She is serious. Her work can be dangerous — physically and emotionally draining — and she loves it.
Lt. Dana Tindall has worked with the City of Bradenton Fire Department for almost 13 years, and her experience is on display as a training exercise plays out at the Pink Palace in downtown Bradenton.
“I think you guys are a little too high,” she advises as a very tall ladder outfitted with a blinding light and two firefighters gets closer to the window for a simulated rescue.
For a moment, the look of concentration on her face is defined sharply by the light coming from outside as firefighters draw closer.
Over the years, I’ve photographed Dana at training exercises, fires, car accidents, “passing the boot” for charity and rappelling down water towers. She teaches at fire school, volunteers for Community Haven and goes once a year to work with children at a burn camp in Indianapolis.
A greeting to Dana while she’s caring for a victim of a car accident will go unacknowledged. “I’m there when your world is falling apart. When you see us, you know it’s going to be okay.”
“I have two kids, Pete and Joe,” she says with a laugh about her Jack Russell terriers, “and I have 62 big brothers,” she says of her fellow firefighters.
“Everybody loves firefighters, we’re not there to give you a ticket, see if your house is a mess or give you a code violation — we’re there to help.”
Her plans for Christmas are to work. As most folks spend the day with their loved ones, enjoying the holidays, Dana will be spending her day working with her “family.”
“An elf’s work is never done,” she says.--photo by Tiffany Tompkins-Condie/ttompkins@bradenton.com
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