A bond forged by fire

David Kieltsch, formerly of the Jackson Fire Department, first strapped on boots 10 years ago. For him, firefighting is an adrenaline rush and he says he loves the ability to help others the work provides.

"If you do it and you discover you love it, it just gets in your blood. You never want to do anything else," he said of the job.

But it wasn't until he went to Iraq as a civilian contractor that he grew to fully appreciate all his profession could mean. That's when he encountered firefighters who overcame stunning obstacles to help rebuild their country.

"The Iraqi firemen are unbelievable. They do our job and 10 times more everyday," he said. "Try doing what we do with people shooting at you or worrying about an IED. I just have a lot of respect for them."

Kieltsch works for WSI, a civilian contracting firm with about 650 people stationed at military bases across Iraq. On leave, he returned to the Jackson Fire Department last week to present the department and the city with a flag signed by American firefighters and a helmet signed by Iraqi firefighters. The items were a gesture of thanks for equipment donated by Jackson to firefighters of Kirkuk, Iraq.

Kieltsch said the journey of the donated equipment has been a long one.

Deployed in December 2004, Kieltsch, along with other contract employees, have responded to fires, hazardous material spills, extrications, and emergency medical calls at different bases across the country. Kieltsch was based in Kirkuk in the north of the country and was transferred last year to Taji just north of Baghdad.

"After Sept. 11, I felt part of my obligation as an American was to do something to preserve my kids' way of life. I thought about re-enlisting but instead I found this job, which pays quite a bit, and I think it gives me the chance to do just as much good," he said.

But he quickly found the most meaningful part of the job to be his responsibility of training Iraqi firefighters.

"Firefighting is universal. But the language barrier is probably the hardest thing," he said. "So we have to do a lot of hands-on showing this is how you grab a hose and this is the way to enter a building, but it's very gratifying to see how much they want to learn and how much they improve," he said.

From search and rescue training to vehicle fire training, to extraction to structural firefighting, he said the tutelage was pretty standard stuff.

But there was one major problem: most of the firefighters lacked suitable equipment.

"They would just hold their breath run in the building and run back out. They couldn't do much more than that," he said.

And in Iraq, the learning curve is steep. Kieltsch and his company were only mandated to respond to calls on their 4 square miles of base in Kirkuk. But as soon as Iraqi firefighters are trained, they are expected to respond to calls all across the city which has a population of 700,000.

And even for a big city, the calls there are numerous.

Kieltsch said he saw the newbie firefighters were responding to calls with rubber hoses that did not stretch far enough and protective gear that was little more than a heavy coat.

Because faulty wiring is a fact of Third-World life, the number of housefires in Kirkuk is extraordinary. But not all the calls were a result of wiring.

"The biggest concern for them in a car fire or an extraction can be a secondary explosion. You may think you're going into a classic rescue operation and then another explosive device is detonated and the situation becomes even more dangerous," said Kieltsch.

So when Kieltsch came home for leave in March of 2005 he petitioned his former boss, chief Brad Golden of Jackson, to see what could be arranged in the way of donating equipment.

Golden was eager to cooperate.

"We have gear that we can no longer wear because of higher state standards. It's still good gear, we just can't use it," he said.

"We were happy to help out. These guys are brother firefighters. Even though they may be 7,000 miles away and we can't read their names and they can't read ours, we're doing the same thing."

So with Golden's help and through the help of Sam Welker of the Cape Girardeau fire department, Jackson donated nine full sets of turnout gear including bunker pants, boots, helmets and gloves. Kieltsch said when he returned to Kirkuk with the gear, the change was immediate.

"The first time we trained with the new gear, the Iraqis were so excited they were just in giggles," he said. "They've never seen this type of equipment before. It was an instant change. Before they were timid, just wanting to run in and run out, now they have masks and breathing apparatuses they can fight a fire just like an American firefighter."

An avid photographer, Kieltsch said he could fill an entire day showing pictures of his Iraqi experience. From videos of sandstorms that travel up to 40 mph covering the entire base in a blanket of dust, to photos of the scorpions and giant camel spiders he often shares his living space with, Kieltsch displays an interesting slide show.

But for Jackson Mayor Paul Sander, who was present at last week's ceremony, the most intriguing pictures were the ones showing Americans and Iraqis working together.

"This is the stuff you don't see on the news," he said. "Here you have so many good things being done, positive things, because of our efforts these people are getting trained."

But Kieltsch, who returns to Iraq Thursday, said the local contribution is just a drop in the bucket of what is needed.

"There's thousands of firefighters in Iraq that are poorly equipped. This is just nine people with better gear for their safety among the thousands that need it."

tgreaney@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 245