Blue Flu Or Legit Sick Time?

Mobile's Fire Chief is investigating what exactly happened over the weekend when 32 firefighters called in sick. Was it an organized "Blue Flu" or was it legitimate sick time? In the meantime, he told his district chiefs to make a change effective Monday. They will go back to riding 4 firefighters to a truck instead of three. They had been riding three because of their current staffing situation. The department is short staffed and strapped for cash due to the City's budget crisis. The change was made after there were concerns about the safety of riding 3 to a truck, "we'll act on facts and if we find somebody, that somebody's violated policy we'll deal with it. If they haven't violated policy and they are within their rights underneath the personnel board rules and regulations than they can take a sick day," said Mobile Fire Chief Stephen Dean. The head of Mobile's firefighter's union doesn't believe the sick days were organized, " well I found out the previous Saturday there was 15 people that reported off, so, this was a spike, it's not an organized activity by my local or by my members that I am aware of," said The President of The Mobile Firefighter's Association, Paul Cumbaa, " if this was an organized blue flu by my local it would have probably been 70 to 80 people as opposed to 30."