WHN 438 – Honours for local hero
Westbury retained fire fighter Jim Shaw has been awarded a medal for long service and good conduct after 20 years in the force.
Crew manager Jim Shaw, 39, received his medal from the Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire at the annual fire and rescue service award ceremony on Tuesday 9th June.
Jim said, “It’s nice to be recognised – 20 years is a long time!”
The medal was awarded at the Wiltshire Fire Service headquarters in Potterne in front of a crowd of 160 people; including Jim’s wife, son and daughter – a testament to his ability to juggle the difficult combination of home life and fire fighting.
Jim once had three call outs on Christmas day but said the rewarding experience of fire fighting made it all worthwhile.
“It’s an exciting job. Nine times out of ten it’s interesting and is quite rewarding. You get to go to a lot of different things – I enjoy it,”he said.
When not out fighting fires, Jim works as a fabricating welder for L.A.D Southern. He said, “I’m very grateful to them because they let me respond from work. It is quite hard for retained firemen to find a boss that doesn’t mind if you run out of the door and not come back for four or five hours, or not come in to work at all because you are out on a shout. There’s not many bosses that will put up with that!”
