Women ranging from 18 years old onward were shown the ropes, ladders and oxygen tanks of firefighting on Saturday.
The Women Firefighters of Denver (WFFD) — an employee resource group for the Denver Fire Department dedicated to advocating for women firefighters — held its third-annual Project Ignite, a free two-day camp that shows women the ins and outs of firefighting.
“The media makes firefighting really glamorized,” Elaine Higginbotham, president of WFFD, said. “If you’re a senior in high school or a freshman in college and you’re thinking ‘I might want to be a firefighter, but I don’t know if it’s the career for me,’ this is the best way to come out and get the feel for it.”
The exposure event includes basic skills like throwing ladders, entering buildings with reduced visibility and wearing heavy gear — especially in the June heat — giving women a chance to test out the career before entering a nearly 13-month process of applying and training before becoming an actual firefighter, Higginbotham said.
There were 28 women attending the event aged 18 to 48. Some were already volunteers at other departments. Some just wanted to see what it was all about.
According to the National Fire Protection Association, about 89,600 firefighters in 2020 were women, only about 9% of all firefighters.
“It’s massively important,” Higginbotham said of mentoring and backing women interested in the career, noting that the number of women in the firefighting profession is currently under 5% nationwide, with Denver sitting around 6%.
“But being able to see that women can be firefighters, too, is so important,” she added. “Growing up, I never saw a female firefighter. So, this is such a unique moment, especially for our department.”
She added that all of the instructors throughout the two-day seminar are women.
“Having women from the department come out and support this event, all from different ranges of seniority, is really awesome for everybody to see,” she said.
Jade Stone, 19, and Gabby Deherrera, 20, are both volunteers for the Kiowa Fire Protection District. Both attended the event to learn more about the field and the Denver Fire Department.
Deherrera has a long line of male firefighters in her family, sparking her dream of firefighting when she was a young girl. Stone wanted to join into the medical field but also wanted to do something “badass,” she joked.
“We’re leading a pack of little girls that want to do the same thing we’re doing,” Deherrera said. “We want to be people they can look up to.”
Both noted they grew up thinking that women couldn’t be firefighters just based on gender, and they become dedicated to bucking that trend.
“We’re going to be smaller than men. We’re not going to be stronger than them,” Deherrera said. “But we train and get all the practice. We can be just as good as them.”
“It’s really important, especially in our generation, to see women stepping up,” Stone said.
