Malaysian news agency Bernama has profiled Sabah’s first woman fire station chief, Agustavia Joe Guasi, who was appointed earlier this month to a role most often occupied by her male counterparts.
Her appointment to a fire station in Lintas, Sabah was announced earlier this month.
Agustavia, 37, was first recruited into Sabah’s Fire and Rescue Academy in 2001, completing her training a year later. For the next five years, she was placed in the Fire and Rescue training department, and in 2007 was moved to Operations and Rescue. After a stint there, she was moved to the Lintas Fire Station she would one day head, before shifting again to Sabah’s Center of Operating until July 2019.
Calling herself a career-woman, Agustavia is also mother to four children, has completed a long-distance undergraduate degree in public administration at University Utara Malaysia, while also participating is some very serious rescue operations, including last year’s deadly earthquake on Mount Kinabalu.
Agustavia told Bernama that initially she had not expected to fall in love with her role so much, thinking it was mostly putting out fires and helping road accident victims, but after years on duty, she says that her job has much more depth than that.
While the youngest of three siblings says that her role is not just about the mental and physical endurance necessary, it also requires responsibility, and mutual trust to carry one’s duties.
“The career isn’t as easy as just wearing a uniform,” she said. “Some women are scared of fire, but some become the fire.”
Paging Lizzo, we have a sis 4 u.
Reader Interactions