At FDIC International 2023 Opening Ceremony Day 1, Battalion Chief Daniel Sheridan from the Fire Department of New York spoke about “The Invisible Hand on the Fireground.”
“If we truly believe that the call to the fire service is indeed a ‘calling,’ then logic would dictate that He who called us to this service would take care and watch over us. A chief from another department once commented to me, ‘I may be in Command but I am not in Charge.’ As I look back over these past 37 years, truer words had never been said.
“I arrived at 17 Truck in September of 1986, and it wasn’t long before I had my first brush with death. Another probie, Frank Simpson, and I were working together this particular night. The night started out with a fully involved vacant building fire on 149th Street. We used our tower ladder to extinguish the five floors of fire. When we returned to quarters, one of the firefighters took medical leave after being hit by some roofing that flew off the building and struck him. Since Frank and I were probies, we needed to stay with the captain. A firefighter from the engine came across the floor and was assigned the roof position.
“A few hours later, we responded to another fire in the basement of a brownstone building on Alexander Avenue. Frank and I, along with our captain, who was covering for six hours, crawled into the burning basement in search of the fire. The glow was visible in a rear bedroom. The outside vent firefighter, Jimmy, did what he was supposed to do, VES (Vent Enter Search) (we didn’t have the I-Isolate back then in the acronym) the rear. Suddenly, Captain Tony Alva grabbed the two of us and screamed at us twice to get out. He recognized that the room we were in was about to flash. He grabbed us and pushed us down the hallway as the flames erupted all around us. If it weren’t for Tony and his tremendous experience, we would have been caught in the flashover.
“Christmas night that same year, Frank and I were involved in another flashover when the room we were in on the floor above in a two-story private dwelling flashed over just as we bailed out the front window. We were in the firehouse only a few months and already we had experienced two near misses. It seemed to me that the words of that chief were not too far off. Over the next few years, I was involved in many situations that always gave me pause; I’d think to myself, ‘Boy, that was close; we got very lucky on that one.
“Looking back over these past 37 years, I firmly believe that we do God’s work and He looks out for us. Now I’d like to cite just a few examples of where I believe God directly interceded in our work, God’s Work. These are all fires I personally witnessed and one that I was not at. What are the chances?
- A firefighter would fall 75 feet from the roof of a five-story tenement into a rubble strewn shaft and survive.
- A firefighter would fall through a roof of a commercial vacant factory that was fully involved, machinery all around, and land on a bed that was being used by a homeless person.
- A deputy chief being vehemently opposed to us entering a three-story vacant frame and then 20 minutes later the building totally collapses.
- A battalion chief operating at a five-story vacant building with fire on three floors. As engines and a ladder company operated on each floor along with the Rescue and Squad, he asked his aid as an afterthought if there was any CIDS (Critical Info Dispatch System) on the building and the aid replied a minute later, ‘Yes, Chief, UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL ANYONE ENTER BUILDING.’ He pulls everyone out and the building pancake collapses.
- On the advice of a random engineer, Deputy Chief Tommy Fox pulls everyone off the pile at the World Trade Center and then nothing happens. He feels foolish. The next day, a weird looking civilian in a blue suit and white hat tells him to pull everyone off the pile. There were lots of firefighters working the pile. As soon as everyone is off, the pile caves in. The firefighters all would have been buried alive.
“I have many more stories, but I’d like to tell this last one in full detail. It happened on Christmas Eve 1990 and not only is it special because of that but because I feel that the Spirit of Harry Hoey, Ladder 17, who was killed while operating the tower ladder bucket rescuing an elderly couple from the roof at a fire in October of 1974 was watching over us.
“About a week before Christmas, we got called for a fire in an apartment in the projects across the street. I remember having the irons, Billy Larsen had ‘the can.’ We weren’t able to get this one with the can. 60 Engine stretched a 1¾-inch handline and put out the fire that started in the Christmas Tree. This single mom of four kids just lost everything she had; there was going to be no Christmas for her and her kids this year.
“When we got back to the firehouse, we were changing our bottles, cleaning the tools, and getting ourselves ready to get back in service and Billy rallied the guys and in the spirit of Harry Hoey said, ‘We’re gonna make Christmas happen for her and her kids.’ Billy gave out assignments: We needed toys, clothes, food, furniture, and anything else that she needed; we even got diapers. The plan was to surprise her on Christmas Eve.
“I was driving the battalion. I was so disappointed. I wanted to be part of the group that was going to donate the gifts and goods to the mother and her kids. This firefighter showed up and relieved me in the truck and I slid over to the battalion. I recall thinking to myself, his gear looks like it just came out of a box, it was brand new. He came from an engine company from somewhere in Manhattan. This was highly unusual; we never got details out of the battalion, let alone the boro. He was looking around the firehouse in amazement; he’d never seen anything like this, it was the heart of the South Bronx.
“The meal was in the oven since after lunch, the firehouse was bursting with the Christmas spirit. Guys were still wrapping gifts for the kids and their own kids as well. About two hours into the tour, the guys were ready to make the donation, but the captain who was acting chief wanted to go to his firehouse to see his own guys, so I had to drive him there. I would miss the festivities. After the visit, we were going to Mass.
“After the Mass, we had dinner and we settled back into the firehouse, a few runs here and there. The truck got called out to a water leak in a high-rise fireproof multiple dwelling building. We were on another box close by. On the way back from the box, we saw 17 Truck’s rig outside the building that had the water leak.
“I could see a woman off in the distance in the middle of the street jumping up and down waving her arms frantically. My gut reaction was that something pretty horrific was happening and she needed help. I immediately radioed Billy and told him to forget the water leak, I think we got a job. As we got the car closer, I looked to my left and saw a fire blowtorching from the first-floor bodega in a five-story tenement. 17 immediately responded.
“Years later, Billy told me that the detail asked him on the way to the fire, ‘What do you see, a little smoke?’ Billy laughed because the fire was out all the windows in the rear and running up the back of the building. The engine companies began stretching their hoselines. Engine 60 started the attack from the street. Squad 41 stretched a second line to the second floor.
“I’m not too clear on what happened next, but I wound up with the captain on the second floor. I remember the squad trying to put out fire in both railroad apartments on either side. The fire was racing through the rear of the building. While all this was going on, our roof firefighter Bobby Norman was scrambling for his life; the roof was a total blackout. Billy had the outside vent; he was with Chris Blackwell from Rescue 3, and they had to bail out into the tower ladder bucket when the room they were in flashed over. He told me they were going out the window whether the bucket was there or not.
“I returned to the street and saw my replacement standing outside frozen with his can and hook. I thought that it was ok because this was a hairy situation and he was probably safer there.
“Engine 60 knocked down all the fire in the store, allowing us to get to rear of the store. Seven of us were pulling ceilings and overhauling, looking for pockets of hidden fire. We all heard a loud commotion in the front of the store. The detailed firefighter was screaming about some fire. He was very persistent, so the lieutenant in the engine said to us all, ‘Let’s go up front and see what all the fuss is about.’
“We all vacated the rear of the store and moved up to the front. When we got there, we found a few embers in the doorway. ‘This is what all the screaming was about?’ Then suddenly, there was a deafening roar. The whole rear of the building had pancake collapsed, in the exact spot where seven of us just were a minute ago.
“These are just a few of the stories that have happened in my time on the FDNY. If I thought about it hard enough, I’m sure that this Divine Presence is always with us. Think about what is happening when the general public is in dire need: They pray to God for help. Who does God send?”
