Chapter Seven
Of all the fires that we handle, I think the ones that bother me the most are the "arson for insurance fraud" type.
Usually you can tell these fires right away. They are generally set on a top floor. Usually it's a floor vacant of tenants. Nobody sees the arsonist and generally the rest of the building can be evacuated. They will be set in a back room, away from the street, in order to avoid attracting attention until they are well underway. They are set on the top floor because it's most likely to do the most damage fastest. Even if we are on the scene as soon as the fire gets going, we are probably going to punch a hole in the roof, and we are definitely going to use a lot of water, which will seep down to all the lower floors. So, you have an open roof and water damage as well as possible collapse of the top floor onto the floors below. Lots of damage, lots of money, lots of room to defraud the insurance company.
The reason these fires make us very unhappy (to call us "unhappy" about this is probably an understatement along the lines of calling the Statue of Liberty "an empty building") is twofold. One, I have seen some very good men hurt very badly all in order for some scumbag slum landlord to collect his insurance money, rebuild, and burn the whole thing again, sometimes as many as three times in five years. A thing like that can make a lifetime firefighter a little cranky.
Of equal significance is the fact that the people living in or adjacent to these properties have nothing. They are usually uninsured, have very little to begin with , and noplace to go once their home has been destroyed. The buildings are generally of such cheap composition and construction that they go up in a flash anyway, leaving virtually nothing behind. And occasionally there is also loss of life. Just because a fire is set on a vacant floor is no guarantee that the people in the floors below will get out safely.
Once a fire is made, there is little way to control it. Depending on the accelerant used, the age and condition of the building, wind conditions, and at what point the alarm is turned in, an arson fire can be one of the most unpredictable forces outside of a natural disaster. There is no controlling it. If we're "lucky" they use kerosene or another "slow" accelerant that will be slow to catch. Kerosene isn't that great either, as it is more difficult to put out than gasoline, but the fact that the fumes are not as flammable makes it a less "hungry" agent. I have seen gasoline fires that incinerated not only the building but the arsonist -- they are that quick, that unpredictable, and that hard to control.
Of course, most arsonists are not Rhodes scholars to begin with. The dumbest are usually the guys who do it themselves. They forget little details -- oxygen feeds fire, gasoline fumes are heavier than air -- and they tend to get carried away. Sometimes literally. More than one building owner turned arsonist has been caught by checking the burn units of the local hospital for admissions. This used to be illegal for confidentiality purposes, but a law enacted some years back, started in New York after a rash of arson/murders but adopted here, makes third degree burns over five percent plus of the body a "mandated report" for the treating ER and physician. The Fire Marshal must be notified.
Even professional torches slip up, particularly if they are not career arsonists. If they are pros, they know what to do and how and when to do it in order to get the biggest bang for the slumlord's insurance buck and, most importantly to them, to avoid getting caught so they can spend all their hard-earned cash on booze, drugs, whores and very ugly clothing, as they seem to believe God intended. However, if the "professional" arsonist is somebody's nephew who was paid fifty bucks to douse the place with lighter fluid, the results can be nearly as bad (and as traceable) as the do-it-yourself school. Certainly there is not usually fifty dollars worth of difference in the quality of the job, and usually it turns out Uncle Scumbag could have saved himself the fifty and gone to jail by himself. With most of these guys, it's not a matter of whether they're caught but when. Some of the slum landlords have enough money to keep it in litigation or make it go away; sometimes the Fire Marshal gets enough right off the bat to get a conviction, particularly if this is not the first time.
Anyway. The reason these fires piss us off is that innocent people are hurt. Sometimes it's the firefighters, sometimes it's the tenants, sometimes it's only the honest policyholders of the paying insurance company. Sometimes, as in what happened on the summer night I'm going to tell you about, it's all three. And occasionally the guilty will fry. That happened too on this muggy July night.
On this particular evening, after Derrico and I unsuccessfully tried to retrieve Mags' diamond claddagh necklace from the floor drain of the garage (the time-honored gum-and-stick routine, by the way, is useless -- chewing gum these days is made of some vinyl-like material that apparently doesn't adhere to much of anything but theater seats), we were discussing the borrowing of fishing equipment. We both like to fish, and since we are particularly partial to bass fishng up around Sandusky and Kelley's Island, we have quite a bit of interchangeable equipment. Usually whoever has the latest thing in lures will share, though personally I prefer the Erie Dearie; always have. But Derrico gets very excited about new technology. If a lure has a scent, a sound, a special reflective paint, anything new or different, he has to try it. He proselytizes his new discoveries with missionary fervor. "Sully," he will say, "you gotta try this new one. Have you seen the new...." He will then launch into a description of the bells, whistles, pheromones, LED displays and so forth that are guaranteed to have bass jumping out of the water and into the boat. "Sammy," I wil say, "I don't want a goddamn video game; I just want to relax and catch fish." But he gets hurt, and it's easier to just say "Thanks", shove the thing into a safe place in the tackle box, and thank him profusely when you get back. Of course, this can be carried into a joke.
One time I had him convinced that I caught ten fish using his brand new "Fishing Systems Inc." lure and a scrap of neon-pink synthetic lace. Where I got the lace is just exactly nobody's business. But where Derrico got the lace -- by buying a pair of drawers at Wal-Mart (the lace had to be identical, you see) was nobody's secret, especially when I snapped a digital photo of him holding up the goods there in the lingerie department (the drawers were huge, about Derrico-size, since he needed enough of the lace, you see) and put it on the wall of the house for all the guys to admire. Amazing what they can do with digital cameras these days -- enlargements, color enhancement....
Anyway. I was just saying to Sammy, "Hey, have you got any...." when the squawk box announced a fire at a nearby intersection. A tenement building with some cheap retail storefronts at the street, this was a building that had burned only about two years prior to this.
Apparently, this was going to be a big one. “Truck goes, engine goes,” went the instructions, and the indication was that we were first due, with a second alarm.
Being first due means that like any good hosts, we will be the last to leave and clean up after ourselves when we go, so we knew this would take awhile. Not that any of us has ever minded. We didn’t become firefighters because of the outrageously high pay and soft work. I have never, in fact, had the displeasure of working with anyone who isn’t 100% a firefighter. Oh, we’ve had a few guys come and go over the years who weren’t heart and soul, but they didn’t really last long enough to become part of the group I’d think of as co-workers. Most of us came into this because we like putting the wet stuff on the red stuff, fighting the really big ones, and because there is no greater satisfaction than saving people’s lives.
Anyway, we rolled up onto the scene and were fairly sure that this was arson. That, of course, would be the Fire Investigator’s call, but just the fact that the blaze seemed to have originated on an apparently empty top floor of the six-story building was suspicious. And of course it was in the back, making access more difficult.
The truckies got up on the roof and started to ventilate. Of all the jobs I really admire in this profession, the truckies are second only to Rescue in my book. No sane person wants to be anywhere near a fire, and especially not inside a burning building, but I’ll tell you right now, I would any day rather be in front of a fire than on top of one. Truckies are the guys the civilian thinks of as “hook and ladder” guys. I’m an engine guy myself, which means that the apparatus to which I’m assigned (that’s “firetruck” to the layman) is a pumper, carrying an engine with a 500-gallon water tank, hoses and equipment. A truckie is one of the guys you see on an apparatus with a ladder. Usually the ladder has a 50-foot reach capacity. Putting the ladder together with the center supports is a feat in itself, and is only the first step toward getting up on the roof of the building or inside of the upper stories.
Anyway, the truckies were up top, cutting a hole in the roof. They do this to allow the superheated gases from the fire to escape, preventing the fiery explosion of the building and everything (and everyone) in it. We were at the street, getting a line in off the hydrant. Had there not been a hydrant, we would have been out of luck, because it takes 250 gallons of water a minute to knock down a fire of any substance, and this one was really going. We could tell that at least half of the sixth floor of the building was involved, and the flames were perilously close to making the leap across the narrow alley separating “our” building from adjacent buildings.
The night was fairly warm, and the middle floors of the building were occupied apartments which had apparently been successfully evacuated. There were people everywhere in the street, some crying and some cheering us and some just standing there gazing up as if at the stars. Everything these people own was probably in this building and the wonder was not that they were milling around excitedly so much as that so few of them seemed upset. I guess the shock and the initial excitement were keeping everyone from thinking this through any too well, though a few people were crying and yelling.
39 Engine and 42 Truck came rolling onto the scene, second due, as well as the Battalion Chief and his driver. Our orders came to get in there and knock back the flames to the interior as well as to search for anyone trapped inside. We used an open door and took the stairs, fanning out into the smoke-filled floors, crawling along corridors in search of any straggling survivors or unconscious victims. It was, of course, black as hell in there, and with our masks and helmets on it was hard to hear clearly, but you develop sort of a sixth sense about finding life.
Cullen-the-cadet was the can man, carrying a portable extinguisher, as we went in with our Halligans and axes, breaking doors and taking out any obstructions. When we reached the fourth floor, we heard a noise behind a door. It was hard to tell but it was apparently a utility or supply closet. Derrico tried the handle -- locked. He used the axe to splinter the door but it was a pretty heavy wood door and so we used the Halligan to pry it off. The noise grew louder; it was whimpering. We shouted assurances: “You’re all right; hold on, just another second; we got you….”
Then, a portion of the ceiling started to collapse directly overhead. Avoiding it would have meant backing away from the door. It all sounds complex yet fairly obvious, but I am here to tell you that when something like this happens, you had better have good reactions, because there isn’t time to think. I reacted by jumping back, but not before I grabbed the tail of Derrico’s turnout coat to pull him back as well. Cullen was off to one side, and got knocked on his ass. A flaming ceiling beam had fallen between me and Derrico, forcing me to let go of Sammy’s coat and knocking me to the floor as well. Derrico, the hardheaded bastard, had actually grabbed onto the door handle and would not let go. The whimpering from within the closet had turned to a series of wails and moans.
“Sammy -- Sam! You hurt?” I never use his first name unless we are at a wedding or christening or unless there is an extreme emergency, and this sure as hell wasn’t the inside of a church. I could tell that he had taken a chunk of the beam to his shoulder. It lay between us, burning hotly. Cullen knocked down the flames to the beam but plaster and debris continued to fall. Derrico doggedly continued prying at the closet door, which finally gave with a cracking sound.
There, on the other side of the door, was a guy probably about our age -- hard to tell with all the smoke and the shit flying through the air. And there in his hand -- I will never forget this -- was a plastic gas can with a melted nozzle.
“You no-good son of a bitch!” I shouted. Sammy grabbed the guy and yanked him back away from the smoldering beam just in time to avoid another shower of burning ceiling debris. We had to get out of there fast. As if in tune with my thoughts, we could hear the Battallion Chief shouting on the bullhorn from the street: “All companies evacuate…All companies evacuate…”
“Cullen! GO!” I yelled.
“Sully, I got to ….” I couldn’t really hear, with the masks and such, and besides, I didn’t give a shit. Cullen is only a kid, a cadet, just started with the Department last year. “Get the hell out of here, “ I shouted, and gave him a shove in the direction of the stair.
Then I turned to check Derrico, be sure he wasn’t badly injured -- he couldn’t have sustained a hit like that and not been hurt but when you’re in the middle of a job you don’t notice right away -- adrenaline and all that. “Sammy, you good to walk?”
“Yeah, yeah. Come on, Sully, help me get this piece of shit on his feet.”
I’m not proud of my next impulse. I swung on the guy, a full roundhouse.
Derrico, with the arm that got hit, grabbed me. “Goddammit, Sully, NO. Let’s just get the hell out.”
It was dumb of me. If I had connected and knocked the bastard out, we would still have had to drag him out of there. As much as my own personal anger might have tempted me to leave him in the building he had set on fire, human life is human life, and our job is to preserve it. Who lives and who dies is up to God, and our job is to make His job a little easier by saving lives whenever we can.
Worse yet, I forced Derrico to waste precious time and energy on preventing me from hitting the guy. Another of my less than proud moments.
Anyway, we dragged the guy down the stairs (we weren’t too careful about being gentle with him, I’m afraid), and got him out to the pavement. Of all the people in that building, he was apparently the only one who had not escaped. We bundled him into a waiting ambulance. I would be willing to bet that he had to be treated for more contusions than burns; I can guarantee you that being escorted down three narrow, steep flights of stairs by two angry firefighters is not the way you want to leave any building, whether it’s on fire or not.
The building, of course, was a total loss, but we finally got it out without the surrounding properties becoming involved. And it turns out the arsonist was not just a client, he was the owner, to paraphrase the TV commercial, so it was very easy for the fire investigators to find and interview him -- he was in Metro Hospital under police guard, making their job easier if no less delightful.
EMS was waiting at the scene to assess and treat any of us that were injured and transport us to Metro if necessary. Derrico was sitting on the back of the meat wagon with a pretty young EMS standing over him insisting he go for evaluation. “Sweetheart,” he was laughing, “I got heartburn that hurts worse than this. Forget it.”
“Sam,” I said to him. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why’d you stop me? You know.”
“Because, my friend, your dumb ass is worth ten of his, and you are the one who would have regretted it.”
“Oh, Sweetheart. Can I get that in writing?” I made a kissing noise.
The pretty EMT, accustomed to these sorts of hijinks among firemen, started packing up her supplies. “Wouldn’t want to interrupt a romantic moment,” she said.
“Oh, come on, baby -- we swing both ways!” I said.
“Sully, you asshole, watch your language in front of this blushing young flower,” said Derrico.
“Can it, shitheads,” said the EMT as she snapped her kit shut, to scattered applause from the curb.
And so ended another night for 19th Engine. It left me with a lot of unanswered questions about things -- why Derrico would lay his life on the line for that piece of shit arsonist, why I didn’t connect with said piece of shit‘s jaw, what the EMT’s name is….
Probably just as well I don’t know the answers to any of them. I like surprises.
Usually you can tell these fires right away. They are generally set on a top floor. Usually it's a floor vacant of tenants. Nobody sees the arsonist and generally the rest of the building can be evacuated. They will be set in a back room, away from the street, in order to avoid attracting attention until they are well underway. They are set on the top floor because it's most likely to do the most damage fastest. Even if we are on the scene as soon as the fire gets going, we are probably going to punch a hole in the roof, and we are definitely going to use a lot of water, which will seep down to all the lower floors. So, you have an open roof and water damage as well as possible collapse of the top floor onto the floors below. Lots of damage, lots of money, lots of room to defraud the insurance company.
The reason these fires make us very unhappy (to call us "unhappy" about this is probably an understatement along the lines of calling the Statue of Liberty "an empty building") is twofold. One, I have seen some very good men hurt very badly all in order for some scumbag slum landlord to collect his insurance money, rebuild, and burn the whole thing again, sometimes as many as three times in five years. A thing like that can make a lifetime firefighter a little cranky.
Of equal significance is the fact that the people living in or adjacent to these properties have nothing. They are usually uninsured, have very little to begin with , and noplace to go once their home has been destroyed. The buildings are generally of such cheap composition and construction that they go up in a flash anyway, leaving virtually nothing behind. And occasionally there is also loss of life. Just because a fire is set on a vacant floor is no guarantee that the people in the floors below will get out safely.
Once a fire is made, there is little way to control it. Depending on the accelerant used, the age and condition of the building, wind conditions, and at what point the alarm is turned in, an arson fire can be one of the most unpredictable forces outside of a natural disaster. There is no controlling it. If we're "lucky" they use kerosene or another "slow" accelerant that will be slow to catch. Kerosene isn't that great either, as it is more difficult to put out than gasoline, but the fact that the fumes are not as flammable makes it a less "hungry" agent. I have seen gasoline fires that incinerated not only the building but the arsonist -- they are that quick, that unpredictable, and that hard to control.
Of course, most arsonists are not Rhodes scholars to begin with. The dumbest are usually the guys who do it themselves. They forget little details -- oxygen feeds fire, gasoline fumes are heavier than air -- and they tend to get carried away. Sometimes literally. More than one building owner turned arsonist has been caught by checking the burn units of the local hospital for admissions. This used to be illegal for confidentiality purposes, but a law enacted some years back, started in New York after a rash of arson/murders but adopted here, makes third degree burns over five percent plus of the body a "mandated report" for the treating ER and physician. The Fire Marshal must be notified.
Even professional torches slip up, particularly if they are not career arsonists. If they are pros, they know what to do and how and when to do it in order to get the biggest bang for the slumlord's insurance buck and, most importantly to them, to avoid getting caught so they can spend all their hard-earned cash on booze, drugs, whores and very ugly clothing, as they seem to believe God intended. However, if the "professional" arsonist is somebody's nephew who was paid fifty bucks to douse the place with lighter fluid, the results can be nearly as bad (and as traceable) as the do-it-yourself school. Certainly there is not usually fifty dollars worth of difference in the quality of the job, and usually it turns out Uncle Scumbag could have saved himself the fifty and gone to jail by himself. With most of these guys, it's not a matter of whether they're caught but when. Some of the slum landlords have enough money to keep it in litigation or make it go away; sometimes the Fire Marshal gets enough right off the bat to get a conviction, particularly if this is not the first time.
Anyway. The reason these fires piss us off is that innocent people are hurt. Sometimes it's the firefighters, sometimes it's the tenants, sometimes it's only the honest policyholders of the paying insurance company. Sometimes, as in what happened on the summer night I'm going to tell you about, it's all three. And occasionally the guilty will fry. That happened too on this muggy July night.
On this particular evening, after Derrico and I unsuccessfully tried to retrieve Mags' diamond claddagh necklace from the floor drain of the garage (the time-honored gum-and-stick routine, by the way, is useless -- chewing gum these days is made of some vinyl-like material that apparently doesn't adhere to much of anything but theater seats), we were discussing the borrowing of fishing equipment. We both like to fish, and since we are particularly partial to bass fishng up around Sandusky and Kelley's Island, we have quite a bit of interchangeable equipment. Usually whoever has the latest thing in lures will share, though personally I prefer the Erie Dearie; always have. But Derrico gets very excited about new technology. If a lure has a scent, a sound, a special reflective paint, anything new or different, he has to try it. He proselytizes his new discoveries with missionary fervor. "Sully," he will say, "you gotta try this new one. Have you seen the new...." He will then launch into a description of the bells, whistles, pheromones, LED displays and so forth that are guaranteed to have bass jumping out of the water and into the boat. "Sammy," I wil say, "I don't want a goddamn video game; I just want to relax and catch fish." But he gets hurt, and it's easier to just say "Thanks", shove the thing into a safe place in the tackle box, and thank him profusely when you get back. Of course, this can be carried into a joke.
One time I had him convinced that I caught ten fish using his brand new "Fishing Systems Inc." lure and a scrap of neon-pink synthetic lace. Where I got the lace is just exactly nobody's business. But where Derrico got the lace -- by buying a pair of drawers at Wal-Mart (the lace had to be identical, you see) was nobody's secret, especially when I snapped a digital photo of him holding up the goods there in the lingerie department (the drawers were huge, about Derrico-size, since he needed enough of the lace, you see) and put it on the wall of the house for all the guys to admire. Amazing what they can do with digital cameras these days -- enlargements, color enhancement....
Anyway. I was just saying to Sammy, "Hey, have you got any...." when the squawk box announced a fire at a nearby intersection. A tenement building with some cheap retail storefronts at the street, this was a building that had burned only about two years prior to this.
Apparently, this was going to be a big one. “Truck goes, engine goes,” went the instructions, and the indication was that we were first due, with a second alarm.
Being first due means that like any good hosts, we will be the last to leave and clean up after ourselves when we go, so we knew this would take awhile. Not that any of us has ever minded. We didn’t become firefighters because of the outrageously high pay and soft work. I have never, in fact, had the displeasure of working with anyone who isn’t 100% a firefighter. Oh, we’ve had a few guys come and go over the years who weren’t heart and soul, but they didn’t really last long enough to become part of the group I’d think of as co-workers. Most of us came into this because we like putting the wet stuff on the red stuff, fighting the really big ones, and because there is no greater satisfaction than saving people’s lives.
Anyway, we rolled up onto the scene and were fairly sure that this was arson. That, of course, would be the Fire Investigator’s call, but just the fact that the blaze seemed to have originated on an apparently empty top floor of the six-story building was suspicious. And of course it was in the back, making access more difficult.
The truckies got up on the roof and started to ventilate. Of all the jobs I really admire in this profession, the truckies are second only to Rescue in my book. No sane person wants to be anywhere near a fire, and especially not inside a burning building, but I’ll tell you right now, I would any day rather be in front of a fire than on top of one. Truckies are the guys the civilian thinks of as “hook and ladder” guys. I’m an engine guy myself, which means that the apparatus to which I’m assigned (that’s “firetruck” to the layman) is a pumper, carrying an engine with a 500-gallon water tank, hoses and equipment. A truckie is one of the guys you see on an apparatus with a ladder. Usually the ladder has a 50-foot reach capacity. Putting the ladder together with the center supports is a feat in itself, and is only the first step toward getting up on the roof of the building or inside of the upper stories.
Anyway, the truckies were up top, cutting a hole in the roof. They do this to allow the superheated gases from the fire to escape, preventing the fiery explosion of the building and everything (and everyone) in it. We were at the street, getting a line in off the hydrant. Had there not been a hydrant, we would have been out of luck, because it takes 250 gallons of water a minute to knock down a fire of any substance, and this one was really going. We could tell that at least half of the sixth floor of the building was involved, and the flames were perilously close to making the leap across the narrow alley separating “our” building from adjacent buildings.
The night was fairly warm, and the middle floors of the building were occupied apartments which had apparently been successfully evacuated. There were people everywhere in the street, some crying and some cheering us and some just standing there gazing up as if at the stars. Everything these people own was probably in this building and the wonder was not that they were milling around excitedly so much as that so few of them seemed upset. I guess the shock and the initial excitement were keeping everyone from thinking this through any too well, though a few people were crying and yelling.
39 Engine and 42 Truck came rolling onto the scene, second due, as well as the Battalion Chief and his driver. Our orders came to get in there and knock back the flames to the interior as well as to search for anyone trapped inside. We used an open door and took the stairs, fanning out into the smoke-filled floors, crawling along corridors in search of any straggling survivors or unconscious victims. It was, of course, black as hell in there, and with our masks and helmets on it was hard to hear clearly, but you develop sort of a sixth sense about finding life.
Cullen-the-cadet was the can man, carrying a portable extinguisher, as we went in with our Halligans and axes, breaking doors and taking out any obstructions. When we reached the fourth floor, we heard a noise behind a door. It was hard to tell but it was apparently a utility or supply closet. Derrico tried the handle -- locked. He used the axe to splinter the door but it was a pretty heavy wood door and so we used the Halligan to pry it off. The noise grew louder; it was whimpering. We shouted assurances: “You’re all right; hold on, just another second; we got you….”
Then, a portion of the ceiling started to collapse directly overhead. Avoiding it would have meant backing away from the door. It all sounds complex yet fairly obvious, but I am here to tell you that when something like this happens, you had better have good reactions, because there isn’t time to think. I reacted by jumping back, but not before I grabbed the tail of Derrico’s turnout coat to pull him back as well. Cullen was off to one side, and got knocked on his ass. A flaming ceiling beam had fallen between me and Derrico, forcing me to let go of Sammy’s coat and knocking me to the floor as well. Derrico, the hardheaded bastard, had actually grabbed onto the door handle and would not let go. The whimpering from within the closet had turned to a series of wails and moans.
“Sammy -- Sam! You hurt?” I never use his first name unless we are at a wedding or christening or unless there is an extreme emergency, and this sure as hell wasn’t the inside of a church. I could tell that he had taken a chunk of the beam to his shoulder. It lay between us, burning hotly. Cullen knocked down the flames to the beam but plaster and debris continued to fall. Derrico doggedly continued prying at the closet door, which finally gave with a cracking sound.
There, on the other side of the door, was a guy probably about our age -- hard to tell with all the smoke and the shit flying through the air. And there in his hand -- I will never forget this -- was a plastic gas can with a melted nozzle.
“You no-good son of a bitch!” I shouted. Sammy grabbed the guy and yanked him back away from the smoldering beam just in time to avoid another shower of burning ceiling debris. We had to get out of there fast. As if in tune with my thoughts, we could hear the Battallion Chief shouting on the bullhorn from the street: “All companies evacuate…All companies evacuate…”
“Cullen! GO!” I yelled.
“Sully, I got to ….” I couldn’t really hear, with the masks and such, and besides, I didn’t give a shit. Cullen is only a kid, a cadet, just started with the Department last year. “Get the hell out of here, “ I shouted, and gave him a shove in the direction of the stair.
Then I turned to check Derrico, be sure he wasn’t badly injured -- he couldn’t have sustained a hit like that and not been hurt but when you’re in the middle of a job you don’t notice right away -- adrenaline and all that. “Sammy, you good to walk?”
“Yeah, yeah. Come on, Sully, help me get this piece of shit on his feet.”
I’m not proud of my next impulse. I swung on the guy, a full roundhouse.
Derrico, with the arm that got hit, grabbed me. “Goddammit, Sully, NO. Let’s just get the hell out.”
It was dumb of me. If I had connected and knocked the bastard out, we would still have had to drag him out of there. As much as my own personal anger might have tempted me to leave him in the building he had set on fire, human life is human life, and our job is to preserve it. Who lives and who dies is up to God, and our job is to make His job a little easier by saving lives whenever we can.
Worse yet, I forced Derrico to waste precious time and energy on preventing me from hitting the guy. Another of my less than proud moments.
Anyway, we dragged the guy down the stairs (we weren’t too careful about being gentle with him, I’m afraid), and got him out to the pavement. Of all the people in that building, he was apparently the only one who had not escaped. We bundled him into a waiting ambulance. I would be willing to bet that he had to be treated for more contusions than burns; I can guarantee you that being escorted down three narrow, steep flights of stairs by two angry firefighters is not the way you want to leave any building, whether it’s on fire or not.
The building, of course, was a total loss, but we finally got it out without the surrounding properties becoming involved. And it turns out the arsonist was not just a client, he was the owner, to paraphrase the TV commercial, so it was very easy for the fire investigators to find and interview him -- he was in Metro Hospital under police guard, making their job easier if no less delightful.
EMS was waiting at the scene to assess and treat any of us that were injured and transport us to Metro if necessary. Derrico was sitting on the back of the meat wagon with a pretty young EMS standing over him insisting he go for evaluation. “Sweetheart,” he was laughing, “I got heartburn that hurts worse than this. Forget it.”
“Sam,” I said to him. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why’d you stop me? You know.”
“Because, my friend, your dumb ass is worth ten of his, and you are the one who would have regretted it.”
“Oh, Sweetheart. Can I get that in writing?” I made a kissing noise.
The pretty EMT, accustomed to these sorts of hijinks among firemen, started packing up her supplies. “Wouldn’t want to interrupt a romantic moment,” she said.
“Oh, come on, baby -- we swing both ways!” I said.
“Sully, you asshole, watch your language in front of this blushing young flower,” said Derrico.
“Can it, shitheads,” said the EMT as she snapped her kit shut, to scattered applause from the curb.
And so ended another night for 19th Engine. It left me with a lot of unanswered questions about things -- why Derrico would lay his life on the line for that piece of shit arsonist, why I didn’t connect with said piece of shit‘s jaw, what the EMT’s name is….
Probably just as well I don’t know the answers to any of them. I like surprises.
to be continued....
posted by CB | 4:50 PM
