After over 20 years of service in the Coastal Bend, Deputy Chief Erben of the Corpus Christi Fire Department is trading the South Texas flatlands for Northwestern wildlands as he heads to Spokane, Washington to serve as their Fire Chief.<\/p>\n
Erben spoke to 3NEWS on Tuesday to talk about his future in Spokane, his history in Corpus Christi, and the challenges that came with service during Hurricane Harvey.<\/p>\n
“I’m gonna be Fire Chief up in Spokane County,” Erben said. “It wasn’t something I was actively seeking. My wife and I were planning a winter trip, looking for possibly a place later on to retire to — and during our planning we found a job there. We looked into the it, and into the area, and everything seemed right.”<\/p>\n
Erben, who grew up in New Braunfels, moved to Corpus Christi in 1992, and graduated from Ray High School. \u00a0In 1998, Erben applied to become a firefighter with the CCFD. He was quickly accepted, and has served in the department since.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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\u201cMy first fire was at Limerick Apartments many moons ago,\u201d Erben said, recalling his early days with the department. \u201cMy time as a rookie was the most fun I had.\u201d<\/p>\n
A U.S. Army veteran who completed a 19-month overseas deployment as a combat engineer during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Erben said Hurricane Harvey would later test him in a different way \u2014 becoming one of the most difficult periods of his career with CCFD.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was the only time in decades that we actually had to stop responding to calls,\u201d Erben said. \u201cBalancing the safety of our firefighters and the safety of the public was very challenging.\u201d<\/p>\n
CCFD Capt. Roger Narvaez said Erben was a leader who listened to his crews and considered their input.<\/p>\n
“(He was) a very smart chief,” Narvaez said. “(He) took what his guys felt and thought into consideration when making decisions for operations.”<\/p>\n
Erben said he is ready to take on new challenges in Washington, including wildland fire conditions and winter driving.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re really flat here, and our weather patterns are different,\u201d he said. \u201cThey have a lot more timber up there. I keep getting asked if I\u2019m ready for the big wildland fires up there. I\u2019m ready.\u201d<\/p>\n
He began his career on B-shift at Station 1, serving on Medic 1, Engine 1 and Truck 1. He later promoted to driver on Engine 5, where he worked in the department\u2019s hazardous materials program.<\/p>\n
After promoting to captain on Engine 5, Erben transitioned into the rescue program, working on Engine 3 and Rescue 3. As a battalion chief, he served as Battalion 1 and Battalion 2 and acted as the department\u2019s Special Operations Coordinator.<\/p>\n
For the past nine and a half years, Erben served in operations leadership roles, first as assistant chief and later as deputy chief.<\/p>\n
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He also spent nine years with Texas A&M Task Force 1, serving as a rescue specialist, task force leader and medical unit leader. He chaired the Wildland Medical Support Committee for the Texas Emergency Medical Task Force and served as Large-EMS chair on the CBRAC board.<\/p>\n
Department officials said Erben was active in labor and management leadership, serving as a union steward, health and benefits trustee and First Vice President of Local 936.<\/p>\n
In the community, Erben is a graduate of Leadership Corpus Christi Class 44, spent 11 years with the Rotary Club of Corpus Christi and served for a decade on the Salvation Army Advisory Board.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe community of Corpus Christi has been wonderful,\u201d Erben said. \u201cThe reason I have the skill sets and opportunities I do is because of this community.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chief Erben is headed to Spokane, Washington to serve as Fire Chief, but he still remembers his first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99417,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[155,157,156],"class_list":{"0":"post-99416","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-corpus-christi","8":"tag-corpus-christi","9":"tag-corpus-christi-headlines","10":"tag-corpus-christi-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}