Floriane Grondin: a volunteer firefighter following in her father’s footsteps

Floriane Grondin, 28, is a volunteer firefighter at the fire station of La Plaine-des-Palmistes, a village in the highlands of Réunion, the French island in the Indian Ocean. Her father, a firefighter for 34 years, serves at the same station. Recruited at the end of 2023 together with her brother, she now chairs the station’s social association.

A long-standing vocation

Floriane Grondin joined the Réunion fire and rescue service (SDIS) as a volunteer firefighter in the recruitment round held at the end of 2023. She was 25. The wish to join went back much further. Her father has been a firefighter for 34 years, and she grew up “surrounded by firefighters, sirens and red engines”. His colleagues were role models for her and, in her words, “a real family”.

“I have always seen my father as a hero. It may be a bit of a cliché, but I have huge admiration for him and for what he does.” From her mother she took other values: altruism, empathy and a sense of responsibility. At secondary school, when a pupil felt unwell, others would turn to her to look after them until an adult arrived.

In the end it was a friend who encouraged her to apply. Joining the fire service, she explains, was a way of “giving a concrete place to this wish to help” and of gaining proper skills in caring for people.

Preparing for recruitment

Her family was surprised at first, and somewhat reluctant. The job brings to mind physical strength and danger; she stresses another side of it: “You also have to be able to think, analyse a situation, make decisions and work as a team.”

For the physical test she trained morning and evening. The written test and the interview followed, and her family lived through the preparation with her: “I must have worn them out with my preparation, making them listen to me talk again and again about the SDIS or recite my interview answers.”

Her brother sat the same tests at the same time, and both passed. For her, it is a way of “carrying on, each in our own way, this family history linked to the fire service”.

Town hall by day, fire station by night

Like most French firefighters, she is a volunteer: she serves alongside her main job. Since her first interview with the SDIS, in April 2024, that job has changed. She is now deputy director of the Sport, Community Life and Local Events departments at the town hall of La Plaine-des-Palmistes, and head of its Health Promotion service. She helps coordinate the local health contract and the Sport and Health Centre, which run prevention programmes for residents on nutrition, physical activity, addiction, inclusion and the independence of vulnerable people.

“In my job, I mostly work on prevention, while at the station I respond to emergencies.”

The two roles feed each other: “These two experiences inform one another and give me knowledge I can use in each of them.” Her working day at the town hall runs from 8 am to 5 pm, so she takes her shifts at the station in the evening, at weekends or during her holidays. She “loves being on duty so much” that she sometimes takes days off work to spend them at the station.

The ride back

With two years of service (“I’ve only got two years in my boots”), she does not single out one call. What stays with her is a moment: the ride back to the station after a difficult call. The crew commander and the crew go over the decisions taken, the difficulties met and what could have been done differently.

“Other people’s views help me see what I did well and what I can improve, and they help me gradually gain confidence in my skills.” These conversations matter for the team too: in her view, “a team’s cohesion is built as much during calls as in the discussions that follow”.

Reviving the station association

Like most French fire stations, La Plaine-des-Palmistes has an amicale, a members’ association that organises social and sporting life for the station’s personnel. Her role as its chair started with a detail. At the sports events held for Saint Barbara’s Day 2025 (Saint Barbara is the firefighters’ patron saint), the station’s small group had no printed T-shirts, unlike the other teams: “We felt a bit like the ugly ducklings.” She set up a WhatsApp group to suggest a shared T-shirt to the station’s personnel, and the idea was well received.

New volunteers were arriving at the same time. The outgoing chair, still in office, suggested to others that she take over, then came to ask her himself.

The association organises cycling and motorbike outings and pays part of the meal costs. On 13 July 2026, the eve of France’s national day, it held the station’s first firefighters’ ball, a tradition across France. The committee has five members who want, as their chair puts it, “to show that our station deserves its place just as much as those on the coast”.

F

Serving her own village

In La Plaine-des-Palmistes, many residents know one another. “Behind every call there are residents, families, sometimes faces you know.” At the town hall as at the station, she says she finds the same wish to be useful.

Wearing the uniform at the station where her father serves means something particular to her: “carrying on a family history while building my own, serving people I am attached to”.

A woman in the crew

At her station, she says, she is not treated differently from the men: “Nobody handles me with kid gloves.” She has not met any obstacle linked to being a woman. In some sensitive situations, her ability to reassure patients is an asset for the crew.

“I’m a gentle person, with character. For me, those two things are not contradictory.”

She still thinks there is a long way to go. Women remain few in the profession, and fewer still among non-commissioned and commissioned officers. “It is important that women can see themselves in these roles, progress and take on responsibilities without their place being called into question.”

Her advice

Women from La Plaine-des-Palmistes sometimes come to her with their doubts before applying. She always tells them the same thing: “You have nothing to lose, only things to prove to yourself.” And, as people say in Réunion Creole: “Pa kapab lé mor san éséyé!” You cannot say you are not capable until you have tried.

Key dates

• End of 2023: recruited as a volunteer firefighter at 25, together with her brother.
• April 2024: first interview with the Réunion fire and rescue service (SDIS).
• Saint Barbara’s Day 2025: starting point of the station association’s revival.
• 13 July 2026: first firefighters’ ball at La Plaine-des-Palmistes station.

This portrait is part of an online series that extends the feature “1976–2026: 50 years of women’s commitment” in Ligne de vie No. 1 (English edition), the historical review of the Friends of the Firefighters’ Museum of Réunion and the Indian Ocean. All portraits in the series are gathered on the Femmes des secours page (in French). Testimony collected in writing in October 2026 and translated from French. Photos supplied by Floriane Grondin. To share a testimony, in English or French: lignedevie@lemuseedespompiers.re.