You never forget your first

They say you never forget your first fatality as an emergency responder and they’re right. The memory of that day is just as clear today as it was 12 years ago.

Every year when the crisp, January cold settles into the mountains of Central Vermont my senses begin to remember. I remember the sound of the tone coming over the pager and the dispatcher’s voice pulling me from my dreams. ‘Barre Dispatch South Barre/East Barre Fire, please respond to reports of a two car 10–50, Route 302 near the EMT building. Reports of a woman trapped under a car, repeat… Barre Dispatch to…’

I jumped from my bed and the warmth of my covers and rushed to throw on yesterday’s clothes, grabbing my keys as I opened the door and braced myself against the cold. I remember the hurried drive to the station. ‘Hang on.’ I said aloud as I imagined how frightened she must be. ‘We’re coming, just hang in there.’ As I turned into the station I remember my back tires swinging out on a patch of ice. ‘Crap..’ I muttered easing off the accelerator and straightening it out. Behind me I saw the strobes of another firefighter coming up behind me.

Pulling into a spot, I quickly set the Emergency brake and pulled the key from the ignition, jogging to the door while fumbling to find the station key. In no time I had the door open and was sprinting for my gear.

It didn’t take long before the station was full and the trucks were pulling out. ‘East Barre Engine 1 to Barre Dispatch, out with two.’ I relayed. ‘10–4 East Barre Engine 1, out with two, 04:21.’

‘Four twenty one AM,’ I thought. It was still dark. The engine moved quickly over the road, the strobe lights sending waves of red and white across the houses as we passed. After a few minutes we saw the lights from the ambulance ahead and slowed to a stop.

‘Don’t forget to put the chucks down.’ my Captain reminded me as he opened the door and disappeared from view. ‘I got ‘em.’ I called back as I pushed the door open and slid from the passenger’s seat down to the road. As soon as my boots made contact, they hit the ice and swung out from under me. I made a quick grab for the door and steadied myself. Exhaling gratefully, I regained my footing and shuffled cautiously over to wheel chucks, pulling them from their station and propping them securely in place around the wheel.

Grabbing a Haligan bar I set off after my Captain. Dawn was approaching and soon the light would begin to peak up over the horizon. Squinting, I tried to make out what was before me. Up ahead on the right was a crumbled mass of metal, glass and plastic. My eyes carefully moved over it in an attempt to identify the make and model, but you could hardly recognize that it had been a car a few moments ago, let alone anything else. The frame was torn apart where the front driver’s side tire would have been and was twisted open at a ninety degree angle. The exterior shell appeared as if it had imploded in on itself, leaving no evidence as to what color it may have been.

To the left teetered a milk truck, it’s front passenger tire sunk into the ditch and the rest of it pinned against the guard rail. There didn’t seem to be much damage to the truck besides a few dents in the front bumper. The driver stood next to the door of his truck, visibly shaken and quivering in the cold, his arms wrapped tightly around himself.

Continuing on I saw the hood of the first car laying in the breakdown lane to the right along with part of the engine and further beyond that still, the ambulance securing the other side of the scene. At first glance, this call was like any other, but an eerie stillness had settled over the site and something was different somehow, though I couldn’t say just what.

The first thing that struck me was the lack of urgency. Normally, the ambulance would have been long gone or at least loaded up by the time we got there and in this case the accident was right outside their building so they had had plenty of time. Yet, there they remained, and to top it all off they weren’t hurrying around either. ‘Maybe they need us to extricate the victim before they can do anything.’ I thought, so I shuffled along a bit faster. Ahead, I saw my Captain, Sal talking to Buzzy (one of the police officers). Buzzy was pointing toward the car’s hood and shaking his head. Frowning, Sal turned to me.

‘Where’s the victim? Did they get her out yet?’ I asked. Sal swallowed hard and shook his head. ‘Turns out it wasn’t a woman.’ he replied. ‘Oh…’ I said, confused. ‘Well, him then. Did they get him out?’ Again, Sal shook his head. ‘What do they need?’ I asked. ‘Jacks? Spreaders? Jaws?’ Sal’s eyes fell to his boots for a moment before meeting my gaze again. ‘There’s nothing to do, kid.’ he said soberly.

My eyes searched his. He looked worn down all of a sudden, his eyes bloodshot and his face pale. I didn’t understand what he was trying to say, and he knew it. He dug into his coat pocket and pulled out a cigarette and a lighter. ‘They called in a woman trapped under a car.’ he muttered, slowly shaking his head as he placed the cigarette loosely between his lips. ‘It’s never what they say it is.’

Cupping his hand around it to block the wind, he flipped the lighter. The flame lit up his face for a moment before fading into the end of his cigarette. ‘They guessed that it was a woman,’ he said stiffly, holding the smoke in his lungs. ‘He’s in such bad shape’ he continued. ‘they honestly couldn’t tell.’

I didn’t know what to say so Sal continued. ‘He wasn’t trapped under a car.’ he breathed, releasing the smoke back into the cold. ‘He just happened to come to rest under the hood there.’ he said pointing back at the debris without turning to look at it. ‘There’s nothing to do because there’s nothing we CAN do. He was dead before the dust cleared.’

I looked around Sal, back towards the wreckage that I suddenly noticed everyone was trying hard not to look at. My eyes scanned the ground. Pieces of plastic and metal were strewn about. Shattered glass began to glisten as the first of the sun’s light finally peaked over the horizon, casting a dull light across the road. But what was that?

Something white caught my attention… shoeless feet in dirty socks. Sticking out from under the car’s hood….were legs. Like the scene from the Wizard of Oz, the hood covered his body like a blanket leaving only his feet sticking out.

I WILL never forget that day because I COULD never forget that day.

His name was Brian… he was 33 and he was going to get married that Saturday. He’d have been 46 today and would probably have a family. One minute he was kissing his fiancé goodbye and heading off to work, the next he was lying broken and still on the pavement.

Now, I can’t say whether or not a seatbelt would have saved his life that day, but I can tell you for sure that not wearing one left him no chance at all.

They say you never forget your first fatality as an emergency responder, and they are very right.