HOUSTON – First responders are the ones who rush toward danger. The sounds of gunfire, the raging flames, all to save lives.
Just this past Saturday, firefighters in Idaho responded to a brush fire only to be ambushed. Two firefighters lost their lives and a third was injured.
Now, firefighters in Houston are looking at how they’re prepared to respond to an attack.
“That can happen here or anywhere else within the nation,” said Captain Samantha Smith with Community Volunteer Fire Department.
“You never know when something bad might happen,” added Assistant Chief Josh Taylor of Community VFD. “It could be in Idaho one week and it could be at Houston, Texas, another week. Those firefighters and EMTs had no idea what was coming. So, that could happen anywhere in the world.”
It’s why Community VFD and other Houston departments train for these things. Their goal is to respond to an emergency, not become an emergency.
“We talk often about these what-if scenarios and making sure that we’re working through them,” Cpt. Smith said.
That includes making sure they have the right tools.
For example, every fire truck and ambulance within the Community VFD system has a bulletproof vest for every seat in the truck.
A bulletproof vest is placed in every seat of each vehicle operated by the Community Volunteer Fire Department. (Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.)
But that’s not it. The fire department has a bulletproof ambulance for those “worst-case calls.”
“Pretty much everything that you typically see inside the normal ambulance would be all compacted right here,” Asst. Chief Taylor said.
The machine is a rarity across Houston and the country. No other department in Harris County has a bulletproof ambulance.
It’s something you’d typically expect SWAT officers to jump out of.
But this piece of equipment is specifically designed to rescue people hurt in the most dangerous of situations.
“Any kind of active shooter events,” Asst. Chief Taylor said. “It’s armored, it’s bulletproof. We can drive up straight to the front door if the scene’s not safe.”
Gage Goulding: “Give me an example of when this unit has been used recently.
Asst. Chief Josh Taylor: “It recently got used as of last week on I-45. We had a young lady that was on a lawn chair on 45 and refused to get off of it. It was a dangerous situation. We’re gonna be using it for the World cup because that’s gonna be a large influx of people.”
If an ambush like the firefighters in Idaho saw were to happen in Houston, would our firefighters be able to avoid it?
“We do everything we possibly can. But at the end of the day, unfortunately, we all know that there’s just certain situations that we can’t avoid,” said Cpt. Smith.
Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.