The contributions of firefighters and EMS personnel were mentioned by Vice President Joe Biden Sunday as the nation remembered the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11.
In addition, Biden visited firehouses in Shanksville and Washington, D.C.
Biden also lauded the efforts of a volunteer fire company from Frederick County, MD that answered the mutual aid call to the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.
Speaking at the Pentagon, Biden said: “Micky Fyock, a volunteer fire chief in Woodsboro, Maryland, 60 miles away, after working all day, when he heard that evening that the rescue workers at the Pentagon needed a fire truck -- a small fire truck, small enough to fit through tight places, he knew he had a ‘54 Mack, which was the smallest one around. So fresh off an all-day shift, he barreled down the highway and battled the blaze all night with thousands of others.”
The a 1955 B-85 open cab Mack ladder truck snaked its way through the narrow tunnels under the Pentagon to reach a courtyard where firefighters directed a water stream to prevent the fire from spreading.
During a previous interview with Firehouse.com, Fyock said: “We had the little truck that could.”
The vice president continued: “And at dawn, exhausted and covered with soot -- with soot, 14 hours on the job, he (Fyock) sat on a bench and confronted [sic] a man -- a man who he said was wondering aloud, why am I still alive for had I not been at the dentist, I would have been in the office, my office, totally destroyed, with my colleagues gone. Why me?”
He also praised the actions of an EMT.
“Specialist Beau Doboszenski was a tour guide that morning, on the far side of the building -— so far away, in fact, he never heard the plane hit. But he shortly felt the commotion. He could have gone home -— no one would have blamed him. But he was also a trained EMT and came from a family of firefighters. So when people started streaming out of the building and screaming, he sprinted toward the crash site. For hours, he altered between treating his co-workers and dashing into the inferno with a team of six men.”
Biden also mentioned others for their contributions.
“…What happened after that was far more remarkable than the damage inflicted in the building behind me. Those who worked in this building, many of you in front of me, and thousands more first responders across the region --firefighters from Arlington County, Fairfax County, Montgomery County, the District of Columbia and many others, they sprang to action, risking their lives so their friends, their colleagues and total strangers, people they had never met, might live…”
Before delivering the speech at the Pentagon, Biden and his wife surprised crews at Engine 20, Truck 12, with coffee, breakfast, and words of thanks.
