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Oct. 12, 2005 On a quiet night this past September, I finally got to bed early. As I slept, comfortable in my bed, I was awoken at 3:30am by a fire dispatcher on my police scanner, which I leave on all the time. It was the dispatcher from the next town over from me, in Salem, Massachusetts. The initial report was for a building fire. This caught my attention. A few seconds after the initial response was dispatched, the police arrived and confirmed that there was in fact, a three story house fully involved. A minute later, and no longer than that, the first companies arrived at the scene. A second alarm was sounded. That was just the start of an hour I soon wouldn't forget. As I layed there in my bed, I listened to the brave men and women who also were woken up from a sound sleep, and dispatched to a fiery Hell, that I couldn't even want to imagine. A minute after the second alarm was sounded, I heard the Salem police dispatcher calling the fire department to notify them that they were getting 911 calls from within the structure. A third alarm was then called, and additional equipment was heading into the city from several surrounding towns. As this was going on, all available personnel were heading into the house to rescue the people trapped. These brave firefighters were going into an inferno to save strangers. I know what you're thinking, "That is their job." Well, how many of us out there would do that? Not many of us, that's for sure. As I continued to listen to these events unfold, I heard the most chilling radio call I have ever heard. One of the firefighters, that was conducting a rescue, became disoriented while carrying a crying woman out of the blaze. I could hear him calling for a ladder, and I could hear her moaning, as clear as if she was in the same room as me. He kept calling, "I need a ladder. I need a ladder" Then I heard someone call out, "Pick a window. We have ladders at every window. Find a window." At that time an SOS and a fourth alarm was called. Equipment kept flowing into Salem from all over the county. A few minutes passed, which felt like an eternity, and then, the words that everyone was waiting for, "The SOS has been lifted, and everyone is out of the building" That was an hour of my life that
I will never forget. The fire took several more hours to put out, but I
was able to drift back to sleep, knowing everyone was OK. No, I didn't
know the people who occupied that dwelling, but I do know quite a few
of
the brave firefighters that worked that early morning horror. Look, I
don't want to wake up at 3:30am to go to the bathroom, let alone get
dressed and go straight into Hell. My utmost respect to the bravery and
courage to all the firefighters in this great country of ours. I may
have said this before, and I will say it again. Thank GOD for all of
you. I sleep better knowing, that you (Our Brave Firefighters) are just
a phone call away. I've used the word brave quite often in this
article,
because that is what our firfeighters are: Brave.... |
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