I SURVIVED!!!!!!

Yes i survived hell week!! whoo hoo!!! and now my hands/fingers are swollen and painful, and i have these massive bruises on my elbows/arms and my shins are sooooo sore! From Tuesday to Thursday, all we did, alllllllll day long, was rotate between 4 stations: SCBA Daily Checks, Donning and Doffing from a Pumper (Engine), EBSS (Emergency Breathing Support System), and the Maze. Daily Checks is just what it is - the routine you go through on a daily basis to check out if your SCBA (cylinder, gauges, alarms, harness, etc) are in good working order. Donnning and Doffing from the Pumper is putting your gear on, jumping on the engine, getting the SCBA on, buckling the seatbelt, unbuckling seatbelt, jumping out of the engine, and finishing by turning on your cylinder, putting your helmet and gloves on and going on air. All under 3 mins. EBSS was one of the more physical ones. Basically, you have your black out mask in your face peice, you go on air,an instructor takes you to a charged hose line, and you have to crawl/find the downed firefighter (a classmate) who has their emergency alarm going off, connect with their EBSS, then drag them to safety, without ever letting go of the hose line. It's not that bad, actualy kind of fun.... especially if you're playing the downed FF, cuz all you do is lay there... youdo get a little beat up though, cuz you really cant be gentle to drag someone like that. especially if you have to drag them over the hose line, then it gets kind of tricky. I feel good about my ability to do this b/c my last "rescue" was this guy who is easily 220lbs WITHOUT his gear and SCBA on.... sooo in full gear that would mean he was roughly 280lbs. The Maze was where a lot of ppl had issues b/c it's completely dark and you're in really tight, confined space. you have your blackout mask on and are air the whole time. Your time limit is how much air you have in your cylinder. Come test day, if you run out of air while still in the maze, you fail. I've been pretty good so far. I mentioned before we had diminished capacity, where we had to take off our packs in the dark and slide it through without letting go. Well they added Entanglement. Basically, they set up a bunch of rope lines, and when you crawl through it, you have to do the swim technique where you back up, lie on your side, holding onto the hoseline, take your right hand, go from your right hip down to the hose line, up the hose line to meet your left and then "swim" with your right hand/arm, pushing off the wall simultaneously, and then repeat. This method is how we are to get out of a tangle situation. If we're "swimming" and feel like we're caught, we have to back up, find what we're stuck on,free ourselves, then keep on swimming. This is what got ppl a lot. it's hard to try to feel what ur stuck on when you yourself have important hoses (that feel just like rope) connecting you to your air. It is a lot of fun though. Theonly part of the maze that I dont particularly enjoy is the Attic. Once in the attic, you have to stay on the rafters but turn around b/c stairs are in the corner and the only way to go down stairs is backwards and on your stomach. I think it just hurts my stomach a lil. Anyhoo, sorry about no pictures.... next time i will try