“We’re uniformed, but we’re not operational firefighters.”Naylor, now a fire control officer, joined the service in 1983 as a telephone operator. Many retained firefighters later progress to become full-time personnel.And, if working within the fire service is an attractive prospect but perhaps you feel dissuaded by anything from a physical disability to suffering from mild vertigo, there are always openings in roles that don’t involve operational training. The London service, for instance, employs about 100 people in its “mobilising team” – the control room staff who take 999 calls and coordinate the brigade’s response to emergencies – and a further 800 or so professional support staff, working in finance, human resources and so on.John Naylor is in charge of the West Yorkshire fire control room, based in Birkenshaw, near Bradford. In areas such as Avon and West Yorkshire, with their mixture of urban and rural surroundings, a similar mixture of full-time and retained operational personnel is sufficient for the fire service’s task. “The youngest member of my watch is 21, and the oldest is fiftysomething, so we have a range of ages. On my training course, one guy was in his forties, and had been a retained firefighter for some time.”That’s another way into the service – as a retained, or part-time, firefighter, alongside a more regular day job. “An 18-year-old can be earning an £18,000 or £19,000 salary, moving up quickly to more than £20,000,” she says.

“And there’s a clear career path up through the ranks.”Currently, the only way to reach a high-level role in operational firefighting is to begin as a trainee and work up through the ranks, though the Government plans to implement a multi-tier entry system over the next couple of years.Not all trainees are 18-year-olds. “The service is made up of people from any walk of life, as long as you’re fit and able,” says Sean Perry, a probationary firefighter from Bristol. The upside of this, for any prospective firefighter, is that it resulted in a pay rise.As Hilary Brown says, the fire service provides great opportunities for ambitious young people. You have to want to do it, and people have to see that you love doing it in order to accept you.”The one dent in the otherwise blemish-free public image of the fire service came with the strike over firefighters’ pay in 2003. Some of the guys don’t want women in the job, because they’re in the job to impress women.”And then there are some women who find it’s just not the job for them – they expect other people to go out of their way to help them fit in You have to have the right attitude. “We often do home visits as part of our work in the community,” Grant says, “to check that people aren’t overloading their electrical sockets, or to install smoke alarms. When they see a female, people relax, because they feel less intimidated.”Of course, as in any profession with such a macho history, there are women firefighters who have a more difficult time.

“I had a great crew who all looked out for me when I was a trainee,” Grant says, “so I think it’s a shame when women come into the job and have a hard time. I might be dealing with fires, floods, a road accident or a cat trapped in a tree.” And she has seen at first hand the advantages of having female firefighters in the service. But I went to an open day at a fire station to see what the training would be like and I knew from that moment that I wanted to do it.”I love that, when I come into work, I have no idea what the day’s going to bring. Now we balance that with a range of skills, many based on communication: the ability to teach, languages, experience of working with the elderly, and so on.”Often women, or those from minority backgrounds, are better placed to perform the new tasks facing a firefighter than their colleagues. “There are people who can get into places where perhaps a white male couldn’t,” Brown argues.Carrie Grant, 33, has been a firefighter in London for four years, and loved every minute of it.

“I’d never even dreamt of it as a career; I didn’t even know there were women in the job. It requires a new set of abilities from the average firefighter.”Historically,” says Pearson, “the recruitment of firefighters focused purely on physical strength, fitness and stamina. “Of course, we still put out fires and rescue people, but there is a focus now on fire safety and awareness.”This means that the once-aloof firefighter now has an active role in the community, working to build awareness of the causes of fires among the general public, so reducing the risk of emergencies. “There has been a shift in emphasis from intervention to prevention of fires,” says Hilary Brown, human resources manager for West Yorkshire Fire Service. We’re trying to provide the best possible service to the community, so we need to reflect that community in the service.”Pearson’s words signal the fundamental change that has taken place within the fire services in recent years. The London Fire Brigade now has 163 women and 502 minority ethnic firefighters among its full-time operational personnel.