LON SLEPICKA & HEATHER CASEY
Firehouse.Com News
"I'm sad often."
Those words are of the man who lost six friends, six of the Bravest he commanded, who died in a fire he now refers to as "the monster".
District Fire Chief Michael O. McNamee's reflections are those of many on the Worcester, Mass. Fire Department who were connected with the six who died, deeply involved as a comrades in an profession that sometimes asks for the ultimate sacrifice.
In an interview with Firehouse.com News during the Firehouse Emergency Services Expo in
Baltimore where he was the featured speaker in July, McNamee spoke openly about his feelings and all that has transpired since the Dec. 3, 1999 warehouse fire.
The CBS television newsmagazine "48 Hours" will dedicate their entire November 2 broadcast to the Worcester Six and the fire that killed them.
"We've been told things are going to die down. But there is something out there that wants to keep the memory alive," McNamee said. "It isn't going to go away. It is part of everyone who was there, for the rest of their lives."
In some ways everyone was there. Brick by brick for eight days, search crews struggled to recover the firefighter's bodies. Television beamed the images across the nation.
The memorial service was thought to be the largest ever. For three miles, 30,000 firefighters stretched in a procession down the streets of Worcester led by President Clinton and Vice President Gore. The mighty and the meek spoke words of comfort and inspiration. Bagpipes played for thousands who wept.
All of it was ground into the memory of a nation that is proud to honor its national heroes.
There are some, McNamee admits, who want him and those who freely talk about the fire and the men who died, to finally shut up. He chooses to look to the advice of father, now dead two years. "My father was a realist. He would have said to me, I know you wish you weren't here. But deal with it, go at it head on."
A fair skinned, soft-spoken man with a twinkle in his eye, one would not imagine the burden this man carries. When talking about the tragedy, he appears simply duty bound to relate his inner feelings to those who ask. He is a firefighter and most in the profession know such a burden may be just around the corner.
"The building hid everything. It was a standard interior fire when we got there and the monster turned. I've been doing this 28 years and I've never seen conditions change like that."
The toughest decision made the day the six died was McNamee's. His order ended the search for the missing firefighters. He decided that no more lives would be risked.
That decision probably saved the lives of others whom would have entered the building to look for their comrades. That is now a haunting decision.
McNamee spent 27-28 hours at the scene. After he went home, one of his daughters was the first person to call him. "I wondered why I hadn't cried yet… I heard my daughter's voice, and it was like somebody flipped a switch."
"Oh, it's changed us all. I always loved my job - I still love my job - but nothing is ever going to be the same," says McNamee.
"It [the loss] starts out like a gaping wound, and it fills in, but you're left with a heck of a scar."
"It's the first thing I think of in the morning, the last thing I think of before I go to sleep. And if I wake up in the night …."
