On a normal day, paramedics load into their units and drive to a particular spot in the city and just sit, waiting for a call.

Chief Kurt Krumperman said there's a very good reason for that.

"If you see an Albuquerque Ambulance sitting out on a street, you know next to a Starbucks, they are being posted for a call, they're not just having coffee," Krumperman said.

Unlike the Albuquerque Fire Department, that has stations throughout the city, all of Albuquerque Ambulance Services' units are located and stored in one spot.

When paramedics go on shift, Krumperman said their office can be just about anywhere.

"They sit on street corners or in parking lots," Krumperman said.

But the chief also said where they park is no accident.

Dispatchers determine where to place more than 60 ambulances from a heat map that takes five years of data and predicts where calls might come from.

"Our personnel have to be prepared at all times, and continue to train in spite of the amount of rain and snow we've had lately," said Rick Merinar, district forester for the Cumberland Forestry District.

"If a wildland firefighter becomes complacent because of the [recently experienced] wet weather, then that crew member can become a liability to the rest of the crew. Being prepared is paramount in our agency."

The Division of Forestry responded to 619 wildfires across the state during calendar year 2015. Those fires burned 8581.4 acres for an average of 13.9 acres per wildfire. This was the lowest year for wildfire occurrence on record since 1922 and 1923, according to state forestry officials.

"2015 was not representative of the typical wildland fire activity that we normally see across the state" said Jim Dale, assistant district forester. "Over the past 50 years, Tennessee has averaged 2,817 wildfires per year and 32,245 acres burned.

"Since 1960, over 1.8 million acres of forests and grasslands have been burned in the state, with a high of 112,459 acres in 1987 alone. Prior to 1960, the highest recorded calendar year loss due to wildfires was in 1952 when over one million acres of Tennessee forests and grasslands burned," Dale said.


Preparing for wildfires in Tennessee forests and grasslands is not the only thing on the minds of firefighters these days. The state is slowly becoming less rural every year as more people move to and call the state home.