Tomb Sweeping Day busy time for volunteer firefighters

Yin Weizeng and his team were finally able to sleep soundly after staying on guard round the clock during the Qingming Festival, or Tomb Sweeping Day, on Wednesday, when many people in his village burned incense and paper money to commemorate the dead.

Yin Weizeng, known as "Brother Firefighter" on the Web because of his volunteer work, has put out approximately 1,000 fires over the past decade. He extinguished five fires during the last three days of the holiday period, he said.

"The number of fires has been reduced a lot recently because of extreme weather conditions of snow and ice in the northeast of China," Yin, 43, said.

"We used to have 20 to 30 fires at this time of year, when local farmers used outdated practices to honor their friends or families," he said.

Fire departments in most Chinese cities are staffed by full-time firefighters. But most of China's rural communities, which account for 70 to 75 percent of the fires, are still protected by volunteer firefighters, who have become a very important force in fire safety.

To date, more than 400 volunteer firefighter service corps and over 7,700 service brigades have been established, with a total of more than 500,000 registered volunteer firefighters, according to the Ministry of Public Security.

Yin converted his home into a fire station in the Chalukou village of Dehui city, in Northeast China's Jilin province, purchased firefighting equipment and recruited young team members.

Over the past decade, Yin and six other volunteer firefighters on his team found themselves speeding off to their homes in his truck, which he turned into a fire vehicle, once a call came in. Their duty was to protect 220,000 residents and 56 factories.

But Yin said he hadn't intended to do what he is doing now until a tragedy occurred in his neighborhood that led him to become a firefighter.

It was a big fire in 2002. As a gas station owner, he was driving a full tank of oil to a station one day when he watched his neighbor's three cottages burn down in a fire driven by intense wind.

"I felt a total sadness. The homeowner was left with no money, no home and not even clothes," he said. "She even tried to go inside to save some of her valuable things, but was stopped by the fire."

"I wish that what I had been carrying was a tank of water, not oil, to help her out, but I wasn't able to do anything," he said. "From that moment, I thought of becoming a volunteer firefighter."

But Yin got off to a rough start and had to sacrifice time with his family. Yang Junhua, his wife, didn't quite understand when he first brought up of the idea of building a volunteer firefighter team.

"It was a dangerous and money-burning job. Our business had just taken off at that time and I didn't want him to risk all our savings in a career as a volunteer," she said.

Yin asked for help from Dehui Fire Department, which offered rigorous training.

Tomb Sweeping Day is one of the busiest times for firefighters. Other busy seasons include Spring Festival, when fireworks are set to celebrate Chinese New Year.

"I always feel that I owe something to the community, because it takes care of you and nurtures you," Yin said. "And there is a lot of satisfaction in being part of a volunteer firefighting job - a job not everyone can do."

Contact the writers at lvchang@chinadaily.com.cn and liumingtai@chinadaily.com.cn