Firefighters Saving Lives

Joe,

I was reading the post about the new Tower 16 and the related comments. I am not sure of the reason behind the need to know specific rescues made by Salisbury firefighters, but I believe it may be due to confronting anonymous comments. It is hard to have true dialogue when people remain cloaked behind 'anonymous' and other screen names. I can understand your views about city department management and politics as well as fiscal responsibility. The taxpayer has a right to question government practices and the government should be expected to respond to those questions. Public servants, paid and volunteer, should also afford the same opportunity to question, comment and answer. Logical and deliberate debate about whether or not the city of Salisbury has needs that require apparatus such as Tower 16 will now be lost because comments have strayed from need of certain apparatus to the need of firefighters, for nothing more than property conservation. The debate has now greatly shifted from "do we (Salisbury) need a large tower ladder" to "do (Salisbury) firefighters save lives?" While it is true in some instances police officers have arrived first at fires and saved lives (or made valiant attempts), this is because of simple logistics. Most municipalities have more police officers on duty than firefighters; most police officers are physically out on the street and have suddenly arrived at a working fire, or have been in the vicinity when the call has been dispatched. The same can be applied to EMS crews as well. However, you paint all (Salisbury) firefighters with a large brush, discrediting those who have actually saved lives or risked their own in an attempt to save life, when you challenge anonymous comments to cite specific rescues.

I was a volunteer firefighter with Headquarters (now Station 16). Some of my best friends are still members today, and are with all three Salisbury stations. When I come home to visit, I am still warmly accepted by those who know me. There are many firefighters (volunteer and career) who have made attempts and/or rescued occupants who were trapped by fire. I doubt that you will receive actual replies from Salisbury firefighters who have participated in rescues. For the most part, or at least the ones I know, in their mind that would be haughty. We do not keep a record or such of 'grabs' or 'saves', but file it away in our mind as experience, life, something between those who work together on the same shift or the same department. I believe you would find this attitude in firefighters in other departments across the country. Listing who saved who, where and when, does very little to further question the need for specific apparatus.

If citizens begin to believe that fire safety is best handled by a misguided definition of "first responders" then they shortchange themselves of all available fire protection they should be entitled to. A few years ago, three members of the Salisbury Fire Department received national recognition for their efforts in trying to save a life at a house fire. Two of the three are city police officers. So, do you (Salisbury citizens) give umbrage to the two and disregard the third because he is 'just a firefighter'? When debate about apparatus becomes debate about who saves lives, then the only logical next step (in this illogical thought) is to determine what lives are worth saving. No one should ever stoop to such a low level of immaturity. I know a number of members who have rescued or attempted rescues. Some have received national recognition, such as the late Doug Brown, while others hardly heard the word 'thanks" or "good job" from the chief at that time. Some have risked their personal safety, only to be faced with a disciplinary action due to internal politics. Some performed rescues while as a volunteer, and then again when they became career members. Others, as in the photo below, performed rescues outside of the city of Salisbury and outside of the department response area.

However, some readers will not see the rational points in this. Instead, "anonymous" will follow your call to have a list of rescues. The number of Salisbury firefighters, career and volunteer, who do their job and avoid the soap opera within the department and city, will receive another coat from the broad brush. For those, I can offer my own experience, just one personal example. On a New Years Day, before I moved from Salisbury, firefighter Todd Pruitt and I located and removed an unconscious occupant from his bedroom in an early morning house fire. The victim was a Salisbury State University student and football player, if I remember correctly, and the two of us had a difficult time trying to get him out.

Unfortunately he succumbed to smoke inhalation.

I guess since he died, then this one doesn’t count?

The fire that Harold Scott is referring to was in the eighties. They went to the rear and climbed through a window to get to the kids still inside. I believe it is that one; I was referring to, where Doug Brown got an award from Firehouse Magazine. I don’t intend to come across as challenging those who might truly consider firefighters don’t save lives, by posting my own experience, but I do challenge the silliness that goes from questioning the purpose of a specific piece of apparatus to the need for the people who use it.

The photo (actually a photo of the clipping) is from the Times, showing Fulton Bagwell and Tony Sterling (doing compressions) attending to a woman pulled from a fire in Allen, before the Allen Fire Company was formed. The person doing mouth-to-mouth is a bystander who also stopped to help. It is the Fruitland Fire Department in the background.

William (Bill) Carey