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JESSIE GRAHAM
New York Post Online

June 30, 2001 -- "I guess the angels have something else for me to do, somewhere along the line." That's what Lt. Brendan Manning said of his miraculous survival in the Queens Blaze that killed three of his FDNY colleagues on Father's Day.

Manning, 47, is out of the hospital with a laundry list of injuries from the inferno -- but with his humor and sense of spirit intact.

"The doctors are fairly hopeful they can put Humpty Dumpty back together again," he said.

He faces months of recovery and operations from a broken jaw and ruptured eardrum that has left him deaf in one ear. A gash on the back of his head needed 20 stitches, and his clavicle was shattered,

His face is still swollen from severe burns and he can't blink his left eye.

When he heals, he hopes to return to the Fire Department. He plans to take the captain's test in October.

When Manning arrived with Ladder Company 163 at the Long Island General Supply Co. hardware store, thought he was facing a "routine fire."

"Then someone opened the gates of hell and the devils came out," he said.

He pried open the heavy metal back door to find the fire's source and looked up at the ceiling with an infrared camera, spotting a "red ball" of flames above him.

"I was just about to tell the chief, 'Chief, we have fire in the . . .,' I didn't even get the word 'ceiling' out when this huge force just hit me coming out of the basement," he said. "I remember being lifted up. I remember being in a black fireball type of thing with orange and red."

The force of the blast flung him 20 feet out into the alley.

"I remember telling myself this is a nightmare and I want to wake up from this nightmare," he said.

"But at the same time there was another voice saying this is very real and this is happening and it's happening now. I was very scared."

Two days later in the burn unit at Cornell New York Hospital, he found out that three of his colleagues had died, and another was fighting for his life.

The horrific blaze was set accidentally by two teen boys, whom Manning said he forgives.

"Kids are kids. I don't feel that they meant any harm," he said.

He'd counted John Downing as a friend and co-worker, and had met Harry Ford and Brian Fahey.

He can't believe they're gone.

"So many people hurt. Three guys dead. Eight children fatherless," he said. "It's surreal. It just seems so unreal."

Manning also thanked New Yorkers yesterday for supporting the fallen heroes' families with donations to a fund established by The Post.

"It's just an absolutely amazing thing how many good people there are in New York City," he said.

"To see such an outpouring of love and caring for these kids and these families, it breaks your heart."

Generous New Yorkers contributed $23,000 yesterday to the Astoria Fire: Post Heroes Fund, bringing the total up to $478,000.

"I personally, on behalf of everyone in the fire department, thank all the people who have contributed and The Post," said Fire Commissioner Thomas Von Essen.

Von Essen said firefighter Joseph Vosilla, who was critically injured in the blaze, was placed back on a respirator Thursday, after briefly being able to breathe on his own earlier this week.