Seattle Fire Department makes history with its first father-daughter duo

The Seattle Fire Department (SFD) is making history with its first-ever father-daughter duo.

Captain Gordon Wolcott pinned his daughter, Raechel Elhers at a ceremony back in March, officially welcoming her to SFD. He said he always knew she would one day follow in his footsteps.

“I know from her personality that she would do it or die trying,” Wolcott said. “She was highly athletic and aggressive and those are two of the biggest requirements for this.”

Wolcott first joined SFD back in 1992 when Raechel was just seven years old.

“All of a sudden I have all these uncles that are not actually my uncles but it’s like oh Uncle Mike is coming over, Uncle Ben is going to be here to help with this, just a huge family coming together,” Raechel said.

“I already knew how to back up a rig with hand signals as a teenager because I thought that was how you drove, I thought that was how things were.”

In 2023, SFD had 74 female firefighters and in 2024 that number dropped to 69. Raechel hopes that moving forward more women will apply to join SFD.

“We have little girls walking up to us and are like oh my gosh it’s a whole crew of women firefighters like that is the coolest thing on the planet just to show them we’re here,” she said. “Hoping that there’ll be more daughters to come.”

SFD’s application for entry-level firefighters opens on October 4th. Click here for more information: seattlefirejobs.com.

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