Memorial Dedication to be Held on Anniversary of Tragic Worcester Blaze

[Neil]

Memorial Dedication to be Held on Anniversary of Tragic Worcester Blaze


Posted: 11-07-2008
Updated: 11-07-2008 03:59:54 PM


PAUL PELUSO
Firehouse.Com News

Listen to Firehouse.com Podcast
http://dynamic.firehouse.com/broadca...nt-dedication/

View Info on Seminar and Dedication

Dec. 3 will mark the ninth anniversary of the fire at a cold storage warehouse that claimed the lives of six Worcester, Mass. firefighters -- it will also in many ways mark a new beginning for the department.

A new fire station will exist on the very soil the fallen firefighters gave their lives, and next to it will stand a remembrance wall that will serve to honor their sacrifice.

The wall will consist of a slab of granite standing about six feet high and running about 12 feet. Carved into the granite will be an image of six firefighters in action. In front of the wall will be a pedestal with a folded bronze coat and helmet sitting on top of it. Behind the pedestal will be a bronze sculpture of a firefighter kneeling, giving reverence to his fallen brothers.

Along with the dedication, the seventh and final Worcester Fire Department Safety and Survival Seminar will be held on the same day as the dedication.

"A lot of positive came out of our negative," Lieutenant John Daly said. "It's time for us to wrap it up and I can't think of a better way."

Creating the Memorial

Worcester Captain Kevin Maloney met sculptor Brian Hanlon at Firehouse Expo in Baltimore in 2007. At the time, Hanlon was working on a sculpture for Holy Cross College -- located in Worcester -- and he stopped Maloney after spotting the department's logo on his shirt.

The department had been talking about creating a monument on the grounds of the new station, and after Hanlon shared some of his prototypes with Maloney, things started taking shape.

The total cost of the project will cost the department approximately $110,000 -- the rest of which they hope to raise through the proceeds from this year's seminar, along with a raffle for a 2009 Honda Civic.

The department already had close to $60,000 in funds from past safety seminars and donations from fellow firefighters. In 2001, shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks, the department donated the money raised that year by the seminar to a fund set up by the FDNY.

Daly said that while the money raised from the past seminars was initially set aside for the Worcester Fire Firefighters Memorial Park -- spearheaded by city officials -- they eventually decided to put it towards the remembrance wall.

"It's been a very slow process to be quite honest," Daly, who sits on the city's memorial committee, said. "They've been dragging their feet on it too long."

The committee began meeting shortly after the tragic fire, and as plans began to expand, so did the cost. Daly said the person who won a competition set up by the city put a price tag on the proposed project of between three and five million dollars.

"It made it really unrealistic," he said. "They decided to turn it into a memorial park." According to Daly, the committee hasn't met for close to 10 months.

He also believes that the style of the proposed memorial (View Photo) wasn't something the department's members could relate to.

"To me, (the dedication wall) is what they wanted. They didn't want something abstract," he said. "They wanted something that related to firefighters and the work."

Both men say they the thing they are proud of the most is how the money for the dedication wall was raised: through donations solely from firefighters. No private donations were sought for the project.

Honoring the Fallen on Tragic Grounds

Maloney said that when the department found out the new station would be built on the site of the fire, it was a no brainer. The new station is set to open by the time the dedication is held.

The decision by the city to purchase the land for the new station, however, was at first a sore spot for some firefighters, but Maloney said time has helped heal some wounds.

Daly agrees with his comrade: "It would have been a travesty to have anything else built there," he said. "For other guys though, it just hurts too much there for them. It's bittersweet I suppose."

Being able to come full circle and honor their fallen brothers on the plot of land where they perish is something Maloney is thankful for. "The fact that we are able to put our own memorial there; it's pretty satisfying."

Dedication and Seminar Details

When: Dedication will begin at 5 p.m. on Dec. 3 at the new station built on the site of the fire at 266 Franklin Street, Worcester, Mass.


Lodging: The Crowne Plaza Hotel has rooms available for $89 (regular rate is $179). The deadline to receive the discounted rate is Nov. 11.
http://www.cpworcester.com/


Contact Information: Lieutenant John Daly can be reached by phone at 508-423-4799 and by e-mail at jadalyjr@aol.com


Worcester Fire Department Safety and Survival Seminar

The seminar will take place the morning and finish before the dedication.



Scheduled speakers

Deputy Chief John Tripp, Los Angeles County Fire Department
Interstate 5 Tunnel Fire

FDNY Battalion Chief John Salka
Leadership in the fire service

FDNY Lt. Mickey Conboy
Residential Search

FDNY Captain Mike Dugan
Venting Today's Fire Buildings

http://cms.firehouse.com/web/online/News/Memorial-Dedication-to-be-Held-on-Anniversary-of-Tragic-Worcester-Blaze/46$61563

[Neil]

http://www.telegram.com/assets/stati...StFireStation/

[Neil]

Out of the ashes

New fire station rises on hallowed ground

By Scott J. Croteau TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
scroteau@telegram.com


WORCESTER— The smell of hash browns and bacon wafted in the air at the Kenmore Diner on a recent morning.

Jeffrey Fritz, an off-duty Webster firefighter, sat in a booth and peered out a back window.

He eyed a lawn of fresh grass. He saw a pristine parking lot with fresh blacktop. And at the center of it all stood a new building, its fresh brick façade reaching high above the diner.


The view was much different before nightfall on Dec. 3, 1999.

A decades-old vacant meat-packing warehouse sat behind the diner. The Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Co., a hulk of a building, dwarfed the Kenmore.

Drivers on adjacent Interstate 290 caught a glimpse of the five-story warehouse, a dormant reminder of the city’s industrial heyday.

On that night in December 1999, the view from the Kenmore and the highway changed dramatically. The Cold Storage warehouse filled with flames. Fire whipped the air.

Then fear arrived. Six firefighters were soon missing. By night’s end, Firefighters Paul A. Brotherton, Jeremiah M. Lucey and Joseph T. McGuirk, and Lts. Timothy P. Jackson Sr., Thomas E. Spencer and James F. “Jay” Lyons III, were all dead.

Nine years later, the view is different. Gone are the vacant building, the flames and the rubble that held the remains of firefighters for days.

As Mr. Fritz sat in a booth eating breakfast with his family, the view from the window was an uplifting one: of the new Franklin Street Fire Station, an $8 million firehouse on a symbolic spot that will serve as a reminder of the six firefighters who perished there. Gone is the Cold Storage building, replaced by a fire station.

“I was here for that whole week. It was a very long week. It was not fun. There was nothing good about it,” said Deputy Fire Chief Paul A. Rogacz, one of hundreds of firefighters from Worcester and elsewhere who converged on the Cold Storage building nine years ago. “It was a building from hell and I think we beat it. We now have our own building and we’re gonna guard this site now.”

The new station is set to open Wednesday. The public is invited to a ceremony at 3 p.m.

For years after the fire, remembrance events were common at the site of the fire. Flowers, T-shirts and other items were placed against a chain-link fence as people followed through on their promise that the fallen firefighters would never be forgotten.

James F. Lyons Jr., father of Lt. Lyons, will be on hand for the opening of the station. Mr. Lyons, a retired teacher, has not always endorsed the idea of building a fire station on the site. He had said the site should be preserved in its natural state.

But as momentum built for a new station on the site, he came around to supporting the plan.

“Initially, we felt the ground should remain a memory itself to the loss,” Mr. Lyons said recently. “We realized, eventually, that that wasn’t going to happen.”

Mr. Lyons and his family are impressed with the new station.

“This is an appropriate way to remember the sacrifice made there on Dec. 3,” he said. “Hopefully, the station will be a symbol of hope and renewal. Perhaps a symbol of hope and renewal for some, but also of sorrow and loss. I think we need those types of emotions represented there.

“We’re proud of the station. It’s part of our son’s legacy. It’s a fitting remembrance of the valor and sacrifice of Dec. 3. We’ve see a building raised on the shoulders of the six who made the ultimate sacrifice there.”

The new station will replace the Brown Square station and will house some equipment from the Providence Street and Central Street stations, according to Chief Rogacz. Central Street is closed; Providence Street is slated for closure.

City Manager Michael V. O’Brien said of the new station: “Upon its dedication and opening, the men and women stationed here — 24/7/365 — will continue the selfless work of protecting the lives and properties of our citizens.”

Chief Rogacz recently gave a tour of the new station, a 15,000-square-foot, three-bay building.

For now, at least, the bay floors are immaculate. Large yellow hoses used to absorb exhaust from the firetrucks hang from the ceiling.

A walk across the bay area reveals a tucked-away fire pole. The architect’s early design didn’t have a pole, but firefighters insisted on one, said Chief Rogacz. A fire station needs a fire pole, he said.

Upstairs are sparkling showers and bathrooms. There are some details in the station that might not get noticed. The room sign outside the officers’ bathroom has a man and woman in uniform.

As he walked through the kitchen area — a place where firefighters bond over their home-cooked meals — Chief Rogacz looked out the large front window and paused in reflection.

“That’s where the command center was,” he said, peering across the street, where fire officials huddled the day after the fire. “That’s where all the command staff was located, and we were looking this way. A lot of guys were on this spot — what, 30 feet below us where we’re standing? — on the rubble pile. It’s a different point of view. Now we are looking out.”

The view out the back window of the Kenmore Diner will be much different once the new fire station opens.

Brick by brick, James Yantsides, owner of the Kenmore Diner, watched the new fire station’s life begin. In 1999, he was the manager of the diner — someone else owned the property — and watched the deconstruction of the Cold Storage building.

On a recent morning, standing in front of his grill, a few hot breakfasts ready to go, Mr. Yantsides said the fire station adds beauty to the area, which still has some drab warehouses nearby.

Mr. Fritz, the Webster firefighter who regularly eats at the Kenmore, often at the booth with the window view of the new station, said using the site for something other than a fire station could have led future generations to forget what happened.

“It’s nice to see the city took it over and it will always be controlled by the firefighters,” he said. “It might be their resting spot. It will always be a place for the firefighters.”

Soon, the scene will be flipped from the way it was on Dec. 3, 1999, when firefighters rushed into the building. Now, fire engines and firefighters dressed in their gear will rush out of the building.

“The best use for this site is what we are using it for,” Chief Rogacz said.

Reporter Steven H. Foskett Jr. contributed to this report. Contact Scott J. Croteau by e-mail at scroteau@telegram.com.

http://www.telegram.com/article/2008...811160394/1116

Photo / Illustration / LIZ RUSSELL

[Neil]

Sunday, November 16, 2008
Copper roof has a special meaning

By Scott J. Croteau TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
scroteau@telegram.com


WORCESTER— For years, people driving on Interstate 290 glanced to the side of the highway and saw the five-story-high vacant Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Co. building.

The building was reduced to rubble, however, after a raging fire struck the building on Dec. 3, 1999.

Drivers are seeing something new these days as they pass the Franklin Street site from overhead — the tint of a copper roof.


The new fire station, constructed on the site where six firefighters died fighting the December 1999 blaze, cost roughly $8 million to construct. But the copper roof didn’t cost a thing.

Michael and Tina Jemison donated the copper roof, gutter and downspouts for the Franklin Street Fire Station in honor of Mrs. Jemison’s father, Paul MacCarthy, a lawyer who practiced in the city for 50 years.

“Mr. MacCarthy’s family wishes to honor his life spent in the City and the wonderful memories and friends that he so enjoyed here,” City Manager Michael V. O’Brien wrote in an August letter to City Council.

Robert L. Moylan Jr., commissioner of Public Works and Parks, said in a letter to the manager that, “their wish is that the many men and women who serve beneath it be protected by this roof for many years to come.”

The CopperPlus roof ages the same as copper, but is bonded with a stainless steel core.

http://www.telegram.com/article/2008...811160418/1116

The new Franklin Street Fire Station is topped by a copper roof, donated by the family of longtime Worcester lawyer Paul MacCarthy. (T&G Staf/TOM RETTIG)

[Neil]

Sunday, November 16, 2008
New fire station on Franklin Street is a fitting tribute

Nick KOTSOPOULOS Politics and the City


Linked articles:
» Out of the ashes (11/16/2008)

Wednesday will be a special, yet bittersweet, day in Worcester.

That afternoon there will be a ceremonial ribbon-cutting for the new Franklin Street fire station, an $8 million, state-of-the-art facility that will be replacing two century-old-plus fire stations on the city’s East Side.

It’s always a special occasion when the city opens a new fire station, because such celebrations are few and far between, especially during these days of tremendous fiscal uncertainties facing municipalities.


What makes this station opening bittersweet is the circumstances that led to its being built on Franklin Street — east of Interstate 290, in the shadow of the elevated portion of the highway runs through the center of the city. It was there where six Worcester firefighters died while fighting an inferno at the former Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Co. building nearly nine years ago.

Lts. James F. “Jay” Lyons III, Thomas E. Spencer and Timothy P. Jackson, and Firefighters Paul A. Brotherton, Jeremiah M. Lucey and Joseph T. McGuirk died in the Dec. 3, 1999, blaze that was started when a homeless couple taking shelter in the vacant warehouse knocked over a candle.

City officials have repeatedly referred to the site as “sacred ground” and there was initially much reservation in some quarters about ever building anything on the site again, never mind a fire station.

But through the efforts and leadership of former Mayor Timothy P. Murray, it was decided back in 2002 that building a new fire station there was the right thing to do, because the station would serve as a living legacy to the fallen firefighters and what those six firefighters did for this community.

“Their memories will forever be remembered there,” City Manager Michael V. O’Brien said last week.

When the ceremonial ribbon is cut for the Franklin Street station Wednesday afternoon, it will culminate a process that began more than six years ago, when Mr. Murray brought an order before the City Council, calling on the city administration to explore all possibilities for acquiring the Franklin Street fire site, which was owned by Framingham developer Ding On “Tony” Kwan.

Mr. Murray felt it was important for the city to acquire the property to protect it from being commercially developed. The fear of many folks at City Hall was the Mr. Kwan was eventually going to look to redevelop his prime piece of real estate, all but erasing the significance of what happened on that site and what it meant to this city.

Why wouldn’t Mr. Kwan be expected to redevelop his property? No one could have expected him or any other subsequent owner simply to leave it as a vacant lot, and City Hall wasn’t about to give him a pass on the real estate taxes for that property, either.

Feeling that any kind of commercial development on the site would have been sacrilegious, the City Council got solidly behind Mr. Murray’s efforts and pushed for the acquisition of the Franklin Street property. The city subsequently negotiated a deal with Mr. Kwan in which it agreed to take about one acre of the 1.5 acre property by eminent domain and pay him $900,000 for it, and in 2004 the City Council approved a financing plan for the acquisition of the property.

The project did not get off the ground right away, because $2 million in state funding the city was counting on for the project had been held up by then Gov. Mitt Romney. As a result, the site remained an empty lot for eight years, cordoned off by a chain-link fence adorned by remembrances of the fallen firefighters.

It was not until last November when ground was finally broken for the station.

A lot has changed in Worcester since Dec. 3, 1999. For starters, of the 11 members currently on the City Council, only three (Konstantina B. Lukes, Joseph M. Petty and Paul P. Clancy Jr.) were on the council when the deadly warehouse fire occurred, and the events of that fateful night are still etched in their memories.

“This (Franklin Street) site represents the spirit and valor of our fallen firefighters,” Mr. Clancy said. “It is such an important and symbolic location.”

Raymond V. Mariano, who was Worcester’s mayor in 1999, probably best summed up the feelings of the community in the aftermath of the fire when he called the deaths of the six firefighters a “major loss to the city family.”

“Worcester may be the second-largest city in New England, but it’s still a small town in more ways than one,” Mr. Mariano said at a press conference the day after the fire. “This is like a death in the family. This has touched so many people in this city because they knew the firefighters, their wives, their children, or their brothers and sisters. Everyone was crying today.”

Former City Manager Thomas R. Hoover also remembered in an interview a year after the fire how the ordeal brought Worcester to a virtual standstill for several days.

“It seemed as if the city had almost shut down,” Mr. Hoover recalled in that interview. “Not many people could put their mind on their day-to-day work. The fact that so many citizens came to the site each day and night showed how much of an impact this tragedy had on our community. A lot of people, including myself, simply felt the need to be there. It was as if people needed some kind of closure to this tragedy.”

Perhaps the opening of the Franklin Street fire station will bring that closure that Mr. Hoover talked about.

Indeed, the Franklin Street fire station should serve as an excellent living legacy to Worcester’s fallen firefighters and provide a reminder to everyone of how public safety personnel put their lives on the line each and every day they show up for work.

People in Worcester should never forget the night of Dec. 3, 1999, and what it meant to this city. Hopefully, the presence of Franklin Street fire station on that “sacred ground” won’t let us forget.

http://www.telegram.com/article/2008...811160372/1116

[Neil]

Thursday, November 20, 2008
A great tribute

New fire station opens on site where six firefighters died

WHERE WE LIVE

By Steven H. Foskett Jr. TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
sfoskett@telegram.com

WORCESTER— Soon after the rubble of the Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Co. fire was cleared, a debate ensued about what to do with the site where six Worcester firefighters were killed Dec. 3, 1999.

David and Sharon Arnold were among those pushing for a memorial to be built there. But once they stepped inside, they were convinced the city did the right thing by building its newest firehouse on the Franklin Street site, its brick structure and copper roof visible from Interstate 290.

“It needs more poles, though,” said Mr. Arnold, a former city firefighter, referring to the traditional pole firefighters slide down when an alarm is called. “You can never have enough poles.”


Mr. Arnold said he suffered a disabling injury fighting the warehouse blaze almost nine years ago, and said he would have liked to have seen the site turned into a memorial. But he said he was glad to see the station finally take shape.

“It wasn’t my first choice of what to do with it, but it came to grow on me,” Mr. Arnold said.

Standing shoulder to shoulder, firefighters, residents, politicians and family members of the fallen firefighters packed the gleaming, 15,000-square-foot three-bay station for yesterday’s opening ceremony. The station’s first alarms could be sounded as early as tomorrow.

Sixty-eight firefighters will work there, on four shifts.

The new $8 million station will replace the Brown Square station at Plantation and Franklin streets, which is closing, and the Central Street station, which already closed, and will house firetrucks from Brown Square, Providence Street, Grove Street and McKeon Road. The Providence Street station is slated for closure. Fire Chief Gerard A. Dio said the new station is a fitting replacement to the Brown Square and Providence Street stations.

“They’re both over 110 years old, so that tells you how long we’re going to be here,” the chief said.

The ceremony was a mix of warm remembrances and acknowledgement of the political will it took to get state funding for the project. The three mayors who have served the city since the fire — Raymond V. Mariano, now-Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Murray, and Konstantina B. Lukes — attended the ceremony, along with city councilors and most of the city’s Statehouse delegation.

Mr. Murray spoke, along with City Manager Michael V. O’Brien, City Councilor Philip P. Palmieri, state Reps. Vincent A. Pedone and John J. Binienda, and state Sen. Edward M. Augustus Jr. and Ms. Lukes, who said the site of the fire will always be considered hallowed and sacred ground.

“We can never say their names often enough,” Ms. Lukes said, referring to Firefighters Paul A. Brotherton, Jeremiah M. Lucey and Joseph T. McGuirk, and Lts. Timothy P. Jackson Sr., Thomas E. Spencer and James F. “Jay” Lyons III, the six firefighters killed in the fire.

Frank Raffa, president of Local 1009, International Association of Fire Fighters, said the new station was a long time coming. He said he knew the six could hear everyone at the station.

“This is a great tribute, this is a new beginning,” Firefighter Raffa said.

Wiping away tears after the ceremony, Mrs. Arnold said there couldn’t have been a better tribute to the six firefighters than to have a new fire station that will be staffed 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. When asked why she continues to attend memorials, and why she attended yesterday’s opening ceremony, she had a quick answer.

“Out of respect,” Mrs. Arnold said.

Contact Steven H. Foskett Jr. by e-mail at sfoskett@telegram.com.

photo
Joining other relatives of the six men killed in the Worcester Cold Storage and Warehouse Co. fire in cutting the ribbon yesterday at the new Franklin Street fire station were Casey Spencer, far left, partially obscured, and Dan Spencer, children of fallen firefighter Thomas E. Spencer; Michelle Lucey, widow of fallen firefighter Jeremiah M. Lucey; Denise Brotherton, widow of fallen firefighter Paul A. Brotherton; and three of her six sons, Steven, Jonathan and Michael. (T&G Staff Photos / PAUL KAPTEYN)
http://www.telegram.com/article/2008...811200775/1116

[Neil]

Channel 5 link.
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/vide...179/index.html