the.com/fire department
People who sprint toward the building everyone else is sprinting away from.
means A public agency organized to put out fires, rescue people from danger, and respond to other emergencies.
from Straightforward compound: 'fire' plus 'department,' the latter from French département, 'a part divided off' — originally just meaning a designated branch of civic duty. Organized firefighting itself traces to ancient Rome's vigiles, but the modern municipal department — paid, equipment-based, answering to city government — took shape alongside urban growth and the insurance industry's push to professionalize firefighting away from volunteer brigades and rival companies that sometimes brawled over whose job it was to put out a blaze.
- actual calls
- most runs are medical, not fires
- origin
- ancient rome had a 500-slave fire brigade
- funding move
- rome's brigade bought burning buildings cheap first
- modern irony
- firefighters also rescue cats and cut seatbelts