The subject of discussion at Station 51 is a surprise inspection by the fire chief that will occur sometime that day. This is played for laughs, as the guys clean the station, including the vehicles, then drive through mud puddles on their runs and have to clean the vehicles again. As between-run diversions go it's not bad. We get to see inside of Capt. Stanley's office, where he has a clock with the fire chief's face on it.
I watched this episode out of sequence because Warren Berlinger, whom I loved in the season three episode "Inheritance Tax," is in it. Unfortunately, the character he plays here, Mr. Fennedy, is mild mannered and nothing like the scenery chewing commodities trader he played in season three.
Fennedy had a heart transplant six months before, and his wife is convinced he has changed for the worse. "He's not the man I married," she says. "Not the same man at all."
Turns out she's been ragging on him about not being the same man ever since he came home with the new heart.
The paramedics get him to Rampart where Dr. Brackett tells Mrs. Fennedy that if she keeps nagging her husband he will "psychosomatically reject his heart." (Perhaps he should have said Fennedy may psychosomatically reject his wife.)
I couldn't help but think that this was probably the only acting job Berlinger ever had where his shirt came off. (He's not exactly the most svelte actor you've ever seen.)
In the end his wife cools off and everything is hunky dory.
Wolfman Jack makes an appearance as a radio station employee filming a skydiver named Lucky Collins who came down in some power lines and is suspended 30 feet off the ground. Unfortunately, Jack has nothing to do beyond explaining to Gage and DeSoto what happened. I'm surprised he took the job. Maybe he needed the money.
Although this isn't the final rescue it's the most interesting, as someone (probably stuntmen) climbed this big electrical tower to get the parachutist down. The shots of Gage and DeSoto working on Lucky are tight, so they were probably filmed close to the ground. But in the long shots you can see there really was someone hanging on the tower in a parachute and two men climbed up to get him.
Next comes an amusing dog bite scene at Rampart. Veteran actor Roger Bowen plays a veterinarian who was bitten by a boxer. He says it's an occupational hazard and plays the part well. Brackett fixes him up, and that's that.
The next emergency call is for a man who was injured while racing his car in the concrete riverbed (or whatever they call it) where the Terminator and John Connor were chased by the T-1000 in "Terminator 2: Judgment Day."
The car is upside down, and the driver has to be put into an inflatable suit so he will make it to Rampart alive.
Once he's in the hospital they determine he has hip and pelvis fractures. The suit is deflated, and the patient's pain gets bad. So the suit is re-inflated. I guess that's all they had time for because we never see the outcome of that one.
Next thing we know the firefighters have returned to Station 51, where Capt. Stanley tells them that the fire chief came by early that morning when they were on a run, let himself in and conducted the inspection. The only word Stanley got about it was that the clock in his office is two minutes slow.
That's supposed to be funny because before they knew the chief had come and gone they hid the clock so he wouldn't see it.
I watched this episode out of sequence because Warren Berlinger, whom I loved in the season three episode "Inheritance Tax," is in it. Unfortunately, the character he plays here, Mr. Fennedy, is mild mannered and nothing like the scenery chewing commodities trader he played in season three.
Fennedy had a heart transplant six months before, and his wife is convinced he has changed for the worse. "He's not the man I married," she says. "Not the same man at all."
Turns out she's been ragging on him about not being the same man ever since he came home with the new heart.
The paramedics get him to Rampart where Dr. Brackett tells Mrs. Fennedy that if she keeps nagging her husband he will "psychosomatically reject his heart." (Perhaps he should have said Fennedy may psychosomatically reject his wife.)
I couldn't help but think that this was probably the only acting job Berlinger ever had where his shirt came off. (He's not exactly the most svelte actor you've ever seen.)
In the end his wife cools off and everything is hunky dory.
Wolfman Jack makes an appearance as a radio station employee filming a skydiver named Lucky Collins who came down in some power lines and is suspended 30 feet off the ground. Unfortunately, Jack has nothing to do beyond explaining to Gage and DeSoto what happened. I'm surprised he took the job. Maybe he needed the money.
Although this isn't the final rescue it's the most interesting, as someone (probably stuntmen) climbed this big electrical tower to get the parachutist down. The shots of Gage and DeSoto working on Lucky are tight, so they were probably filmed close to the ground. But in the long shots you can see there really was someone hanging on the tower in a parachute and two men climbed up to get him.
Next comes an amusing dog bite scene at Rampart. Veteran actor Roger Bowen plays a veterinarian who was bitten by a boxer. He says it's an occupational hazard and plays the part well. Brackett fixes him up, and that's that.
The next emergency call is for a man who was injured while racing his car in the concrete riverbed (or whatever they call it) where the Terminator and John Connor were chased by the T-1000 in "Terminator 2: Judgment Day."
The car is upside down, and the driver has to be put into an inflatable suit so he will make it to Rampart alive.
Once he's in the hospital they determine he has hip and pelvis fractures. The suit is deflated, and the patient's pain gets bad. So the suit is re-inflated. I guess that's all they had time for because we never see the outcome of that one.
Next thing we know the firefighters have returned to Station 51, where Capt. Stanley tells them that the fire chief came by early that morning when they were on a run, let himself in and conducted the inspection. The only word Stanley got about it was that the clock in his office is two minutes slow.
That's supposed to be funny because before they knew the chief had come and gone they hid the clock so he wouldn't see it.
