When Melinda Sharpe began training to become a firefighter, she was the only woman in her course.<\/p>\n
While her colleagues relaxed in hotels between gruelling training days, Ms Sharpe went home to breastfeed her one-year-old baby and got her two other young children to sleep.<\/p>\n
\"I'm not a quitter so it was something I was determined to do no matter how tired I was,\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"I was up two to three times a night while I was doing my recruit course and expressing [breast milk] on my lunch break.<\/p>\n
\"[The other participants] were pretty much childfree so they didn't have the responsibilities of family life.\"<\/p>\n
She wants to inspire more women to enter the male-dominated field but warns it is not easy.<\/p>\n
Supplied: Melinda Sharpe<\/p>\n
Ms Sharpe, a former emergency department nurse from southern Queensland, passed the auxiliary course in 2017 and began on-call work at Inglewood, near Goondiwindi.<\/p>\n
She is now a full-time firefighter in Toowoomba, west of Brisbane, after three attempts at the challenging assessments.<\/p>\n
Supplied: Melinda Sharpe<\/p>\n
\"On my first two goes I failed the physical test,\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"There's a beep test, claustrophobia test, then a set of online aptitude tests that you need to pass.<\/p>\n
\"We then go to a physical test, which is quite difficult, quite intense.\"<\/p>\n
While she was physically smaller than most of the men, she was expected and determined to perform \"like any of the boys\". <\/p>\n
\"There's no difference for males or females. We all do the same testing,\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"Women are fighting to be treated equally.\"<\/p>\n
Out in her community, Ms Sharpe is working to challenge people's assumptions that fire trucks are driven by firemen. <\/p>\n
\"I've jumped out of the truck before when we've pulled up in public and you'll hear a mum say to their little child 'Oh look, the firemen are here',\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"And the mum will see me. <\/p>\n
ABC Southern Queensland: Lucy Robinson<\/p>\n
\"I'm not one to jump in and correct someone but you can see that they've noticed it's not all firemen, it's firefighters.<\/p>\n
\"Just being a female out in the community will allow other females to see females in the role and maybe consider it as a career.\"<\/p>\n
Several years into the role, she is beginning to see more women enter the profession.<\/p>\n
Four women now work in Queensland Fire and Emergency Services' south-west region, up from two 12 months ago.<\/p>\n
Nursing helped prepare Ms Sharpe for some of the confronting scenes she faces as a firefighter.<\/p>\n
\"I've seen it all. I'm not fazed by gory things,\" she said.<\/p>\n
She prides herself on bringing a caring nature to the role.<\/p>\n
ABC Southern Queensland: Lucy Robinson<\/p>\n
\"I'm not saying the men aren't caring but they can be a bit more abrupt,\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"[But] there are no issues being in a male-dominated profession really. <\/p>\n
\"The only thing that's changed from my nursing is basically the tea room conversations I'm learning a lot about old cars and sport.\"<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in the emergency services, women are determined to turn around the gender imbalance.<\/p>\n
Group leader of the Dalby State Emergency Service, Tanya Mudie, has spent the past two years handmaking hundreds of hair bows for female volunteers in south-west Queensland.<\/p>\n
It's part of her self-funded 'Empowering Women' project, aimed at building up the confidence of the women in the service.<\/p>\n
\"It was very much a boys' club. There was the mentality that it was man's work that we were doing,\" Ms Mudie said.<\/p>\n
\"We do take the same tests, we have the same training, but I feel like a lot of the time the women are behind the eight ball and feel like we can't do it because we don't have that formative background a lot of men have.<\/p>\n
ABC Southern Queensland: Baz Ruddick<\/p>\n
\"For example, I'd never held a chainsaw, I'd never been in a boat.\"<\/p>\n
Ms Mudie says while the journey to success is often tougher for women, they are increasingly taking on leadership roles in emergency services.<\/p>\n
\"We're able, we're empowered, we can do it,\" she said.<\/p>\n
\"Women are finding their voice a lot more than they have before.\"<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Continued here:<\/p>\n
Female firefighters lead the charge for change and urge women not to give up - ABC News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When Melinda Sharpe began training to become a firefighter, she was the only woman in her course. While her colleagues relaxed in hotels between gruelling training days, Ms Sharpe went home to breastfeed her one-year-old baby and got her two other young children to sleep. \"I'm not a quitter so it was something I was determined to do no matter how tired I was,\" she said Continue reading