On-the-Job Risk-Taking; Rescuers Trained to Override Fear

Tom Hamilton had no qualms about hanging 30 feet in the air strapped in a basket used for rescuing people from buildings - though at one time he was afraid of heights.

Firefighters and emergency medical service technicians from the Purcellville and Round Hill fire companies secured the orange wire basket holding Mr. Hamilton to the side of a manually operated basket that sat on top of the 102-foot tower ladder. The firefighters and technicians worked atop a commercial building in Purcellville Plaza last month during a training exercise on the equipment.

Mr. Hamilton, a 36-year-old firefighter with the Round Hill Volunteer Fire and Rescue Company, compares his trip down to a carnival ride.

"It wasn't bad," he says. "Once you have a task you're working on, if you're concentrating on your task, you're not concentrating on your fear."

Firefighters, law enforcement officers and those engaging in other risky professions and recreational activities have to override their fears and instincts, or unconscious responses to a stimulus, to do their jobs. They do this through training and repetitive drilling that makes their responses automatic and by learning how to work as a team, metro-area physicians and public-safety providers say.

Kenny Fox, who also had acrophobia, got over his fear by thinking about his feet.

"If you're in an area up high, as long as your feet feel secure, it helps you overcome things," says Mr. Fox, 33, a technician for the Purcellville Volunteer Fire Company. Adrenaline helps, he adds. "It's the back part of fear that keeps you focused on what you need to do. That kind of blocks a lot of it out of the way."

The body has ways to cope with fear through various defense mechanisms, such as disassociation or a fight-or-flight response, says Dr. Stephen Peterson, psychiatrist and chairman of the psychiatry department at Washington Hospital Center in Northwest

"If a person develops a coping mechanism or habitual way to react to a threat, when the threat occurs, they're more prepared to deal with the fear," Dr. Peterson says. The two biggest fears firefighter recruits face are acrophobia and claustrophobia, says Capt. Corey Parker of the Purcellville Volunteer Fire Company, part of the Loudoun County Department of Fire and Rescue Services.

"The ultimate goal is to have confidence in the equipment and in themselves through a lot of repetition, through mentoring and understanding these things are present," Capt. Parker says, adding that firefighters rely on and back each other to do the job, which boosts their confidence.

"It's OK to have a fear, but the firefighters have a job to do, a mission to do, and are part of a team," he says.

Training helps those in risky professions learn the skills needed for their jobs, says Laurence Miller, a police psychologist with the West Palm Beach Police Department. They learn how to do a task in a rational and orderly way and to intellectualize the task to gain distance from it so they can do their jobs efficiently, he says.

"Intellect allows you to see the bigger picture and act accordingly with a goal in mind," says Mr. Miller, who has an independent practice in psychology in Boca Raton, Fla. He holds a doctorate in psychology.

The people who choose high-risk professions enjoy taking risks or are committed to some other aspect of the job, such as a sense of altruism, says Dr. George S. Everly Jr., associate professor of psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

"All people don't instinctually run away from danger. Some people are attracted to it," he says.

Even so, risk-takers do respond physically to danger. Their stress responses and level of arousal will increase as a matter of self-preservation, but the increase will be at a more controllable level, Dr. Everly explains. In stressful situations, the brain assesses the threat and prepares the body for a fight-or-flight response by releasing adrenaline, causing an increase in heart rate, blood circulation and muscle tension, he says.