There is a serious shortage of fire brigade volunteers. But almost nowhere is the shortage as great as in Moerdijk. Dick Havelaar, post commander of Moerdijk Dorp, calls the shortage of fire brigade volunteers ‘gigantic’. “Of the sixty calls last year, we were unable to respond twenty times and had to stay indoors. You definitely don’t want that.”
“We have a huge shortage of people at the Moerdijk Dorp barracks. We may have eighteen men, but I will soon only have six on the roll,” says Havelaar.
“Then the fire brigade will be at your door ten minutes later.”
“My concerns are very great, knowing that I only have six men,” Havelaar says. “If we cannot respond, arrival times will be longer because a post will have to come from Lage Zwaluwe or Zevenberg. Then the fire brigade will arrive at your door ten minutes later. While every second counts: whether it concerns resuscitation, a fire or a car accident. When we as a barracks disappear, people must become more self-reliant.”
The Central and West Brabant Safety Region sees the shortages. But also know that it is worse in Moerdijk than elsewhere. “This shortage can still be met,” says spokesperson Louise Schneider. But additional volunteers are highly needed.
“Women may think it’s too hard for them, but it’s actually for everyone.”
Fire brigade volunteer Naomi Mills (33) is in front of the classroom in special primary education during the day. She regularly receives surprised reactions from her students when they hear that she is also a firefighter. “But teacher, aren’t you tired in the evening? Oh?! Do you still do that?” She grins: “We do that during the day and we do this at night,” after she extinguished a so-called fire in a drug lab during a fire exercise in Zevenbergen.
Why are fewer and fewer people signing up for the fire brigade? “I think the threshold for walking into the barracks and applying for a job is high. Women may think it is too heavy for them, but it is actually for everyone. I am only 1.65 m tall myself,” she says, laughing. . “I am a mother of two children myself. If one of them has a wound, my mother’s heart breaks. But when I have my suit on, I have a mission and another mindset.”
“The biggest misconception is that you do your work completely voluntarily, so you don’t get paid,” says the firefighter. “The biggest difference is that the professional fire brigade sleeps over and has more response times than the volunteer fire brigade. We get paid just as much and have undergone the same training. The only voluntary thing is that we show up ‘voluntarily’.”
According to Dick Havelaar, fewer and fewer people are making time for volunteer work. “People have less and less time and are allowed to leave their employers less often. A lot of people say: ‘No time, I don’t have time’,” he sighs.
“Then everything immediately falls out of my hands, my heart beats three times as fast and then I’m gone.”
Naomi’s heart actually starts beating faster from a pager notification. “Then everything immediately falls out of my hands, my heart beats three times as fast and then I’m gone,” she says beaming. “If you save even one person or can give someone help, then you have already completed your mission. completed. You gain a new family, you gain new experiences every week and you are active.”
Jeroen de Visser from Moerdijk will start training as a firefighter in May. “I have relatives in the fire brigade, I used to be in class with the daughter of a commander and I was made enthusiastic by others from the Moerdijk Dorp post. I went to see the open day and haven’t left since.”
As he watches firefighters from Zevenbergen and Moerdijk ‘cut open’ a car during an exercise, you see him daydreaming. “When I was little I never thought I would ever do this. For me it’s about personal development and giving something back to society.”
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There is also a major shortage of fire brigade volunteers in other places