By Bobby Halton
It was on a bitter cold January night in 1964 that Saranac Lake (NY) firefighters made a heroic firefight at the St. Regis Hotel and accomplished some amazing rescues. As detailed in this April 1964 Fire Engineering article (CLICK HERE to download as a PDF, 2.9 MB), firefighters successfully used a life net for three rescues. No longer in use in today’s fire service, these canvas nets, which folded out into a giant circle, were carried by ladder companies. As firefighters held the wooden handles around the outside of the net, fire victims would be urged to jump into it. This was notoriously dangerous not only for those jumping but also for those catching the jumpers. I recall that during life net training, some firefighters would injure their wrists and shoulders, sometimes seriously.
Heavy 55-foot wooden bangor ladders were also deployed to rescue guests. Many of us older firefighters recall throwing the bangors and setting the tormentor poles; one can only imagine throwing five or six of them in succession with the aid of civilians to reach guests trapped on fifth-floor window ledges. One astounding ladder rescue involved a mother and her four-year-old daughter from the fifth-floor ledge. With the little girl clinging to her neck, the mother descended the inside of the ladder. Fifteen feet from a one-story roof, the woman let go. Assistant Chief Preston Burl caught her daughter, and former Chief Francis Glad broke the mother’s fall.
The story doesn’t end there. Even nearly 50 years later, that then-four-year-old girl, now a professional singer like her mother, never forgot that night. http://bit.ly/19PDz4m
Just a few weeks ago, she located Preston Burl and called him to thank him for saving her life. Sadly, shortly after, on the anniversary of 9/11, Burl lost his battle with cancer. (http://bit.ly/19eEWso). His daughter, Trista Marro, had requested a copy of the original Fire Engineering article shortly before his passing.
Contacting us afterward, she said, “My father never considered himself a hero, but I am sure he appreciated the phone call he received from Ruth King. She has dedicated her life to performing for first responders. I had a chance to share your article with my father, and he was so pleased that the story made it out of our town circle. Thank you and your team, again, so very much for researching your archives to share with us a wonderful story our family has heard about for decades.”
