Feb. 20, 2023 Bellingham Firefighter Neil Carlberg, a 33-year veteran, died of esophageal cancer in 2018.
By Robert Mittendorf Source The Bellingham Herald (Bellingham, Wash.) (TNS) Distributed byTribune Content Agency, LLC.
Feb. 19—Bellingham has settled an occupational disease lawsuit with the wife of a former firefighter.
City Council members unanimously agreed Monday, Feb. 12, to pay Sheila Hanlon, wife of the late Neil Carlberg, a total of $750,000 in her claim against the city to receive his pension.
“This has been a really long case for the city, and for the widow. I think it’s been very difficult, and so hopefully with this settlement, Miss Hanlon hopefully can go forward and heal with her husband’s memory,” Councilwoman Lisa Anderson said as the agreement was discussed in the City Council meeting.
“You can never put this behind you but perhaps the litigation part can be put behind her and she can go forward and hopefully heal from the process,” Anderson said.
Carlberg, who was a Bellingham firefighter for 33 years, retired in 2011 and died of esophageal cancer in 2018.
Hanlon had sought to prove that her husband’s cancer was work-related, and that he deserved benefits and honors that are reserved for firefighters who are killed in the line of duty.
‘A good firefighter’
Hanlon, a former Fire Department dispatcher, asked The Bellingham Herald for privacy after the settlement was announced, and didn’t want to comment for this story.
Carlberg finished his career as a driver/engineer at Station 2 in Fairhaven.
“Neil was a good firefighter,” said Bellingham firefighter Todd Lagestee.
“We learn more and more every day how many cancer-causing aspects there are to the job of being a firefighter,” he told The Bellingham-Herald. “From sleep disruptions, to acute and chronic stress, to PFAS (“forever chemicals”) actually being in our fire gear — not to mention smoke exposure and absorption through our skin and diesel exhaust. Cancer is a deadly epidemic for firefighters.”
Washington state law presumes that certain cancers are a result of the work that firefighters perform in and around burning buildings and encountering hazardous chemicals in a variety of situations.
Studies have shown that firefighters face a 9 percent increase in cancer diagnoses and a 14 percent increase in cancer-related deaths compared to the general U.S. population, according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
John Swobody of North Whatcom Fire and Rescue died in 2018 of lung cancer, and his line of duty death designation meant that his treatment costs were covered and he was awarded posthumous honors. His survivors also received extra benefits.
This story was originally published February 19, 2023, 5:00 AM.
Feb. 20, 2023 Deputy Assistant Chief Michael Massucci said he was transferred from chief of uniformed personnel and sent to the toolroom in the Bureau of Tech Services to humiliate him.
A sixth FDNY staff chief has requested to be demoted and put back in the field as high-ranking firefighters continue to fume over a leaked audio recording of a closed-door meeting with Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh, the Daily News has learned.
Staff chiefs at the Feb. 3 meeting, which included Chief of Department John “Jack” Hodgens, the most senior uniformed official in the FDNY, and Chief of Fire Operations John Esposito, were outraged after learning that a recording of the gathering was shared with The News.
Kavanagh, the city’s first woman fire commissioner, is heard on the recording telling chiefs she wanted more “innovative, outside the box thinking.” Instead, over the course of 40 minutes, the chiefs assailed her with questions about their personal cars, vacation carryovers and what she meant when she said there is no “bullying” of subordinates allowed.
“Is it fair to say that despite the point I made, the majority of the questions here today were about pay and vacation and cars?” Kavanagh asked the chiefs, according to the recording.
In a letter sent to Kavanagh on Thursday, Deputy Assistant Chief Michael Massucci asked to be booted back to deputy chief. Massucci complained that he was transferred from his post as chief of uniformed personnel and sent to the bureau of operations without cause.
“I have never had any disciplinary issues or complaints filed against me and have been well respected by my subordinates and superiors throughout my career,” Massucci wrote, adding that the transfer was made “without any reasonable explanation, except to state that you are taking the bureau of personnel in a different direction.”
“My reassignment to the Bureau of Operations and placing me in the toolroom in the Bureau of Tech Services was an attempt to humiliate and disgrace me amongst my superiors, subordinates, coworkers and friends. Stating later that my skillsets were being better utilized in my new position was yet another attempt to further disgrace me,” Massucci wrote. “The lack of transparency and the lack of truthfulness, not only with me but with the entire Uniformed Executive Staff, has brought me to this decision. I can no longer function as a Deputy Assistant Chief under your administration.”
Massucci joins Hodgens, Esposito and FDNY Deputy Assistant Chief Frank Leeb who have requested in writing to be demoted to deputy chief and moved out of the department’s MetroTech headquarters in downtown Brooklyn. Two other chiefs have made the same request, but not in writing, sources said.
Kavanagh demoted Assistant Chiefs Fred Schaaf, Michael Gala and Joseph Jardin to deputy chief earlier this month after Hodgens would not perform the deed, sources said. The three chiefs were considered “bad apples” and refused to act on Kavanagh’s directives, a source in the fire commissioner’s camp said.
Schaaf was the Queens borough commander when allegations of racism were made in a firehouse. Sources said he resisted transferring and disciplining some firefighters in the aftermath.
Jardin was chief of fire prevention where he objected to allowing buildings to self-certify their fire safety systems, sources said. But he also was the subject of a series of complaints with the city’s Office of Equal Employment Opportunity over his tough-guy management style. The Fire Prevention Division has the largest black workforce in the FDNY.
Gala, a disciple of former Chief of Department James Leonard who clashed with Kavanagh, sued over allegations he was passed over for promotion for criticizing a diversity push in the FDNY. Gala was considered a divisive element in the department, one source said.
Now, the chiefs are trying to determine whether recording the closed-door meeting violated department policy, a high-ranking FDNY source with knowledge of the drama said.
“In the past, firefighters would get in trouble if they videotaped or audiotaped anything happening at the firehouse, so the same should apply here,” the source said.
“At a department meeting of any kind, you are free to speak, exchange ideas and discuss them,” the source said. “If you’re going to be taped outside the minutes of the meeting then that stifles the debate and the conversation.”
In past FDNY administrations, demotions, particularly at the higher ranks, almost never occurred, one FDNY source said.
“It just didn’t happen,” the source said. “If they weren’t doing their job, they just wouldn’t get promoted any more. If there was a real issue, the commissioner would just ask them to retire.
WALNUT CREEK — A driver died after crashing a Tesla sedan into the side of a fire truck that was part of a response to an earlier crash near an Interstate 680 offramp early Saturday, authorities said.
The fatal collision was reported around 3:50 a.m. near the Treat Boulevard offramp from northbound I-680, according to a California Highway Patrol dispatch log.
The Contra Costa County Fire Protection District confirmed the crash in a tweet accompanied by photos that was posted Saturday morning. In the post, the fire agency stated that firefighters were tending to a non-injury collision when the driver of a Tesla sedan hit the right side of a ladder truck.
Fire officials said the driver died at the scene, and that a passenger riding in the Tesla had to be cut out of the car and was taken to a local hospital with unspecified injuries. Photos show that the front of the sedan was crushed, and damage to the right side of the fire vehicle.
Four firefighters were also taken to the hospital for evaluation of what were later described as minor injuries, according to the fire district.
“Slow down and move over when approaching vehicles,” the fire district added in its tweet.
Additional information was not available Saturday evening.
Slow down and move over when approaching emergency vehicles. Truck 1 was struck by a Tesla while blocking I-680 lanes from a previous accident. Driver pronounced dead on-scene; passenger was extricated & transported to hospital. Four firefighters also transported for evaluation. pic.twitter.com/YCGn8We1bK
The Lake Mills community is grieving the loss of their fire chief.
Fire Chief Todd Yandre died Feb. 15 after attending a training drill, WKOW reported.
Yandre collapsed at the gym where he went after training, officials said, adding that it was his tradition.
Despite efforts of his colleagues, he could not be revived.
“His passion was the fire department and training future firefighters,” Yandre’s brother, Mark told reporters.
Mark, who is the assistant chief, said his brother was dedicated and spent more than 41 years.
Visitation will take place on Saturday Feb. 25 at the Lake Mills Elementary School from 3- 7 at 155 E. Pine Street. Visitation will be held from noon to 2 p.m. Sunday at the same location.
A high-rise fire in an apartment building in Silver Spring has left a woman dead and 15 others injured.
Three Montgomery County firefighters suffered injuries as well but are expected to recover, WUSA reported.
Chief Scott Goldstein said the Arrive Apartments are made up of two connected buildings with roughly 1,200 to 1,300 residents.
The buildings had sprinkler systems, but those sprinkler systems were limited to stairwells and other mechanical areas. There were none in the hallways or units.
Goldstein said the fire was contained to one apartment.
A retired FDNY 9/11 hero was tapped as Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh’s second in command Saturday.
As the department’s First Deputy Commissioner, retired Assistant Chief Joseph Pfeifer, 67, will hold the second-highest civilian rank in the FDNY, the department said.
Pfeifer, who retired in 2018, “served as one of New York City’s Bravest for decades,” Kavanagh said in a statement. “(He) created partnerships and programs that enhanced the safety and training of our members, and has always been there for our city, especially on our darkest days.
“Having already worked closely with Joe for many years, I am thrilled he has returned home to the FDNY and joined our executive leadership team,” she said.
Mayor Adams hailed the hire on Saturday, claiming Pfeifer “embodies what it means to be New York’s Bravest.”
Pfeifer joined the fire department in 1981 and was the first FDNY chief to respond to the World Trade Center on 9/11. His brother, FDNY Lt. Kevin Pfeifer, died in the terror attack.
The retired chief has been credited with founding the department’s Center for Terrorism and Disaster Preparedness. He was also the FDNY’s chief of Counterterrorism and Emergency Preparedness for 17 years after 9/11, where he helped shape strategic planning, intelligence sharing and interagency response to terror related incidents, department officials said.
“With nearly 40-years of experience with the FDNY, he is an excellent choice to assume one of the highest-ranking positions in this great department and is someone that New Yorkers and firefighters can count on to innovate in all aspects of fire prevention and safety,” Mayor Adams said.
Kavanagh was the FDNY’s first deputy fire commissioner under former Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro. When she became acting fire commissioner after Nigro retired last year, Lizette Christoff, the department’s deputy commissioner of budget and finance, was made acting first deputy fire commissioner.
No one has taken on the position full time since Kavanagh was promoted, FDNY officials said.
Since he retired, Pfeifer has been an adjunct associate professor in Columbia University’s School of International Public Affairs and the director of crisis leadership at the Columbia Climate School’s National Center for Disaster Preparedness.
The retired chief said he is looking forward to his new challenge.
“The heart of FDNY is the ability to unify efforts to solve complex problems in the face of great tragedy,” Pfeifer said. “Our united team is a sign of resilience to reflect on the past and envision the future so that we can enhance the present.”
As of Friday, at least six staff chiefs, including Chief of Department John “Jack” Hodgens, the most senior uniformed official in the FDNY, have asked to be demoted to deputy chief and be moved back to the field, claiming that there’s been a complete breakdown of communication between Kavanagh and the FDNY’s highest uniformed ranks. The chiefs are asking to be moved into their new roles by March 6.
Hodgens and the other chiefs asked to be reassigned after Kavanagh demoted Assistant Chiefs Fred Schaaf, Michael Gala and Joseph Jardin to deputy chief, and then called other top chiefs on the carpet in a closed door Feb. 3 meeting where she demanded more out of the box thinking and fewer inquiries about vacation rollovers and personal cars.
“The lack of transparency and the lack of truthfulness, not only with me but with the entire Uniformed Executive Staff, has brought me to this decision,” Deputy Assistant Chief Michael Massucci wrote this week as he asked to be booted back to deputy chief.
A high-ranking FDNY source with knowledge of the ongoing turmoil didn’t believe Pfeifer could bring the outraged staff chiefs back into the fold.
“He has a bit of history with the fire department and has some gravitas, but some are angry he took the job,” the source said about Pfeifer. “He’s going to bring some credibility to Kavanagh when the other chiefs leave, but that’s about it.”
A Georgia firefighter on the lam from Alabama for a felony charge is still getting paid.
Douglas County Firefighter Daymetrie Williams has been on paid leave since November, according to 11 Alive.
The felony burglary charge occurred two years before he was hired in Georgia in 2021.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation said that the fire department didn’t do a background check on him until March 2022, almost a year after he was hired.
Williams’ personnel file, obtained by reporters, showed he was written up twice in the span of a few months. He got a written reprimand for an “altercation with an employee” and probation for “unwanted leering.”
Checking with universities where he claimed to have obtained degrees in fire science and psychology proved interesting.
West Virginia University said it had no record of Williams even attending its campus, let alone earning a fire science degree while West Virginia State University confirmed he graduated, but did not obtain a degree in psychology, the station reported.
County officials provided a short statement saying the county is investigating the allegations.
FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh reported that 22 firefighters were hurt, three seriously, while battling a fire in Arden Heights on Staten Island.
“I cannot emphasize enough that this was a very close call for the FDNY. We could have lost three members today,” Kavanagh told reporters.
According to CBS 2 New York, the fire started in a two-family home on Shotwell Avenue at around 1:30 p.m and quickly grew to four alarms.
An FDNY official confirmed part of the home collapsed, but firefighters “were not trapped in the collapse.”
“Members were trapped in the heavy fire,” said FDNY Chief Brian Gorman.
Kavanagh was joined by other fire department officials, along with doctors at Staten Island University Hospital.
“It was thanks to the brave work of our members, including those who went in and saved their fellow firefighters, rescued the trapped members, brought them to EMS on scene who treated them immediately, and brought them to this hospital, who treated them right away, which is why we are here to say that they are stable while critical, but that they are going to be OK,” she told reporters.
FDNY Chief of Department John Hodgens said, “There was a heavy wind condition at the fire, so as the firefighters were inside searching for occupants, the windows failed and the wind blew the fire intensely into the building right at the firefighters.
“So all of them became trapped by fire. One was able to make their way to a balcony and jump off the second floor balcony down into the driveway. And one transmitted a mayday signal that he was in distress, and he was on the second floor.”
That lieutenant was rescued.
“All in all, we’re very happy to report that the members are in stable condition. It was definitely what we consider a close call today,” Hodgens said.
Feb. 17, 2023 If the nearest Level I trauma center is more than a certain distance away, NASCAR requires the host facility to have a helicopter and a paramedic-staffed ambulance on site.
Driver Ty Gibbs (54) exits his after an on-track incident during practice for the NASCAR Clash at the Coliseum at Los Angeles Coliseum.
LOS ANGELES — Flames shot up inside NASCAR Cup Series driver Ty Gibbs’ Toyota while the 20-year-old practiced for the Clash inside the LA Coliseum. As Gibbs pulled over, unhooked his belts and hurried out the window, AMR safety vehicles navigated the unique quarter-mile temporary circuit — a track that didn’t exist just weeks earlier — and within seconds, deployed their equipment to douse the flames and preserve the race car.
The sight of an emergency vehicle on the playing surface — an ambulance on the field of Cincinnati’s Paycor Stadium when Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed during a Monday Night Football game against the Bengals — halted the sports world in its tracks a few weeks before the fire on the Coliseum floor. Millions of people watched in real time as the NFL’s emergency action plan was set in motion.
“One of my co-workers sent me a text, ‘Are you watching this?’ ” said Tom Bryant, NASCAR’s vice president of racing operations.
The emergency response that followed Hamlin’s collapse was a public display of the behind-the-scenes work that goes into these kinds of scenarios, especially in motorsports, where first responders arrive within seconds of an incident.
Had Gibbs, or any other driver, needed emergency medical attention, what was the plan for a venue that’s relatively new to the series? What does the safety plan look like for the racers and fans at the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, which is situated among open thoroughfares in a bustling downtown area? How about the city streets of Chicago, which is set to see a new NASCAR race later this year? What happens if an NHRA racer suffers injuries in a high-speed crash?
Motorsports has developed detailed answers after Dale Earnhardt was killed during the 2001 Daytona 500 and NHRA Funny Car driver Scott Kalitta died after a qualifying attempt in Englishtown, N.J., in 2008. IndyCar’s aeroscreen protects drivers from flying objects, which killed British driver Justin Wilson in 2015 when he was struck in the head by debris from a single-car crash ahead of him.
Motorsports safety initiatives, from belts to helmets and chassis and safety barriers, continue to evolve with advances in technology. Ryan Newman credited NASCAR’s innovations and his Arai carbon fiber zero helmet with helping him survive a massive midair Daytona 500 crash in 2020, after which he needed to be rescued from his upside-down car.
Racing operations officials, track safety officials and motorsports series medical directors shared more about what happens if an emergency situation like Hamlin’s were to happen at a local racetrack or a venue on their calendar.
By air or by ground?
For drivers who need urgent care beyond the infield care center, if the nearest Level I trauma center is more than a certain distance away (about a 20-minute drive), NASCAR requires the host facility to have a medevac (helicopter) on site, as well as an advanced life support ambulance, even if there is a helicopter, just as a backup. There’s also a backup trauma center and designated burn center (which sometimes can be a different entity from the trauma center).
Halifax Medical Center, a Level II trauma center, is located a little more than a mile from Daytona International Speedway, which counts the Daytona 500, Rolex 24 and Welcome to Rockville music festival among its marquee events.
For events on temporary street circuits like Long Beach, which hosts IndyCar, IMSA, Stadium Super Trucks and more, street races “don’t have the best ingress and egress to get in and out of,” said Tim Baughman, IndyCar’s senior director of track safety and medical services. The Long Beach Fire Department has transport units set up on the periphery and location points where they can go across the track and then transport people to the trauma center.
For NHRA events, some racetracks have an onsite helicopter, or at a site close to the facility. Depending on the venue, ground transport could be considered quicker, based on average transport time communicated by county authorities. (Ground transport is just as quick or quicker if it’s needed at Pomona.)
“It’s all a calculus on what is the quickest way to get the patient to the Level I trauma center,” said Dr. Phil Surface, NHRA’s medical director and on-site medical services leader at national events. “People will think lots of times, well, helicopter would be faster, and that’s maybe true. But people forget that it frequently takes, for the helicopter to get spooled up and running, upwards of seven, eight, ten minutes. … If you had the helicopter running and the pilots included in it, it might be quicker via helicopter, but when you consider that, that’s not a reasonable thing. [They] can’t just sit there with the engine running all day and waiting.”
What if a driver suffers burns? In some locations around the U.S., the burn center is not necessarily at the closest Level I trauma center.
“Current emergency medicine techniques are such that you should transport to the nearest Level I trauma center and stabilize [the patient] prior to transferring to a burn center,” said Surface.
Know your teammates
In July, NASCAR will race through the streets of Chicago for the first time. Safety meetings with the city’s large event coordinator and the medical team that supports large events like Lollapalooza have been taking place monthly, starting well before the race was made official. Those meetings, which can start as early as six months in advance, will ramp up closer to race weekend. (It’s about six weeks out for returning facilities, plus meetings the week of the event.)
When the Coliseum, which hosted its second Clash on Feb. 5, or any new track joins the schedule, series like NASCAR and IndyCar tour each facility before any on-track activity to view minute details and walk through the emergency plan, such as:
— the rooms where drivers would be taken
— which medical personnel will accompany the driver
— who will transport the family members
“Our model, the care center is staffed by doctors and nurses from a local regional medical facility. So they already have relationships with the other doctors and nurses at that medical facility, which is super important when you are in an emergency situation and you’re dealing with a patient or multiple patients who are in an emergency situation,” Bryant said.
IndyCar follows a similar process to establish rapport with new partner medical facilities, and spells out what medical care the series provides and what is needed from the off-site medical providers.
“They understand that our cars could crash at 80 to 100 miles an hour and it’s not going to be like a normal incident out on the street because our cars are designed to absorb those crashes. So those types of information is shared,” Baughman said.
In early February, IndyCar debuted a new mobile medical unit that will help evaluate competitors and others who need medical attention for potential transfer to off-site care centers. The transporter holds two hospital beds, equipment needed to care for patients with urgent needs, (including a resuscitation cart, assorted orthopedic care supplies and a portable X-ray machine), a meeting area for patient consultation and emergency updates, and video feeds to monitor on-track activity.
Practice
Several hundred fire and safety team members from tracks that host NASCAR, IndyCar and IMSA events attended NASCAR’s preseason summit, a hands-on, four-day training event in January in Concord, N.C. The setup at Charlotte Motor Speedway included scenario training events: extricating a driver from a chassis, fighting a fire, cutting a windshield and cutting a frame.
“All the things that we hope we don’t have to do,” Bryant said.
“We cut up a bunch of sheet metal and a bunch of metal tubing and lit a bunch of stuff on fire and made a hell of a mess. It was tremendous training — if you talk to those folks, they’ll say it’s the best training they get.”
IndyCar, which has a partnership with IU (Indiana University) Health, has a “unique hybrid safety and medical team,” said Dr. Julia Vaizer, IndyCar and Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s director of medical services.
“We call them separate, right? We can say medical team, we have a different safety team, but we work together,” Vaizer said. “We train, we do everything together. Our physicians train with the safety team in firefighter practices and extrication training because we want our physicians to know the steps that the safety team will be performing so they can anticipate that and we go the same way for our paramedics team.”
NHRA’s traveling safety team, like its counterparts, is comprised of firefighters, paramedics and EMTs who are trained in motorsports injuries, evacuation and extrication. When they are not at the track, many of these professionals work in local emergency rooms and health care professions. They continually stay up to date on training and certifications.
“We have a really time-tested safety team,” Surface said. “It’s well trained, has a long history and we work well with the local firefighters, medics and EMTs. With that backup in place, we tend to do a pretty good job.”
Hamlin’s incident resonated throughout motorsports. NASCAR discussed it. Medical professionals observed the process. Through the lens of first responders, there’s always a takeaway.
“Anytime something like this happens, you just review your own procedures,” Vaizer said. “You’re making sure that everything is set, that the team knows everybody’s job, and they’re doing what they’re meant to do as a specific member of the team.”
