Ok, so today was a day that reality really hit me as to how much of an impact this job can really have on someone's life.

I rarely get to see the calls that I dispatch, rarely get to interact with the people face to face, and never before have I have seen news footage of an incident that I was directly involved in -- until today.

I was covering part of day shift Thursday morning so the Fire Chief could conduct interviews when a call for a vehicle which had gone off the road into a creek came in.

I took the initial call, contacted the Sheriff's Dept and advised medical. Nothing unusual about that, happens every week. Roughly an hour and a half later, I'm looking through the local news stations website when I see a breaking story on a vehicle which had driven off a bridge.

The exact same call that I had dispatched less than 2 hours previous.

They posted a raw video appx. 5 hours later, and I don't know if this is a normal reaction, but I was literally moved to tears. It didn't show anything, but the woman survived and is listed in stable condition.

I guess it was just the emotional impact that you don't get by being removed from the situation.

But wow..it kinda hit me - not in a bad way, just emotionally. Doesn't happen often.