Eventide
By Stanley E. Halfhill

A Tour of Duty at Engine 80's

    A TOUR of duty at Engine 80's is not apt to be a dull one for a member of the Los Angeles Fire Department, now stationed there.  Days and nights are filled with the roar of powerful engines, lifting some sleek new plane into the air, or just thundering away on a test block before being assigned to the first, mentioned, but eventual, function.  Members of Engine 80's work in a bit of a different atmosphere than most Engine Companies.  They maintain a "floor watch" on the apparatus, in front of quarters.  Their "hydrant district" is largely spread out before their eyes.  Theirs is the home of the "visible alarm."  Such alarms usually present no problems of "taking a hydrant" or "laying a line" when their "worker" presents itself in the midst of a mile square of landing field.

    All of which, is by way of saying that Engine 80's is situated at a famous Los Angeles Air Port, and is housed in a neat little bungalow, on the edge of the landing field.  On the right and the left of quarters are rows of immense hangers choked with airplanes of all sizes and descriptions.  The civilian planes, grounded since the beginning of the war, are not very interesting in view of the many sinister war birds, bearing the air force insignias of the Allied Nations.  Private planes are much in the minority, anyway, since Uncle Sam took the field over some time ago.  Behind the hangers are long rows of khaki tents and innumerable members of the U. S. Army.  Uncle Sam has a big interest in this field.  To him, each and every one of these dull-painted fighting planes, means considerable amount out of his cash pocket.

    This then, is the home of a unit of the Los Angeles Fire Department in war time.  If military aviation had not taken over the field this year, it would probably have been just about as busy a spot, by now, if aviation plans had materialized.  The boys at 80's would have been watching the air antics of numbers of private flying students and the comings and the goings of huge passenger air transports.

    Their responsibility would have been largely the same.  They would have been on the alert every minute of the day, even as they are now for landing and take-off crashes.  A very high per cent of these accidents cause fires and with the large quantities of gasoline that the planes carry, they are, of course, bad fires and are attendant with severe life hazards.

 

To the laymen, then, who didn't get much out of the first paragraph of  this article, and the "shop" words and phrases of the fireman, such as "taking a hydrant,"  there is the explanation that a hydrant and water hose would be time-taking and ineffectual tools for the firemen of 80's to use on the usual air-plane fire.  Eighty's is equipped to carry their extinguishing agents with them on the apparatus and by their alertness, to be able to reach the scene of a crash in a very short time.  Quien Sabe?

    At any rate, the scent at Engine 80's today is one that is quite different than at any other engine house in the City.  It is becoming more like the front line of this war every day.  War paint is everywhere and that is not a figure of speech but an actuality.  Here too is seen the naked bayonet, the gun that is always manned.  Down this field rolled the wheels of the planes that bombed Tokyo.  Recently was observed the biggest, the fastest, the newest, of Uncle's weapons of the air within a stone's throw of 80's front door.  Flying Fortresses, Lightnings, Apaches, three of Douglas' most famous ships;  the new dive bomber, the well known attack model and the huge new troop carrier.  A new North American bomber, also.

    Along this stretch of concrete that fronts the hangers, and 80's too, have walked in the past such famous flyers as Major Jimmy Doolittle, Major Al Williams, Colonel Lindberg, and a host of others.  Out on this field have flown such famous flyers as the late Ernst Udet;  picking up Mary Pickford's handkerchief, with the tip of his wing, and by observation, picking up many tips for the future German Air Corps, as the Navy dive-bombed the field.  Or when the Army fighters and bombers gave precision demonstrations.

    Those were the days that air meets and air races were promoted to interest the public in the future of aviation, few then dreaming that all too soon the possibilities of aircraft would mean a ruthless war-fare;  that would have this same public looking upward for a new kind of death instead of a new king of life.  It doesn't seem probable that the public, citizens of the world, particularly appreciate that twist of progress.

    But that progress is a fascinating business to watch, as each new plane rolls off the assembly line, each one more dearly than the one before.  Each to go faster, farther, higher, and to kill a greater number than the one before.