The Setup Interview

[dnarud13]

Hey nukediver,

Fun stuff! I get to play with some of those same toys on occasion. I prefer rad to chem; so much cleaner (the exception being when I had to dig around for a radium source in a semi-load of scrap metal that was dumped in muddy field).

[nukediver]

Hey nukediver,

Fun stuff! I get to play with some of those same toys on occasion. I prefer rad to chem; so much cleaner (the exception being when I had to dig around for a radium source in a semi-load of scrap metal that was dumped in muddy field).

We get to do this a lot; the worst was the hot, humid August day when I had to wade through the contents of a 100 cubic yard truck full of rotting garbage for a source!

[ChrisG]

Who are you, and what do you do?

My name is Chris, and I'm a fire captain and the campus emergency manager for a major public university. I'm in charge of campus emergency preparedness planning and help run our Emergency Operations Center during major emergencies. It's primarily a desk job, but I do also occasionally go out as a first responder with our engine company as well.

I'm also an intermittent disaster responder with a federal medical team called a DMAT which gets called out for major Presidentially-declared natural disasters. I joined the team about 6 months before Hurricane Katrina and spent 2 weeks in Biloxi, MS as part of the response to that. I also got sent to Texas in 2008 for Hurricane Ike - have been on call many times since, but that's my most recent deployment at this point other than exercises.

What hardware do you use?

For the mundane: a 15" MacBook Pro Retina at work for writing all those fun emergency plans, an iPad 2 for taking notes in all the meetings I attend, and an iPhone 4S for the 2 AM calls to tell me about some emergency on campus. At home, I use a 15" Dell Satellite laptop for the moment and plan to switch to either an 11" or 13" MacBook Air whenever it needs replacing.

For the more exciting: a set of Lion turnout gear, a Cairns N5A leather fire helmet (the one you see in my avi), a Scott self-contained breathing apparatus and a Kenwood VHF radio. I generally drive a marked department Ford F-150 Supercrew as my duty vehicle.

For the rare disaster response: My go-bags are a 5.11 Tactical SOMS travel bag, a 5.11 Rush 72 backpack, and a Hazard 4 MOD briefcase. We can deploy on less than 8 hours notice for a 2-week mission, so everything's kept packed and ready to grab. The main travel bag is mostly uniforms/clothing and personal care gear including a Snugpak sleeping bag, a couple MREs, toiletries, laundry supplies, and the stuff I can't carry-on (knife & Leatherman). The backpack is a 24-hour bag with one change of clothes, a hat, some basic medical supplies, personal protective equipment (helmet, gloves, eye protection, traffic vest), flashlight, headlamp and a Camelbak strapped to the outside. The briefcase has my field office supplies (I work primarily in a planning officer role for the team) with a cheap Samsung netbook, an HP H470 portable printer (battery or landline powered), some paper & forms and some other general office supplies.

For fun: I'm a casual photographer and use a Nikon D80, primarily with a Nikkor 24-120mm lens (1:3.5-5.6) from my 35mm days and occasionally with a Nikkor 75-300mm (1:4.5-5.6) for longer shots. Also use an SB-800 Speedlight in place of the built in flash most of the time. I started off in 35mm with a Nikon FM2 which I still have, though I haven't shot film in years. I'm also in the process of getting into amateur radio - taking the class right now and planning take the license exam in May. My grandfather - who passed away at 96 in November - was a long-time ham and I inherited his equipment including an Icom IC-700 HF/VHF/UHF mobile transceiver and a Yaesu FT-840 HF base transceiver. I plan to setup the Icom in my current truck (or hopefully a new Jeep this summer) after I get licensed.

And what software?

OS X Mountain Lion at work and Windows 7 Pro at home with MS Office, Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Photoshop - the usual office fare. We also use an incident management program called WebEOC to track information during major incidents, and I use a variety of web-based information gathering systems from state and federal agencies.

What would be your dream setup?

Given what I do, I'm big into portability. Most of my gear is chosen with that in mind. I use laptops instead of true desktops, and I'd love to get to the point where an iPad (or similar device) could completely replace that. My last laptop before the rMBP was a Toshiba convertible tablet purchased with the hope of using it to take notes in meetings and eliminate a lot of paper. That never worked well, but the iPad has filled that gap nicely.

I'd really love it if Apple would develop a MacBook where the screen pops off and becomes an iPad, but can be docked to have true laptop power as well. There are some hints that they're working on that, and I think it would be the best of both worlds.

[ChrisG]

Who are you, and what do you do? I'm Dana Durand and industrial hygiene technician (evaluate workplaces for chemical, ergonomic, radiation, indoor air quality, etc. health and safety).

Early in my career, I was planning on going into IH. Before I got into the fire service, I worked primarily in occupational safety and health - that's what my undergrad degree is in, and I emphasized in IH classes for my electives. My first full-time job was working for an IH, then alongside her as the Safety Engineer. My first master's degree attempt was in Environmental and Occupational Health, but I had to drop that due to a job change and then gradually moved more towards the emergency preparedness/response side. But I did do a bit of work hanging pumps and doing noise dosimetry back in the day. ;-)

[dnarud13]

...hanging pumps and doing noise dosimetry...

I'm still doing a lot of that. I was offered a fire safety position, last year, in Portland, OR, but stuck with IH only because the position offered was in Italy. As much as I like the PNW, I couldn't turn down Italy.

[ceb]

Who are you, and what do you do?

...We also use an incident management program called WebEOC to track information during major incidents, and I use a variety of web-based information gathering systems from state and federal agencies...

What? Someone else here uses WebEOC - who would have thunk it?

[jeffmac]

Jeff I am almost 100% certain I have watched demo videos you have made a while back over at sweetwater.com for the joeco blackbox recorders. Could this be true?

Guilty as charged Mike. We are the distributor for the Black Box in the US and Canada. Was up there doing a training...

[Miking]

Guilty as charged Mike. We are the distributor for the Black Box in the US and Canada. Was up there doing a training...

It's a small world after all!! Good job on the video! how do you remember all that? Is there a special discount rate for TB forum members?