Volunteer Placement Profile Fire and Rescue Volunteer

Fire Department of Costa Rica Goicoechea, Costa Rica

www.volunteerbasecamp.com Fire Department of Costa Rica

Placement ID: 744 Country: Costa Rica Location: Goicoechea Placement Category: Social Services Placement Type: Emergency Services Organization Type: Emergency Services Minimum Duration: 8 weeks Language Skill: Advanced Placement Fee: None Accommodation: BaseCamp OR Host Family Months Not Available: Available all year

www.volunteerbasecamp.com Quick Facts: Placement ID: IND-744 Location: Goicoechea, Costa Rica Sector: Social Services Category: Min Duration: 8 weeks Lodging: Language: Advanced Job Description

Guadalupe Fire Station in Goicoechea, attends to the emergencies in all of the communities in the Canton and neighbouring areas. Canton homes are usually old wooden structures. Goicoechea's residents mainly consist of underprivileged, low-income families who live in houses with minimum safety conditions and contribute to most of the fires in the area. The fire station personnel usually attend to several emergencies each day and they only have 20 firemen to cover the 24 hour schedule, 7 days a week. Almost all of the firemen are volunteers. A fire and rescue volunteer at this placement would be working with Costa Rican volunteers not only attending to emergencies but may also be asked to participate in training exercises or courses for future fire fighters. It has been proven that most fires could be prevented. A fire and rescue volunteer would participate in educational activities for school children, at their schools or at the fire station, as well as activities organized by the local municipalities aimed at fire prevention. A fire and rescue volunteer needs to have had experience as a fire fighter. The organization also requests a letter of recommendation from the station where the fire and rescue volunteer last worked and a copy of his firemen graduation certificate. It is mandatory to know a conversational level of the Spanish language.

Volunteer Tasks Required

Fire Emergencies

A fire and rescue volunteer must be ready at all times to attend any emergency in the area or any close community out of the Canton. A volunteer may be called to help even during time off if the emergency requires more staff.

Vehicle Accidents

A fire and rescue volunteer would participate in rescue emergencies at any vehicle accidents using the equipment provided by the station. The volunteer would also provide assistance to the Red Cross if they required the help of fire station personnel.

Education

The fire department in Costa Rica considers its responsibility to educate the general public a high priority in its list of duties; in order to reduce the number of accidents in the country. A fire and rescue volunteer would be asked to participate and share the knowledge obtained during his/her experience as a fire fighter in his/her country. Fire fighting educational lectures and/or demonstrations may be at schools or to visitors at the fire station.

Administrative Duties

www.volunteerbasecamp.com A fire and rescue volunteer may be asked to help with the inventory of equipment in order to request from the head office replacement of missing or damaged supplies/equipment. A fire and rescue volunteer may also be asked at times to answer the phone.

www.volunteerbasecamp.com Organization Details About the Organization

The constitutional law for the Fire Department of Costa Rica, stipulates what emergencies they respond to; focusing primarily on protection service, which is free and nationwide. The Fire Department of Costa Rica responds annually to over 35,000 emergencies throughout the country. The emergencies are from a vast number of sources such as: structural fires of houses and/or buildings, fires on any public or private properties this also includes mountain terrains or at landfill sites, fires on docked boats, aircraft, vehicles or emergencies involving hazardous materials. The fire department also helps in rescuing people from floods, collapsed buildings or structures, motor vehicles or even bee attacks. Under the slogan " The best way to fight a fire is preventing it " , the Fire Department of Costa Rica offers various prevention services designed to help prevent disasters from occurring. It promotes strict safety standards for all construction building, as well as construction personnel. Early childhood education through visits of students to fire stations, as well as permanent consultation services. The Meritorious Fire Department in Costa Rica has been characterized over the years, for its services in the emergency care division and the preventative efforts they have made by expanding their services into the community, making available to private and public companies, courses to strengthen the knowledge of brigades and other members, in the prevention and/or control of emergencies, when/if they occur.

When the Organization was Founded

Since 1543 there is documentation of fires in Costa Rica; on one such occasion the Aborigines burned two villages in protest of humiliations made towards their chiefs. Through the years, fires have continued to be a problem in Costa Rica, as in all known countries. Many fires are intentionally set such as those in Nicoya Esparza, Costa Rica in 1681 and in 1687 caused by hackers. This state of affairs continued even into the nineteenth century as Costa Rica still did not have a group organized to fight fires. History records that in San Jose on January 26, 1864, following a devastating fire in the house of Don Francisco & Maria Iglesias, (both Costa Ricans), induced citizens to take action towards forming a properly organized fire department. The great concerns expressed by neighbors, (following this fire), for their own safety, the lack of personnel, as well as adequate equipment to fight fires caused the Municipality of San Jose to start negotiations on February 15, 1864 towards forming an official fire department. Voluntary contributions from citizens made possible a " fire engine " to be brought from the USA which arrived in the capital on June 20, 1865. Simultaneously, the Municipality of San Jose prepared and submitted to the government, the first Official Rules of the Fire Department, which was approved on July 27, 1865, marking the beginning in the country of the Fire Department of Costa Rica.

How the Organization is Funded

The law stipulates that the Fire Department of Costa Rica receives 4% of the first payment of every insurance signed in the country. They also get funds from fines that citizens and foreigners have to pay if in a accident in Costa Rica.

www.volunteerbasecamp.com Another way that the Fire Department receives funds is by donation from private local and international companies, as well as individuals.

www.volunteerbasecamp.com Placement Location Information

Guadalupe Fire Station was built in 1963 with the support of the community who met to get donors and get the first fire engine. The land where it is located was donated by a neighbor. The building is located one block away from the main Guadalupe street which is a very commercial area where people can find supermarkets, bakeries, clothing, appliance and technology stores, banks, a post office, central park, churches from a variety of religions, hardware stores, several public and private schools. The station attend emergencies at a 37.1 square meters canton with a population over the 135000 habitants but the station also supports other stations during emergencies at cantons like Coronado, Moravia, Tibas, San Pedro, Curridabat which are around Guadalupe. At the moment they have three fire engines and one vehicle to transport support staff durring any emergency.

City Description

Goicoechea is the name of the county but the area is know as Guadalupe. Gudalupe downtown is located two kilometers way from BaseCamp Center and it is a town with a lot of commerce, where people can find almost everything. It has all kinds of shoping centers and malls, restaurants, cafeterias, internet cafes, banks, bakeries and much more. Considered as a very religious area, downtown Guadalupe is considered a very develop district but just a few minutes away there is a lot rural areas with farms, where people still produce milk, strawberries and blackberries. The public transportation is very efficient, there are around 15 lines that cross the county, every Saturday people visit the agriculture fair, where agricultures from all over the country come to sale fresh products.

Points of Interest

Goicoechea became a canton in 1981 with Guadalupe as its designated government seat. Goicoechea was named after a distinguished Franciscan priest Friar José Antonio de Liendo y Goicoechea. The early settlers made their homes in what is known today as Calle Blancos (white street), the first road in the area. From there the population continued to spread eastward, following the paths that were made, giving rise to what later was the center of the country. In 1844 the residents of San Jose headquarters were given a permit to build a hermitage dedicated to their patron Saint Joseph. Six years later, the first pastor of the village, priest Raimundo Mora, changed the patron saint as well as the name of San Jose headquarters to Guadalupe, in honor of the Virgin of Guadalupe. He also established the cemetery, which is one of the oldest works in the city. In 1855 he began building a new church located where it is today. The cultivation of coffee made up the population and economic development of the site, which from 1850 became the dominant product in the region, replacing the large tobacco fields which had been the main source of income of the original population. In Guadelupe the golden grain cultivation was introduced in 1840 by Jose Manuel Nunez, who planted and established the first court of benefit where you had a flour mill. Another important element in regional development, was the way to Carrillo, a site that was located in the vicinity of the confluence of the Sucio and Honduras, which arose from the need for coffee and grain to get through the port of Limon in order to shorten the journey to the major European markets.

www.volunteerbasecamp.com The first school was built in 1883, located in the northern part of the current park. In the administration of Jose Joaquin Rodriguez Zeledon. On August 6th, 1891 the title of town was awarded to the village of Guadalupe. Subsequently, due to the growth of Guadalupe on August 10th, 1920, the government gave the town, city status.

Weather in the Area

San José City lies in the Torrid Zone and is in a tropical rainforest. However its elevation gives it a mild climate. Under the Köppen climate classification it features a tropical wet and dry climate that borders on a subtropical highland climate. The temperature ranges between 17 and 30 °C (63 and 86 °F). Relative humidity averages 68.2% (with extremes of 55% in March and 78% in October) and the daily range tends to be between 60% and 90%, with the humidity typically dropping to the lower end of this range near mid-day and rising again during the night. It rains on an average of 170 days per year but half the rainfall pours down on only 15 of these days. The rainy season is from May to mid-November, but cloudiness and rainfall can occur during the dry season. The weather is also very windy; this decreases the temperature at times.

Transportation From BaseCamp

From the BaseCamp house walk from the main street to San Jose's downtown, it is only two blocks away. Take any bus that goes to San Jose and get off the bus at the Munipality of Guadalupe. From there, walk one block to the east and two blocks north to reach the Fire Station.

www.volunteerbasecamp.com