First Published 11/10/08

The reason that I ask is because the “why” always leads to the “how”.

Firefighter Killed While Working At A Vehicle Accident Scene.

Why was he/she killed? What was he/she doing at the time? How did it happen?

Firefighter Dies After Returning To The Station.

Why did he/she die? What was he/she doing at the time? How did it happen?

Firefighter Dies At A Structural Fire.

Why did he/she die? What was he/she doing when they died? Where was he/she when he/she died? How did it happen?

Firefighter Dies At Fire Due To Equipment Malfunction.

Why was there an equipment failure that killed the firefighter? What equipment failed, causing the death? How could that happen?

You look at the “headline” and the questions that I pose are reasonable and in my mind, are but a few of the many questions that will come post incident.

Why?

Because a firefighter died. The “why” always leads to “how”.

Take my first headline and break it down. The firefighter, based upon news reports, was struck by a vehicle who failed to slow down and move to the farthest lane. That answers the “why”. According to reports, the firefighter was returning from the apparatus with a tool when he was struck and killed. That answers the “what”.

The “how” is the question that gets most of the emotionally-charged attention and debate. Those who were at the scene or who are close to the department are immediately and irrevocably devastated by the death of their loved one. They are angered by the senselessness of it. They were there to help. Though risk is a part of the job description, DYING is not!

This death of one of their own is very personal. At this time, the only question that matters is how are we going to get through this?

The only information to be shared is the details of the memorial and funeral. This isn’t “school” and “lessons learned” will have to wait.

Emotions have paralyzed a department that, just a few moments earlier was whole and robust.

The fire academy graduation picture of the fallen firefighter is sent out across the nation. To his comrades-his grieving brothers and sisters-it is the face of their fire department. It is the face of honor, bravery, commitment, integrity and compassion. Those qualities ARE the firefighter and they resonate through the department and cannot be separated one from the other, even through death. He defines the fire department and the fire department defines him; locked together by decades of those who came before him and tempered by the finest of traditions.

And what about the rest of the nation’s fire service; the brothers and sisters, who on any given day, could die serving their fellow Man?

They must find a way to make some sense of it, to come to grips with their own mortality, to offer solace to the aggrieved and when the time is right, to ask “why”.

When the “why” is asked, which leads to the “how”, I ask, not because I speculate that someone did something wrong; I ask because I don’t want to do something wrong.

Questions are asked out of our selfish need to know, but it is incumbent upon leaders to study fatality reports to add anything that they can learn from it to strengthen their decision-making.

I firmly believe that sound decisions-right decisions-can be made and yet, have a wrong outcome. Firefighters must make their decisions based upon their knowledge through training and experience within seconds of conditions that can change within seconds and do so with the conviction and belief that everyone goes home.

A firefighter will fight fire with the strength of a hundred men, because they know that it will become a destructive and hateful monster that will grow and consume everything in its path. It will leave booby traps that will collapse upon you, gain strength from whatever it consumes, generate more energy and KILL, unless we kill it first.

It will hide under its cloak of smoke, will inhale a small breath of air and explode into a fiery fury to destroy, were it not for the firefighters standing between it and its quest.

It has been written that the fire service has a romance with Fire; that we speak to it with a certain romanticism. Fire has been the object of worship. Some will light a fire in the fireplace to “set a mood”. Others will sit around a fire and tell stories or sing songs, mesmerized by its almost hypnotic powers.

But firefighters see its ugly underbelly, its aftermath of destruction and death. There is nothing “romantic” about that. There is only hate; a hate that is manifest from the misery, pain, suffering, sadness, sorrow and fear that a fire causes.

I hate it for another reason.

I hate it because it leaves me to ask “why”, which always leads to the “how”.

Yet, I’ll never know when it is the right time to ask.

I only know that the questions will be asked as long as proven leaders-leaders who lead from the front-and firefighters with promising careers that will never be-continue to die.

God bless them.

God, please protect us.

TCSS.

The article as submitted is published under The Adventures of Jake and Vinnie© umbrella and is the intellectual property of Art Goodrich a.k.a. xchief22 and ChiefReason. It is protected by federal copyright laws and cannot be re-printed in any form without expressed permission from the author.