..these are the men and women who come to our rescue. I think we need some water down here. Get down. Stay down. Window frames are starting to catch. This is where we have to be careful. Gentlemen, you are getting this. You are getting it. In the last year, the London Fire Brigade has been tested like never before. Helping the victims of a spate of terror attacks. And then at Grenfell, the UK's most devastating fire since the Second World War. After 30 years in the London Fire Brigade, I didn't ever expect to see anything like that. Get out! Fire! It was - It was horrific. With unprecedented access... Fall out. ..we're going behind the scenes. Right now there are, I believe, two casualties still trapped. With firefighters filming themselves on the front line, we will see what they see. To the right. To the right. Fire is a killer. It's a breathing, living thing. No-one knows where or when disaster will strike next. But when we're in danger... ..the Fire Brigade is just minutes away. We have a large possibility of an explosion. Able 2017 In June, the London Fire Brigade was confronted with one of the most terrifying fires in living memory. The tragedy of Grenfell served as a shocking reminder of the lethal threat fire poses. Whilst blazes on that scale are thankfully rare, Londoners still experience around 400 fires a week. The capital's stations respond within six minutes of being called. But increasingly the focus is on fire prevention. Firefighter Lundquist. Yes. Firefighter Nelson. Sir. Firefighter Sanchez. Yes. Firefighter Yamin. Yes. Firefighter Coolie. Yeah. Firefighter Fitzsimmonds. Sir. In Battersea, South West London, it's the start of shift for Red Watch. Red Watch, Red Watch 'shun'. Fall out. 54-year-old crew manager Aldo Diana has spent 26 years as a firefighter and is about to retire. I've had my fair share. I've seen some horrific stuff and good stuff. So it's the right time for me to go. Over the last three decades, Aldo's job has changed. He now spends more time trying to deal with fire safety. Hello? Hello, it's the London Fire Brigade. Today, Aldo and Red Watch are advising one section of the public known to be at greatest risk of fire. People who hoard. Can we come in and speak to you for five minutes? They have a register of people they classify as hoarders, who they keep an eye on. There's things I'm attached to for what other people might consider silly reasons. But there's other things which I've got no real attachment to but I don't really wanna throw them out because... ..they might have some financial value in the future. Paul has struggled with his hoarding for over 20 years. He's one of an estimated 1.2 million people in the UK who hoard. Where are you, Paul, are you through the back? In terms of what we do, we try and come out and speak to you about, erm, hoarding, to try and see if you can maybe, erm, cut back a little bit on some of the stuff you've got in your house because it's a fire risk. Last year in the UK, almost 30% of fire fatalities came from hoarders' homes. Firefighters use an internationally recognised scale of hoarding called the clutter rating. Level nine is the most extreme. This one's quite loaded. It's got to be seven or eight. It's a lot, isn't it? It's quite high up. It bothers me if I think about it too much, but on a day to day basis, I just accept it. There's a lot of combustible material here that could go up. The bin, which has got a plastic bag in, has got cardboard and tissues. So if he doesn't put that cigarette out properly, it can smoulder. Erm, not good. But...all we can do is advise them. It's down to them then to take it on board. Paul, thank you very much. You're welcome. Thank you very much for chatting. Right. See you later. Bye. If he was in the back room and you knew you had to do a rescue, thick black smoke, you're not gonna know where you're going so it's all by touch and by feel. It's a massive risk for us firefighters to deal with something like that. But...it's what we do. It's impossible for the London Fire Brigade to get their message through to all of the city's thousands of hoarders. A call has come in. The home of someone the Fire Brigade would classify as a level-nine hoarder is ablaze. "Fire Brigade." "Yeah, hi. Erm, the burglar or fire alarm's gone off." "Is there any sign of smoke or just the alarm, as far as you know?" "I thought I could smell smoke." "You could smell smoke, yeah?" "I think so, yes." "OK. We're on the way." Eight fire engines from nearby stations are on the scene. Have you been down there? That is - That is level nine, mate. That is. We ain't getting in there very easy. The sheer volume of combustible material means the fire risks spreading not just upstairs, but to the neighbouring homes. Firefighter Chris Evans is one of the first on the scene. Yeah, the adrenaline gets going. Especially when you're getting all the smoke in the street. You think, "Hello". It's always in the back of your mind, "Is there somebody in there?" Also the heat hits you straight away. Fortunately, the owner has escaped without injury. It looks to me, then, that that middle room, that's where it is. Yeah. Apparently the floor's sort of gone and that's burning. As the crew gear up with breathing apparatus, firefighter Chris struggles to find a way through. Visibility is zero. You can't see your hand in front of your face. Erm, and it's a case of using your senses that you've got left. When we went in through a little corridor there's stuff on the floor you need to get past. Found the room where the fire seems to be. Couldn't get in there. It's impossible to move through there. Fire is coming up through the floor. And it's just getting worse and worse. We couldn't get in there to get to the seat of the fire. With poor visibility and a risk of tripping, they need to clear a path. Their only option now is to hose through the side window. With the fire out, Chris assesses the damage. I can honestly say that when I first went into what I now know is the kitchen, I thought it was a small cupboard. There's a lot of stuff in there. There's a lot of stuff in there. How that gentleman lives in there, I have no idea. You know, if the gentleman didn't have a smoke alarm, couldn't get out, then probably be pulling, potentially, a dead body out, if I'm brutally honest. 1 In my bag of goodies... ..my original Royal Marine green beret I was given back in 1984. So proud of this. Means a lot. So, so much. It's made me the man I am today. In Battersea, crew manager Aldo is getting ready for his shift. You will see some guys and they will pull their shirt out of the bag and they'll put it on and they won't even bother to iron it and that really gets my goat. With Aldo leaving, a new recruit is being brought in. Before I joined the Fire Brigade, I was working in an office and before that I went to uni. Got a degree in economics and business and realised that I needed a job that was a bit more active. This is the first rookie Battersea Red Watch has had in four years. 25-year-old graduate Joe Fitzsimmonds. Come in. Hi. Firefighter Fitzsimmons. How are you? Good, thank you. How are you? I'm Stewart. I'm Watch Manager Brown. Welcome to the Watch. Thank you. Do you wanna grab a seat? This is Crew Manager Aldo Diana. Hi, Joe. Hi there. He'll be looking after you on the Watch. How was your training? Yeah, really good. Yeah, so, all ready to do time on the fire station. Yeah, looking forward to it. Excellent. 'A little bit nervous, obviously the first day. Just finished 11 weeks of training.' Everyone listening? This is Joe. New boy. Joe. Hello there. Jonas, Mike, Tim, Marcus and Badger. Being in the uniform feels sort of great. When it comes to sort of a dream, as well as like an astronaut or a pilot, every kid has them sort of dreams and I just feel quite lucky that I'm able to live one of mine. Joe has a lot to learn. But everyone's keen to take him under their wing. Look at your steps, Joe. It's right leg, right arm, left leg, left arm. Leg round, body against the pole. And it's literally just leg, arm, leg, arm. And then slide. You try it now. Can you be careful with that tool, guys? Hang on, hang on. Stop, stop. Stop, stop, stop. Stop a sec. Well, all right. Just leave go. 'I think it's like a weird family here. With Aldo sort of being the grandad of it.' The tool itself opens right up, right? And you can place the tool on there. It doesn't go banging in. It goes on placed and then you close it, yeah? Right. Take it. 'The new boy Joe is looking like a rabbit in the headlights.' Joe, when the cutters get to the point where you think they've stopped, keep going. Mastering the cutters will be a vital skill for Joe. (SIRENS) Until the '80s, fire trucks had only hacksaws and crowbars. Now every appliance is equipped with specialist cutters, spreaders and chains. It's a big change from when Aldo joined. When he started in 1987, there were only a few female firefighters. Er, Al? What? In there. Tammy Macleod-Carey has been in Lambeth's Red Watch for ten years. Out of over 5,000 firefighters in the brigade, more than 300 of them are women. People are generally shocked to see a girl in this uniform. And I think a girly girl in this uniform. Erm, I do get funny looks all the time. And the standard comments. Some can't be said, about sliding down poles and things like that. How are you doing, you all right? Yeah. Tammy's husband Andy Macleod-Carey is a firefighter at the same station, but on a different watch. They take turns looking after their four-year-old son. I'm on it. 'We probably get to spend one day a week together. Which is tough, but maybe that's probably why it works.' Dinner! 'I've got a four-year-old at home and then I come into work and think it'll be nice, I'll have some nice, adult conversation. And I'm faced pretty much with the same level of conversation as my four-year-old. I'm only joking. I bring it down just as much. We got a call to a fella who had a bit of a problem. We had to relieve him of his... his imprisonment, didn't we? He had the meat and two veg stuck in this...stainless steel cock ring. It's not the first time. We're getting them all the time. Well, we've had a few, haven't we? Not all the time. How many have you had in the last ten years? About one. I've had three. Personally, I only had one. I didn't realise we'd go to so many rings stuck on penises when I joined this job, which is always an interesting one. It's fun. It's really fun. What - Where was it fun?! 'I think it would be difficult for me to be married to someone outside of this job. Because of the fact that I'm with men all day. But he gets it. He's on a watch himself so that makes perfect sense to him.' Oh, a shout. That's me. A call has come in of an incident on Westminster Bridge. 'It's a really iconic location with a lot of tourists attracted to that area.' (SIRENS) 'So, you know, thoughts are going through our heads that potentially there's another reason behind this.' 1 (SIRENS) Tammy and her crew from Lambeth are racing to an incident on Westminster Bridge. 'Where we are stationed here is really iconic. I'm always aware that this has got the potential for terrorism at any time.' It was on this bridge that just a few months later, a terrorist attack would claim five lives. 'I think that's anybody's biggest, one of their biggest fears at the moment, in the current climate.' (SIRENS) This time a coach is on fire. If the fuel tank ignites, it could cause a serious explosion. (BIG BEN CHIMES) We put the fire out now, extinguished the fire but it's still about 300 degrees down there, and a lot of fuel leaking out on the road. Re-ignition is something that you don't want. With engine fires and the oil being so hot, it could easily go off again. Tammy must ensure the engine is properly cooled so it doesn't burst back into flames. 'Me being small comes in handy a lot when it comes to fitting into small holes.' Mike? Yeah. Can you have a look how many lights are on, please? How many? Lights. How much water I've got. 'We are glorified burglars half the time. And there is always a small window or a small gap to fit through or throwing someone over a fence. You know, that is always me.' "LBC travel, I'm Joanne Webb. Big problems in London. Westminster Bridge remains closed in both directions after a coach was on fire. It's still extremely busy on both sides of the river." We're not gonna leave it till it's cooled beneath 100 degrees. At least another 20 minutes. All right. I'll keep you posted, though. What's the temperature on that now? Mike, what's the temperature? The recovery truck's here now. As soon as it's cool, it'll get on the back of there and we'll open this road up again. 30 French schoolkids were evacuated from the coach. We don't know why the bus, er... Take fire. Take fire. We'll come back, don't worry. (LAUGHTER) You'll remember us. A few months later, it was another group of French schoolchildren who were caught up in the terrorist attack on Westminster Bridge. Tammy's station took just over four minutes to arrive on scene. (BEEPING) BOY: 'Hi, Mummy.' Hello, sweetheart. Did Daddy brush your hair today? No, I can tell. 'It's hard when you get the phone call saying he misses you, but I guess any working mum goes through exactly the same thing. I'm away for a couple of days, which is tough on him sometimes.' 'Are you having a nice time at work?' Yeah, I'm having a lovely time at work. 'I miss you.' I miss you. 'I could not do a desk job. I need something different. And, erm, yeah, this job definitely gives me that.' In Merton, South London, the Fire Brigade's control room is fielding some of the 500 999 calls it takes in a day. Each year, they deal with around 7,000 hoax or non-urgent calls. Fire Brigade. Really? OK, so you're stuck in your chair at the moment, because the foot rest is stuck. OK. What do you mean, it's snapped? But nothing's on fire? His garage door's broken. Obviously we won't be going. Time wasters put added pressure on a service already stretched to the very limit. On average, they're called out over 250 times a day. And over 5,000 calls a year are to road traffic accidents. In South West London, fire engines are mobilising to a crash, where a man is trapped, suffering with potentially serious spinal injuries. One adult male. 50 years old. NBT. Wimbledon's Blue Watch manager, Stuart Butler, is overseeing the incident. The casualty's got potential neck spinal injuries, which is why the LAS have got a neck brace on the casualty. But we've got someone in the back of the car supporting the casualty's head. Moving the car can affect those injuries to the point where you could disable them. He's got some very severe neck pain, causing him, we'll say, some numbness in his legs. Worst-case scenario, could be left paralysed so he needs to have a CT scan, x-ray so they know the extent of the damage. Firefighters need to cut him out... ..and get him to hospital quickly. But a wrong move could end in paralysis. We need to go round, stabilise all the time. So they can come in and get him out, OK? Crew manager Andy Wilson oversees his team as they begin the rescue. We'll take him out the safest way which is a full roof off. That gives us full access, we can get a full amount of people into the car... surrounding him and lifting him out safely, as opposed to just twisting him, possibly making his injuries more severe. Paramedics give him gas and air to control the pain, whilst the firefighters work to remove him from the vehicle. Cars nowadays are made of very strong steel, so all our equipment has to be able to cut through vehicles like this one. Equipment is great now. We've got new, improved cutting equipment. So you've got to take the weight of the roof and the direction of the roof, it's gonna come forward, OK? Everyone clear? Yep. Yep. OK. Prepare to brace. Cutting. When you're ready, make that final cut. OK. Everyone forward. Carefully. On the pavement. The paramedics now are gonna take him up and straight out the boot. OK? Ready, brace, lift. And they're all working together. The person holding the head is the most important person. They're saying when to do it. And we will go again. Ready. Brace, lift. Have you got his arm? And up. Ready, brace, lift. Good work, Darren. You're doing really well, mate. And last six inches. Ready, brace, lift. It's going really well, mate. OK, and lower. OK. Well done, guys. All happy? Yeah, all happy. He's in LAS's hands now. That should start to help with pain, right? Keep breathing the gas. It was quite a slow impact but... Jeez...my legs are numb. My chest hurts. Apart from that, I'm dandy. I'm quite happy that it went very smoothly. He came out in 25 minutes, which is very good. Bang on time. The man was taken to hospital and he was found to have no lasting injuries. 'Fire Brigade.' 'We've got a kitchen fire in our house at the moment.' 'The Fire Brigade are on their way.' 'We have a rotisserie on fire.' Although they increasingly deal with traffic accidents, the London Fire Brigade still responds to nearly 1,600 fires a week. 'Erm. Oh, my God, there's a massive fire, there's a massive fire.' In the last ten years in the UK, 13 firefighters have lost their lives in the line of duty. One of the biggest hazards is a sudden burst of fresh air which can cause an explosive and deadly backdraft. These are the dangers newly qualified rookie Joe now faces. In Battersea, South London, he's still waiting for his first shout, as he gets to know his new team. Wow, he's just "accidentally" thrown water down my leg. A bold move for a man who's just joined the job. 'I think it's very important that this career works out. It's a job I really wanna do. I wouldn't wanna go back to working in an office. I need to make sure it works out. Show that I'm keen. A nickname is a point where they sort of trust you and they've kind of welcomed you in and I've got my nickname already.' Rodders. From Only Fools And Horses. Rodney. We've decided on our Watch Night out that his nickname is Rodders. Yeah. All right, Rodders? Yep. (LAUGHTER) Standards. Standards. Look, standards. Shirt hanging out. Look. You just haven't got yourself dressed properly. Shirt's hanging out. You just pulled it out. I didn't, it was hanging out. You haven't got dressed properly. Can you show me? Your mum shows you every morning. "Come on, Joe, let's dress you before we go to work." 'Aldo is obviously looking to me to maybe sort of pass on his knowledge, his skills, so I'll be his protege. Something that he can kind of, when he leaves, go, "Yeah, I've taught him well and he's gonna do well in the job."' (ALARM) (SIRENS) Finally, Joe's first big call has come in. It's a house fire in one of London's most expensive areas north of the river. Smoke's coming from a fifth-floor attic room, making access difficult and the first risks spreading to neighbouring homes. Get 'em all open, soon as poss. After months of training, Joe will be put to the test as he faces his first real fire. Go ahead, over. Yeah. Proper fire. Finally, the kitchen. Something light. Like... Okarito? Okarito goes well with my favourite ` Opononi. (SPLASHING, YELLING) Ooh, yeah, splash of Opononi, maybe. Oh, look, Alexandra. Whoa, pink. Or... Hot Water Beach. Blue ` very relaxing. Or Alexandra. Hot Water Beach. Mm. Or Alexandra? It's like pinky, bluey. It's not very kitcheny. No, but it is pretty... nursery. Mm. Nursery? Or` Or we could go Rangitikei River. (GASPS) Oh! (LAUGHS) You little beauty! (BOTH CHUCKLE) So the nursery. The colours of New Zealand ` only from Dulux. 1 In Central London, Rookie Joe is at his first fire. It's in a fifth-floor attic. We can't get to the fire because of basically it's too hot. Too hot. So we need to try and ventilate. The crew believe the occupants are safely out, but they still have to make sure. OK, just dress it for me, please. Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus, or BA, can only go in for short periods to avoid heat exhaustion. Now you know you're going in, starting to think about what we're gonna do. Joe will only be called on if the first teams to go in need to be relieved. All right. Are you ready to go in? Are you closed? 'Everyone suddenly sort of turns it up a gear. Everything happens a lot quicker. Loads of stuff is happening at one time.' You have to be quite aggressive with this firefighting. Because otherwise we're not gonna get this. The fire can't be seen through the thick smoke, so firefighters use a thermal camera to find it. Go, go, go, go, go. It's definitely hot here. You're right. You wanna come back? Back, back, back. Come back, back, back. Let's have another BA crew, please. You didn't get to the fire? We saw it with the tank. We were there. I think it's better if we can open the windows. I saw it, yeah. Firefighters Nikki Upton and Ernie Ocar are the first BA crew to come out. Woo-hoo. There was lots of furniture. Yeah. There's a sofa in the room. It's hard to gauge the dimensions of the room. Somebody's home isn't looking too good up there. I'm hoping the further crews in might be able to make more progress if we popped a window. It will help if we get a window open. Gentleman, listen. Listen in. so you can hear me. You have got a loft and you have got a dormer over that side. Once the heat breaks that window, it'll vent out. With no ventilation, the thick smoke is 600 degrees inside. And Joe is next in. Nico, listen. One of the windows at the back has burst. Let's try and get in there. OK. They need to break the attic window to vent the smoke out. Gentleman, it will be venting now. This is where we have to be careful. This is the most dangerous time. When the windows are broken, the smoke will clear. But the fresh air could cause a potentially lethal backdraft. I can see it but it's very, very hot. I'm gonna vent. Gentleman, listen. We see it. You've got it? Yeah, we've got it. It's really hot. We're gonna have a two-minute wait. OK. OK. Come back down to the stairs, keep it at bay. You two come down. You're gonna change with these two. Yeah, Stew, can I have another BA crew, please? With the first crews overwhelmed by the heat, it's Joe's big moment as the next shift goes in. The brief is, make your way to the third floor. Right. Hose management, and then you'll be taking over from Dean and Nico. No worries. Yeah, we're going into the fire. The first proper fire I've got now. Yes. Third floor, assist crews. (BEEPING) 'It's a little bit more manic, more crazy than I thought it would be.' OK. Gentleman, you are getting this. You are getting it. (MUFFLED VOICES) We're making progress. (MUFFLED VOICES) 'It's the first time being in that sort of thing and there wasn't fire, but there were still hot points. The room was still really hot.' Gentleman, let's ease on the water. You're doing very well, shut the water off, it's good for visibility now. Shut the water off. (BEEPING) Well done, mate. Well done, Nico. All right, Deano? The heat coming off him, look. You're on fire! We all remember our first fire. You know, mine's many moons ago now but that first one's really important, just to get it under your belt. Well done, Joe. It was hot. It was a lot hotter than I thought it was going to be. I know we go into training and we do it, but... you're not moving as quickly, there's not as much going on. I think everyone's waiting for you to get your first proper where it's like a sort of, maybe a bit like an initiation. Then you are a firefighter, because you've got in, you've got dirty. Erm, so, yeah I think I'm sort of part of the crew, but they've told me now I've got to buy the cakes. It's a little tradition after your first proper, first proper job, you've got to buy some nice cakes. The fire is thought to have come from one of the most common causes of house fires, a candle left unattended, which set bedding on fire. Joe is one of the many new recruits the Brigade takes on each year. It's a highly competitive process, with thousands of people applying for each position. It's a new one for the menu, Jose. Oh, it's a difficult one. The rice is not up to scratch yet. Definitely needs some mango, mate. A bit of mango, yeah? Yeah. 28-year-old Josie Elliott was accepted into the brigade eight years ago. Three chillies on the jar, it was. Bit hot for me. 'I'm glad I'm doing what I wanted to do when I was a child. I didn't really play with dolls or anything. I wanted my brother's toys and stuff and developed into a little tomboy.' Not bad. Out of a jar. I got the toilet roll on standby for the runny nose. Oh, for your nose. Yeah, for the nose, yeah. Yeah. If anything bad happens, it'll be tomorrow, I reckon. She's based in Brixton station as part of the White Watch. Ready. Ready, brace, lift. right hand side. Three and four, sight the house. A bit more. Yep. Josie's spent her entire career with the same watch members. Right, I want some nice teamwork here, lads, all right? Where we going? Third floor, please. Extend. Keep going. People rely on you and your skills to help them in situations that they can't help themselves in. Whether they're shut in a lift or in a fire, it doesn't matter. At the end of the day, someone's called you for help. I wanna be good at what I do. It's important to me. (ALARM) Josie and White Watch are mobilising to a fire just over a mile away in Clapham. (SIRENS) 'They say three minutes of smoke kills someone, so if someone's trapped in a building, it's smoke-logged, turning up within three to five minutes is crucial, really, to that person's life.' A neighbour has spotted smoke coming from a top-floor flat and the owner is out at work. The time factor's very important, you know? You need to put things in place like water supply and the BA team need to have their sets on ready to go in. The entry control board set up. So, that first five minutes is a real rush around, let's get things into place. Time's essential, cos you've got to put that fire out. You've got to stop that fire spread. Keep going, keep going. The smoke is getting thicker, but it's a mystery where the fire is. 'If you don't find the seat of the fire as soon as possible, there could be potential fire spread through the building cavities and also through the roof where the fire goes into the roof, it's very difficult to deal with it.' (MUFFLED VOICE) 'You've got to feel around, use your hands and your feet and your brain, really.' Eddie, can you go ahead with that? With all the smoke, firefighters are having to use a thermal camera to find the fire. It's showing up extreme heat in one corner. No, no. Yeah, we found it. It's inside a - It's like an old filing cabinet there. There's always a risk of further fires. So Josie's using the thermal camera to look for hot spots that could ignite. Yes, it's pretty warm up there. I'll let the BA crew know, see if they can find anything else or put a bit more water down there just to make sure. The owner has rushed back from work and is met by the neighbour who raised the alarm. Here's your friend. I'm so sorry. She was somewhere else. I thought you were in there and I had a panic. It's thought the fire was caused by a cigarette. If that was five minutes later, could have been big. They'd probably have lost the top half of that house, so, yeah, it was a lucky escape. Smoke alarm did its job. Again. Well done. Job well done. Well done. What do you want, medals? 'Helping people, going into fires, dealing with different stuff. Different days. No day is the same. As cliche as that sounds, but it really ain't. And my family's extremely proud of me. My friends think I'm a hero just cos I wear this uniform.' 'Fire Brigade.' 'Hi, a fire's broken out in the building opposite me.' 'We're on our way. We'll be there shortly.' In the five years before the Grenfell tragedy, fires in London fell by almost a quarter. And over the last 15 years, fire fatalities had fallen by 40%. Unfortunately that has changed after Grenfell. 'Can hear my neighbour shouting for help.' 'What part of London is that?' Even small house fires can claim lives. And the biggest danger is smoke inhalation. We're on our way. A call has come in of a man who's been overcome by smoke in his flat. (SIRENS) In there it was like simply putting your hands over your eyes and then trying to navigate. Despite the emergency services' best efforts to resuscitate, it's too late to save him. We go in there to save people and do everything that we absolutely can. You know, we've done that tonight, but unfortunately the gentleman has passed away. Yeah, it's sad. It's sad to see, but you can't sort of dwell on it. The flat is now the scene of a fatality. A fire investigation team has been called in and they need to find out what happened. When London burns... 1 1 A fire in a top-floor flat, has claimed the life of a home owner. Fire investigators are now trying to piece together what went wrong. Yeah, so, erm, from the moment you first got here, if you can just run through in your own words what happened. Investigator Neil Morley needs to take statements. Whilst his colleague Barry Kent examines the physical evidence. What sort of conditions were you - A lot of black smoke. Couldn't see anything. Couldn't see that. You could feel the heat source up ahead. Just a small fire in the corner. And then as we were still trying to locate the fella, erm, just noticed his bald head. Sat in the chair. ..he came in between us on the chair. 'The focus for us is obviously the cause of the fire.' We paint a picture as we go, we look in and we look at the lifestyle, whether there's hoarding issues. We find all sorts of electrical problems, we'll be looking at candle use, smoking materials, whether we've got those laying about. Then we can start building up a list of possible causes then we go through it methodically and discount them as we go. We're looking at... burn patterns, smoke layer, anything that's a little bit out of place. So, we've got burnt material on the door frame which is obviously out of place. If you can see, there's some material in the sink area, which appears to be a curtain. We've also got down here, some sort of electrical equipment which is quite severely damaged. So...this is where we believe the fire started. Once your fire has ignited and you've got a flaming fire, quite quickly the fire would spread to those curtains and then it would run up the area quite quickly. The movement patterns of the burnt material through the flat would indicate the fire has been brought from the room of origin, which is the front room, carried through here, probably by the occupant at some point in the early stage of the fire's development. It appears that he's carried this in here and he's run some water onto that fire and then he's returned to the room of origin where he was found. Human nature's a very funny thing, but it's quite often that people will tackle a fire. It's their own home, they're proud of their own home, they wanna protect it. People just underestimate the smoke. That's the problem. They underestimate the smoke. You're rushing around a little bit more, you're starting to panic, you're breathing that smoke in without realising until it's too late and then by the time you're starting to struggle, then, you know, you are in trouble. Come on. Sorry, sir. Exactly. Nice to see that shirt's pressed. Don't forget to put creases in the sleeve next time. Yeah, dream on. Youngsters today. Back at Battersea, it's the day after Joe's first big fire. (CHEERING) 'Is Joe made of the right stuff? I think Joe will get there. I'm hoping he will.' So long as he... has a passion for the job. Cos he seems to have a good heart. He seems to have a good head on him. I think he'll make a good fireman. He'll do all right. Yeah, get the horses ready. Yeah! Yeah! As Joe takes his place on the Watch, Aldo prepares to leave. It's a very different Brigade from the one he joined. I believe it's the right time for me to go now. I think it's a young man's game. I've got, you know, a few months to go and, erm, I will be going. There is a buzz on the station, we're happy working together. (TANNOY) That's me. Sorry, I've got to go. Take my glasses! Sorry. I just like getting out there. Look. 26 years in, first man on the machine. It's gotta be done. (SIRENS) 'Fire Brigade.' 'My daughter...' 'It's my son...' 'There's a fire in the building just opposite mine.' '..heard a big, massive thud.' 'It's a real emergency.' 'I can't get out!' (MULTIPLE VOICES) 'I can hear a fire engine. I think there might be one there. I can hear one.' Subtitles by Deluxe www.able.co.nz