Firefighting wasn’t either of their original plans, but this father-daughter duo have been fighting fires for years and recently had the chance to fight one together.
That fire was the last fire Jeff Adams, former captain of Maple Valley Fire and Life Safety, got to fight because he retired not long after at the age of 62.
His daughter, Erin Rhead, 34, is an engineer at Puget Sound Regional Fire Authority in Kent.
Jeff said he had been a firefighter for 25 years.
“Well I always say it, it was never even on my radar. I grew up in a very rural area and never really had any exposure to firefighters,” Jeff said. “So at my previous job I delivered building materials and I kept running into people that were firefighters, and eventually I knew a guy that I went to church with that got hired (as a firefighter) and I thought ‘hmm.’ I like to say that the fire service found me.”