Opex Blog Launch
2022… a year that brings new promise and hope for many people following on from 2 years of lockdowns, governmental false dawns and a divided country. After launching in 2019 Opex Fire Safety grew significantly in a small space of time. But the lull many experienced during the pandemic, did slow us down somewhat. Then came 2022 and with the new year came fresh momentum that has helped to sweep us to new heights.
So as Managing Director, I thought this would be a good opportunity to start laying down some of my thoughts into a Blog, which will serve as somewhat of a personal diary over the coming months and years as we not only track Opex and the changes in the business and fire safety world, but also my own personal changes as I look at my career within the fire and rescue service, but also as I track my impending move into fatherhood, with the arrival of my wife and I’s first child in early October 2022!
As this is the first post, and if you don’t know too much about me or Opex Fire Safety, I would encourage you to take a look at our about page. But if you haven’t, in a nutshell, I am a serving Watch Commander in the Fire Service and have been for coming up 20 years (how time flies!). But with a passion for fire safety, I decided to launch Opex in 2019, initially undertaking a small number of fire risk assessments for a small number of private clients. Since then we have secured a number of contracts with a range of businesses undertaking various roles as and when required.
I often wonder what it is that I enjoy about fire safety and roles we undertake at Opex. Most within the fire service would suggest that it is an area of work that is seen as boring and doesn’t offer much in the way of excitement. There are two things I would like to say on that point.
Firstly, the role of operational crews within the fire service are no longer the same as they were 20 years ago when I joined. Back in my day (I now sound like my dad!) we went to a house fire pretty much every week. We were at RTC’s on a daily basis, and I got so fed up of changing my BA cylinder and cleaning my set 4 times a night at car fires, I often tried to get away with simply holding my breath and closing my eyes if the OIC let me get away with it! Nowadays, we are lucky to get 1 house fire every 6 months, as for car fires, I often hear the younger members of my crew chatting with excitement at the car fire we went to last week that was ‘going like f**k’ which does bring a smile to my face, as I used to be sick to the back teeth of them! So the role of the operational firefighter, isn’t as exciting as what it would seem, plus there aren’t now too many incident types that I haven’t been to, so operational incidents don’t hold the same amount of excitement for me as they once did.
Secondly, my passion for fire safety, stems from an academic desire to apply knowledge to a situation. This is often done during training events, but mostly whilst conducting complex fire risk assessments. One in particular springs to mind that I conducted last year at the Royal Chelsea Pensioners Hospital, which took 2 of us a week to do. A large, complex of historic listed buildings which would not pass any building regs inspection in modern times. Finding ways to change layouts and install products to ensure safe egress out of buildings by ageing veterans really put the grey matter to the test! But ways were indeed found, and I am looking forward to revisiting the complex later this year (August 2022).
Well for a first blog entry, I think I will halt it there. My wife and I had a scan on our wee ‘bean’ yesterday and I am pleased to report she (yes it’s a girl!) is happily wriggling away and we could see her wee legs kicking away, I still harbour hopes that she might follow in her dads footsteps with a football, but I fear her mum has other plans!