Eric S Neitzel

Besides a being a firefighter for over 25 years I am a Media Coordinator / Public Information Officer. I mostly work in the wildland fire community and primarily work the large scale incidents in the west but I have responded to hurricanes like Ivan, Katrina & Rita as well as other very high profile incidents. I pioneered the use of Social Media on wildland fires as a public outreach tool starting with the 2007 fire storms in Idaho and Southern California and I got in trouble for it by the large government response agencies because it didn’t fit in their old school square holes. But since then it has been adopted an essential communication tool over the years and I travel all around the US training agencies on the use of Social Media during disasters. I'm a single dad that has spent a whole lot of years working hard for the government and I love what I do but after a series of recent high profile tragic events where I lost 19 friends and colleagues on the Yarnell Hill fire in Arizona combined a serious health scare I have started to re-evaluate the "costs" to me and my little girl. So, I am on a mission to make a living by just living!!! I'm thriving in the eight trillion dollar travel industry (why not right??). My tax guy said to me last April that my life is now the perfect tax break. Building a Team: What a unique paradigm of disaster management meets adventure travel. There are a bunch of firefighters, ER nurses, emergency room DR's, Fulbright Scholars and disaster managers that have teamed up with this global 100 travel company to not only have a blast traveling the world together on vacation but eventually using this outlet to lend our skills as a team to dispatch ourselves to areas of the world that need our services without the red tape of any government to do good for free. If this is something that you would like to hear more about just get in touch with me. It's all about Saving Lives and Reducing Suffering