A volunteer firefighter in a small Nebraska town received an apology after being asked to remove a flag honoring those who died on 9/11 from his vehicle by supervisors at the hospital where he works.
The Lincoln Journal Star reports that Tamora firefighter Cody Meredith, who works at Crete Area Medical Center, drove to work on Monday morning proudly flying a black-and-white American flag with a red stripe across the center from the rear bumper of his pickup to honor those who died 16 years ago in the terror attacks. Similar flags with a blue stripe honor police who have fallen in the line of duty.
He was then told by supervisors to remove the flag or remove the truck from hospital property. Despite trying to explain the significance of what the flag meant, his superiors insisted, so he asked his wife Kristin -- who is also a Tamora volunteer firefighter -- to swap cars with him because he would not take the flag down.
Kristin Meredith went on to contact the Journal Star and took to Facebook to let people know what happened, and the large response eventually led the hospital to issue her husband an apology.
"It's Sept. 11, Patriot Day," she told the newspaper, adding that both her and her husband's fathers were also firefighters. "We take fallen firefighters very seriously."
A spokesperson for the hospital said that the first people who encountered the flag did not know what it signified and were concerned about the intent.
"What happened was a mistake," spokesperson Edgar Bumanis told the Journal Star. "We've met with the employee and apologized to him."
