fire now and have a go wearing that with the hose, and put a fire out.

I'd rather pull my pants down and shout, look everyone, it's Hose Friday, than walk into that fire.

-What happens if I panic and shoot everything with water?

-You won't, I'll be with you.

If it all does go Pete Tong, I'll just walk you out, so don't worry.

-I'd do the same for you.

-Promise?

-Yeah.

-High-five.

You're with the fire whippet man.

It's quite scary now, I can see the flames through that window.

I don't like it, I do not like it one bit.

Hold on to that, put that hose back to check we have water.

Look at it in there!

We leave the back of the hand on the door to see if it's cold.

This is the door we're going through. Let's go inside.

Then we're going to go low, stay low.

We're at the fire now.

This exercise was scary enough, as controlled or not, fire is fire,

but I tried to imagine how terrifying it would be

in a real, volatile and unpredictable environment.

Excellent, you can check the other way out. OK, let's move.

Come on Rhod, let's get out, stay low.

I've got no idea what to expect, stepping into a fire.

It's pretty scary. The main thing that occurs to me is you need a lot of confidence in this equipment.

-Without a shadow of doubt, yeah.

-And your team-mates.

-That's a big thing.

Tool of the trade John had helped me, but I still knew less about danger and volatile environments

than a Songs Of Praise cameraman.

I start being a fireman today, I'm here at Malpas Fire and Technical Rescue Station.

I've shaved my goatee and put a plaster over my damaged nipple in anticipation of a busy day.

Who knows what could happen? Let's see.

I was now officially on call, and while I looked the part,

I felt as out of place as Lenny Henry wearing orange pyjamas.

Morning, chaps.

We've got a trainee, Firefighter Gilbert, joining us for the next two days,

carrying out some work experience. Attention! To your duties, fall out!

If a call comes in, a firefighter has to be ready, ready to finish his tea

and biscuits, make a note of his darts score and get out!

This is the pole drop.

We use it to get downstairs quickly. Ready to have a go? Reach across

-and commit yourself to the pole.

-I've never committed myself to a woman, never mind a pole!

-Hands on...

-I'll freefall down there and break my leg!

-You won't.

Right, I'm coming down.

Any minute now!

Get the kettle on down there.

I reckon I'll shoot down there with smoke coming off me

and break my legs at the bottom but I'll do it anyway.

-That's it, see?

-Oh!

-Look at that!

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING That's all right, yeah.

If we get a fire call, we need to be able to respond quickly to it.

Ideally, we're looking at responding to a call and rolling out the doors within two minutes.

That'll be easy. D'you know what they called me at the other station?

-Go on.

-The fire whippet!

-Excellent! OK, we'll see.

Jan thought I was full of whippet shit and gave me a challenge.

To make it realistic, I pretended to be a really busy firefighter.

ALARM SOUNDS

-OK, Rhod, you've got a call.

-Walk, don't run. Walk, don't run.

Open that door, sir. Thanks very much.

Oh...sh...!

Oh, what am I doing taking my trousers off?

I'm not supposed to take my trousers off!

Nobody wants a fireman with no bottoms on!

I started taking my trousers off!

SIREN WAILS

-Was that good?

-It wasn't a record, no, but if you can respond

as enthusiastically as that at 3am on your second nightshift, I'll be well impressed.

-I'd have shaved a second off if I hadn't taken my trousers off.

-It doesn't help.

Prevention is better than cure, and we go dishing out fire safety advice to the public.

At last, I get some responsibility. Adam shows me the button and...

BLEEP! ..bingo!

-It's worth having.

-Definitely, they are life-savers.

Whitney Houston sang, I believe children are the future,

teach them well and maybe the little buggers won't set fire to stuff.

I can see through there, there's a bunch of very short people

and I have to tell them about fire safety. I know less about it than them!

I might have a quick look at this actually.

Introduced Tanny, Tanny is a firefighter's helmet.

Tanny should be the same age as the children.

They look about the same age, don't they?

Does she look about six? It's hard to tell when you've got a fireman's helmet with legs.

It says here, what would they do if they found matches?

If child says, light it, pick it up, show concern, it says.

What do I do? This is ridiculous. It's like walking on...

What do you do, do I just walk in like I'm doing a gig?

Good evening, hello!

'The future, my arse, these kids were like feral dogs baying for blood. Where was tool of the trade John?

'He could have thrown me over his shoulder and got me out of there.'

-Yeah, never done this before. Hello, everyone.

-Hello, Rhod!

-If you're five, go yeah.

-Yeah!

-If you're six, go yeah.

-Yeah!

If you're 14, go yeah.

Yeah!

Have you met Tanya the fire helmet?

-Yes.

-Have you?

-She's not real.

-She's not real?

No.

She's in the supermarket and she sees some of these on the ground.

What's this here? Can anybody tell me?

-She picks up mattresses.

-She picks up mattresses?

Very close with mattresses but what does she pick up?

-Matches.

-She picks up matches.

In this story Tanya's been very naughty.

Does anyone know what she's done wrong?

Can we see the next bit?

Can you see the next bit?

-What do you think...?

-Is this the last one?

This isn't the last one I'm afraid, no.

We're only halfway through.

What's happening here? She's burnt the house down.

And she likes her house.

-She likes her house. How's she feeling now?

-Sad.

-Happy.

-Happy?

She could be a bit sad but mostly she's happy because she could have died then.

Oh, she's happy that she's escaped from the fire. That makes sense.

Who could help you in this situation? Would you call a baker?

No!

-Would you call Trevor McDonald off the news?

-No!

What about Chris Bonington, the old Everest Explorer?

-Yes!

-Yes?!

Anyone got questions for myself, Darren or Rhod?

What time do you normally wake up?

That's a very good question. I normally wake up at midday.

-What website are you on?

-What website are we on?

What website are you on?!

# Matches, matches, never touch

# They can hurt you very much. #

That was really stressful.

I'm sweating. Not quite sure how much they've learnt.

That was one of the toughest audiences I've had.

That was worse than Glasgow Empire.

I can't believe a four year-old found me so boring and sluggish

that she was patronising me and asking me to move on.

Next thing I knew we had a call,

it was a tip off, and we headed back to base to check it out.

To investigate fully, we were going to have to cut up a car.

We've got your dust mask to prevent you breathing in any dangerous dust

like glass dust from windscreens.

Screening device coming into play a bit more.

Every time you do a bit of cutting, that has to be brought down.

Try and cut any of these posts now without managing the glass beforehand would be a problem

because it would break explosively and in an uncontrolled manner.

So we're going to break the glass with this, it's got a small point,

so when we release the spring,

all the pressure goes to that small point.

Breaking glass.

Jeepers, look at that, how does that work? That's incredible.

If you're a car burglar, look away now.

Breaking glass.

What would happen if I put that against my head and let go?

-I think it might hurt.

-Would it really?

-I don't quite understand the physics.

-It's to do with science.

I hope they don't want this car back.

Look at that bad boy, that's not a dust buster is it?

Despite the tip off, to the firefighters dismay,

there were no HobNobs in this vehicle.

That's chewing on something isn't it?

Joking aside these guys are experts at cutting people out of vehicles,

but my mind wandered to what it must be like

cutting Peter Stringfellow's toenails.

You can imagine how much more difficult this would be

if there was actually some people in there.

Quite a lot of stuff to look out for

while also trying to control this beast.

Next, I'm going to be a simulated casualty

and they're going to cut me out.

I'm going to do it before I change my mind.

Somebody has been smoking in here.

OK, keep looking at me, keep perfectly still.

Richard is going to try the door and help you.

We'll get you out as soon as we possibly can.

My name's Richard from the fire service, going to get you out.

OK, yeah.

All along I'd been joking about how firefighters are biscuit-obsessed fascists who sit around all day,

but in truth, seeing these guys in action

was as humbling as it was impressive.

Pretty blown away by how professional that was.

The level of training to choreograph something like that,

it's just awesome, awesome.

After a serious end to the day, next day was a special treat,

a trip to the beach to train

for some very different rescue scenarios.

Despite the fantastic weather,

when we got there the beach looked pretty quiet.

It looked so inviting,

we rushed to put on our Welsh equivalent of speedos.

We've been called to an exercise with a person stuck in the mud.

We get calls through quite regularly and this is the equipment you can see

on the floor, that we're going to use over the next hour or so.

The donkey rides here are tremendously popular,

but accidents do happen.

This idiot tried to ride a donkey while eating an ice cream.

Our rescue was against the tide

and it was as slippery as Peter Mandelson,

but we had to get him back.

He still owed £1 on the donkeys for one thing.

Very difficult to move anything.

It's hard to stand and grip

and unbelievably slippery.

It's very hard work.

Last effort then. Come on Rhod.

Anyone got any injuries you'd like to report?

No aches and pains?

I've got injuries but I just can't be bothered to report them.

The most important thing now, decontamination.

We don't know what's in this mud so we'll go in for a full wash off.

There's a welcome sight. It's like a mirage.

Put the warm tap on.

Part of the fire service's responsibility

is to do river rescues.

A bit further up the river, they're going to lob a dummy off a bridge

and we'll effect a river rescue. How often does this happen?

Quite a lot unfortunately, whether it's from people who have been drinking on high spirits

and accidentally fallen off the bridge from playing around

or somebody who decided to harm themselves and jump.

How far has this dummy floated now?

At least 200 metres up stream in that short period of time.

We'd simulate this person who's obviously a swimmer, he's conscious,

we'll treat him for mild hypothermia.

Our assessment is, judging by the red face,

-we reckon he's had a bit too much to drink.

-Absolutely, yes.

Come on, don't do it again, let's get you home.

Been out here about three hours in this dry suit.

You can't have a wee in these.

It's not like a wet suit

and I'm desperate to go to the toilet, so excuse me.

After a final game of rounders on the beach, we headed back.

I was still on call but the lads felt that in a fire

I'd be about as much use as a 1970s sofa.

I needed more training, this time without a safety harness.

I was as nervous as a pig who's lost both his contact lenses

on the pavement outside a butchers.

I don't fancy doing this.

That bit between the ladder and the window is the bit that I'm worried about.

The bit he's going to have to do now.

You don't realise these things completely restrict your movement

and just moving your foot up one rung of those ladders

is harder than it would be in normal gear.

Just pretend you've got a harness on Rhod, think harness.

The ladder's getting much narrower now.

Looking down now.

Quite a long way down there.

What I want you to do, put this hand

on this round here.

That's a long way down. Oh shit.

-Go on.

-That hand round here.

-Don't look down.

-That's horrible.

That's horrible.

Every time I get into a position like this, you've got

that compulsive thought where you want to step off, you want to jump.

I wouldn't want to do that carrying anything or...

It's funny you should say that.

I'm just running around like a headless chicken as usual,

trying to follow orders as best I can.

I'm not on fire!

Oh hose Friday! It was bad enough before, now I'm drenched,

numb with cold, it's slippery, and I've got no safety harness.

I'd rather stand still while a dentist on a mechanical bull

tries to extract my wisdom teeth.

It was almost the end of my shift

and, thank God, we hadn't had a call out.

The fire whippet was home and dry.

ALARM WAILS

Oh, flatpack nipples!

At the last minute the bells went down.

My adrenalin levels went berserk.

This was a real call out and we'd no idea how big

this fire was going to be.

My imagination was running wild.

Oh, it's a tiddler, a little bin fire.

Probably just Tony Blair doing some late night filing.

In truth, I was very relieved.

Predictably, we've been on shift all day since first thing this morning,

the bell goes, there's a call out.

As fires go, it's what you want really, a fire.

Once it starts getting bigger, worse, more dangerous,

then it starts to get nasty,

but that was quite a nice little bit of adrenalin and fun.

My shift was over and I escaped a serious call out.

I told the lads it was a shame.

I was being ironic but they dragged me back to tool of the trade, John.

I found myself wishing it was hose Friday.

What we're going to do finally,

I'm going to take this in, I'm going to protect you.

You're going to be behind me, when I let you know,

you're going to be turning that valve off there.

That there is under flames. You'll be turning it off.

We'll be going in there, me and you, yeah?

Let's go.

Move forward.

Move in there! Turn that off!

Let's move back.

Stand at ease.

I'd just like to say a special thanks to trainee firefighter Gilbert.

I'm sure you're all agree,

he's coped admirably with all the things we've thrown at him

the last couple of days.

Guys, if you'd like to thank him in the normal method.

WHISTLES

Hey! Too much, too much!

Down and five.

Red Watch, dismissed.

It's been a phenomenal eye opener.

These are phenomenally brave, confident, well trained,

skilled people who I think earn a pittance for what they do.

Just from the little I've seen, gave you a little glimpse of what it might be like to do it for real.

It takes tremendous self-belief and confidence in yourself

and the people around you, and your equipment.

It's all a bit too scary for me.

SHOUTING

I thought that was the fire,

I thought I was going to have to get back in and get out on a call.

Before that has a chance to happen,

the final bit is quick marching it

back to the world of stand up comedy.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

E-mail [email protected]