Female firefighters lead the way in battling blazes: The fire warriors of the İzmir Fire Department

The İzmir Metropolitan Municipality Fire Department has increased the number of female firefighters in recent years, as it has in every unit. While 15 female firefighters serve in the department, a total of 1,170 personnel work shoulder to shoulder, rushing from fire to fire.

Ayet Kütükbaş, who serves as a fire truck driver, celebrated Firefighters' Week and expressed her pride in working for the department. As one of the few female fire truck drivers in İzmir, Kütükbaş said, "I don't want to scare people who might join by saying 'it has its difficulties'; it does have challenges, but the rewards are greater. Firefighting is a profession that protects not just humans, but all living things, nature, plants, and animals. That's why it was so appealing to me and drew me in. We started our duties after receiving intensive and excellent training. Women should definitely become firefighters. No difficulty can discourage female firefighters. Our numbers need to increase. Unfortunately, there are insensitive citizens when we are on duty. We feel much more at ease when they use the zipper merge system, especially when we are heading to an incident. We also face significant problems from time to time due to illegal parking. At the scene, in narrow streets, we cannot get our vehicles close enough. This situation makes things difficult for us."

Simge Akbulut, who serves as a firefighter, was trapped under the rubble during the October 30, 2020, İzmir earthquake. Rescued and brought back to life by firefighters, Akbulut now takes pride in practicing the firefighting profession. Akbulut stated, "Unfortunately, we experienced the İzmir earthquake on October 30, 2020. My current colleagues rescued me from under the rubble. Just as I was helpless under the rubble waiting to be saved and my friends came and rescued me, I chose this profession as a firefighter currently practicing it, to save people who are waiting for help from me," she said.

Akbulut stated, “Our training is very difficult. Yes, we were challenged; but because we do it with love, we never even noticed these difficulties. We wanted to do more. Our people are generally not very used to seeing female firefighters. When we are at the scene, they say to us, ‘Excuse me, sir, could you look here?’ They are very surprised when they see me. They make comments like ‘a woman can’t do this,’ ‘what is a woman doing at a fire?’ or ‘this is a man’s job’; but we all continue to perform this duty successfully. If there are women who want to pursue this profession, such things exist in every sector. They should not pay attention to these and should chase their dreams.”

Another firefighter, Emire Betül Esin, stated, "As I was nearing the end of my high school years, I had career dreams just like every other young person. I did some research and liked firefighting. You are helping people, and it was an action-packed profession, just as I wanted. I studied it in school and was later appointed. The cases and incidents we encounter in a large city like İzmir are so diverse. You can face something different every day. There is pain everywhere you go; but the beautiful part here is that you are helping people. You become a source of hope for them."

Fire Sergeant Mehmet Güzer also emphasized that there has been an increase in fires this year compared to last year. Güzer shared the following information regarding the fires in İzmir: “According to statistics, 12 thousand fires have occurred in just the first 9 months of this year; meaning there are still fires that have not yet been reflected in the statistics for the remaining 3 months. There is a significant increase. In general, 98 percent of fires, whether they are forest fires or general fires, are caused by human error. All of them are human-caused. A large proportion is already due to cigarettes. Therefore, our citizens should be a little more careful. Working together with our women also gives us extra pride. The number of female firefighters has increased in recent years. They are all our colleagues who work 24 hours a day, they love this profession very much, and they work with great devotion.”