Teddy Bears to Answer Alarms With San Diego Firefighters

The staff at San Diego’s Fire Station 18 got some extra helpers Tuesday.

Instead of quelling fires, the helpers will be called upon to quell the tears of frightened children that the station’s firefighters encounter.

The helpers are teddy bears, and the San Diego Fire Department hopes they will provide comfort to child victims in a way that human firefighters cannot.

Fire trucks leaving Station 18 and 16 other stations around town will now carry the teddy bears along with their axes, hoses and other equipment, said Al MacDonald, a spokesman for the Fire Department.

If a truck’s captain sees a child who has been hurt, separated from his parents or otherwise traumatized, he’ll give the child one of the bears, MacDonald said.

“The bears give them something to hold, something to comfort them,” MacDonald said. “It makes a real big impression on the kids.”

The idea of giving teddy bears to dejected children isn’t a new one; police and fire departments in several cities across the country are now giving bears away.

San Diego officials first considered the practice after the local chapter of Telephone Pioneers of America approached them last December.

After conversations with employees in a Florida fire department about the bears’ fitness for duty, San Diego officials decided to give them a three-month trial at 17 stations, MacDonald said.

At the end of the summer, the department should have a good enough estimate of the demand for the bears so that each of the city’s 42 stations can be fully stocked, MacDonald said.

The bears are all manufactured and donated by the Telephone Pioneers, a group of retired telephone company employees who work for a number of charitable causes.

The bears, with “Hug me, I’m yours” embroidered onto them, will be available in any color as long as it isn’t red, said Mary Bernritter, the group’s treasurer.

“The children will already be traumatized, and red could represent fire or blood,” Bernritter said.

“We want the bears to be their friends.”