It is early Christmas morning 2022 and I find myself in yet another firehouse trying to make sense of the disorder and chaos I am often bathed in. I should feel something I suppose but I fucking hate Christmas.
Just three hours ago we were rousted out of bed and were quickly barreling down the street dispatched to a MVA with cardiac arrest. I imagine almost anyone reading this can paint the picture of what that might look like, and since neither company, the second from the closest firehouse, was on scene it is this mental picture I am working with while preparing for whatever is about to come. I had no idea of what laid in wait around the next corner.
The first company arrives on scene and confirms one car has rolled over, the second car is heavily damaged in the middle of the road, and there are bodies strewn about the scene. We arrived seconds later to one of the more horrendous wrecks I've seen in many years. As I walked from the engine (firetruck I was working on) with my crew I see one deceased male thrown from the car in the middle of the road lying in a ditch about 60 feet from the car. The car is obliterated on the passenger side and is covered in oil that sprayed out from the dislodged engine of the first car that t-boned it. A quick glance inside to confirm that no one is left inside and we are headed to help the other engine company at the overturned car.
As we approach the other car I see another deceased male thrown from what I assume is the overturned car. I then see EMS working on yet another male thrown from the car who was dead and just didn't know it yet, although that reality was soon upon him. As I make my way to the car I see yet another partially ejected male who is pinned under the car by the corner of the roof and windshield, he is also dead.
While examining the car another fireman tells me he believes there is another person inside. There is almost no access to the inside of this car at the moment as the roof is crushed down and the side-impact airbags have deployed blocking our view, and then I see the air bag move.
I lay down on the ground and cut the airbag away and I see a female bundled up in a broken ball lying on her back, she is the only one alive. We quickly realize that her head is pinned under part of the roof, her feet and legs are bunched up over head in the footwell by the pedals of the opposite seat, and several bones are broken. Her head is nothing more than a few inches at best from the deceased male that was partially ejected.
No one was wearing their seatbelt. No one.
As the crews gather all of the tools that is going to take to stabilize this car and then extricate her I start devising a plan to remove her from harm. To get better access to her head, and to make the first attempt at removing her, we cut part of the roof and front post free only to discover her hair is caught under the top of the door and there is no way to bring her torso in line as she had launched from the backseat, through the front seats into her current predicament. We quickly moved to cutting the rear seat back as we had a fireman in the back seat, but were unable to get full access with the tools as the center console and transmission tunnel had compressed against the seat base.
I asked her for her name and then told her mine and worked to calm her down as we began to cut the car that I am partially lying under, and she is fully trapped in, apart. I can't see what they are doing though I am intimately familiar with steps of the dance going on above my head. It is loud, it is dark, and it is below freezing as the crews are working directly over my exposed back as I lay on my belly with the head of the deceased pushing into my ribs. Another lieutenant is straddling me to protect me from the impact of falling debris and the possibility of a 50 pound set of spreaders failing onto my back and neck thus ending my career. There is broken glass raining down on my head with bits of metal from the cutters doing the only thing they are designed for. I bury myself further into bunker coat to try and protect myself while I continue to work to keep "Spring" calm.
We removed both doors, cut her hair, and finally freed her so they she could be whisked over to the closet trauma center only to realize when she wakes up from surgery that four people died, three of them her friends, on Christmas Day. If she is lucky enough to survive her injuries she will be reminded of the delicate and finite nature of life for the rest of her's every Christmas.
One week from today I celebrate, strong word for such an occasion I now believe, 30 years in 911. Thirty years. An entire career, and one I never planned on. More than half of my life given to the county I work for, the place I call home. It seems like only yesterday I walked in the door, and yet it feels like an eternity has passed. Wow.
I have dealt with so much death, so many ruined holidays for the survivors, so much chaos and heartbreak. I feel nothing. I think I may be broken, honestly. I want to feel, feel something but it is nothing more than a dark empty echoing void.
Perhaps this is the result of a career of trying to protect myself mentally from what I do. Perhaps this the result of a lifetime of trying to protect myself mentally from some of the pain of living. I do not know. I do know I feel nothing and yet I want to feel something, I want to feel normal. No body sees all of this death, pain, sadness, and grief without feeling something, right?
Every Christmas, Christmas Eve, New Years, etc., I have worked death has followed. Death follows me everywhere it seems so really every holiday is just another random Tuesday. Perhaps I hate the holidays because I know what will happen and I know the day will be ruined for somebody. Perhaps that is some "feeling"of mine trying to be found. Some semblance of normalcy lurking beneath the surface wanting to rise up into the light. Perhaps it's just fatigue and experienced based attempts at self preservation. I do know I have another shift starting a few hours and that I won't get home to family until tomorrow evening. Thirty six more hours on duty and likely more corners lie ahead.
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