Not discounting the loss of life from vehicle accidents or health related reasons, but this article will focus on emergency scene fatalities. With the Houston incident, the total for 2013 now sits at 20 fatalities from either being struck by a vehicle on an incident on as a result of interior structural firefighting. These 20 losses are a substantial statistical anomaly as we currently show 54% of all fatalities being within those two categories. Historically heart attacks are at 46.8% with trauma and asphyxiation at 27.9% and 8.4% respectively.
These numbers should open eyes within the fire service and have everyone take a moment to reflect on our jobs and refocus on efforts to remain vigilant while operating on emergency scenes. Everyone should focus on the dangers that are inherently present and utilize our knowledge and skills to operate in the safest, yet most effective, means possible.
In reflecting on these losses, a new picture has been floating around the internet that provides a stark image of what is left in the engine room of nearly every firehouse in the country when a unit is on a run.
The image of boots left laying on an empty engine room floor is one that every firefighter will recognize as an image that means the men and woman have left on a run and not just for a ride. It is a heavy heart that finds this scene knowing those boots will remain empty forever after.
These types of images, and what they reflect, make those outside the fire service wonder what drives someone to be a firefighter and what drives firefighters to continue on after such tragedy. These questions can be summed up with two quotes from former Fire Department City of the New York Fire Chief Edward F. Croker.
“I have no ambition in this world but one, and that is to be a firefighter The position may, in the eyes of some, appear to be a lowly one; but we who know the work which the firefighter has to do believe that his is a noble calling. There is an adage which says that, "Nothing can be destroyed except by fire." We strive to preserve from destruction the wealth of the world which is the product of the industry of men, necessary for the comfort of both the rich and the poor. We are defenders from fires of the art which has beautified the world, the product of the genius of men and the means of refinement of mankind. (But, above all; our proudest endeavor is to save lives of men-the work of God Himself. Under the impulse of such thoughts, the nobility of the occupation thrills us and stimulates us to deeds of daring, even at the supreme sacrifice. Such considerations may not strike the average mind, but they are sufficient to fill to the limit our ambition in life and to make us serve the general purpose of human society.”
-- Chief Edward F. Croker FDNY circa 1910
“Firemen are going to get killed. When they join the department they face that fact. When a man becomes a fireman his greatest act of bravery has been accomplished. What he does after that is all in the line of work. They were not thinking of getting killed when they went where death lurked. They went there to put the fire out, and got killed. Firefighters do not regard themselves as heroes because they do what the business requires.”
It is my hope that every firefighter who dons the uniform takes the time each day to reflect on their chosen profession and understand what it means and what it takes to have chosen, what is truly, the best job in the world.-- Chief Edward F. Croker, FDNY,
speaking upon the death of a deputy chief and
four firefighters in February of 1908
