On Fires Still Burning

Photo by Sonya Hebert-Schwartz, Dallas Morning News

The first time it happened to me was early in the morning on May 20, 2013. I was getting ready for work, listening to The Ticket, like I always do…running late, like I always do. And my phone buzzed on the sink with a text message from my boss, whose four little words weighted me down with an instant panic. “Is your husband OK?” And then came the second text, moments later, from a friend: “Saw the fire on the news…is everything OK?”

My husband left the house that morning around 5 a.m. to report for his shift with Dallas Fire-Rescue. There had been a massive six-alarm condo fire earlier in the morning, and in that fire, Stanley Wilson was killed. My husband wasn’t there. But in those first few moments, I didn’t know that my husband had gotten to work well after the alarm. I didn’t know where he was. And my heart accelerated as I texted, tried to call, got nothing. For the first time since he called me in September of 2011, breathlessly reporting “I got the call!” right after he found out he had been hired, I was scared by his job. I was afraid that my phone would ring and a 671- number would pop up on display and I would just collapse, right there, as bad news was delivered.

I knew the job was a risky one from the get-go. I work in law enforcement—I understand line of duty deaths and on-the-job injuries. I research and write about decision making in critical incidents; I know what can happen even under the best of circumstances. But at some point, shortly after graduating from Academy, my husband told me not to worry about him. “We take care of each other,” he said. “We are never alone.” And I took heart in that. I met the people he worked with—the woman who works out every day so she’ll be fit enough to drag even the biggest of lugs out of a burning building; the Cross Fit enthusiasts who’ll have no problem hoisting someone over their shoulder and getting them down a flight of stairs to safety; the lieutenant who treats his people like his actual family.  I saw the protocols for working in a fire—the buddy systems and hose lines. I watched him inspect his safety equipment. I felt OK about it.

Until May 20 when that reality hit me: he could be gone, I thought. And the possibility was too awful. I called my dad crying, and talked to him until my phone clicked and I saw my husband’s photo pop up on my screen. He was fine. He was covering for a crew at another station. They were busy.

In that moment, there was relief and then an enormous sorrow and empathy for the wife whose husband didn’t call with that relatively banal update. I watched over the next few hours as Facebook flooded with the black bars meant to signify line of duty deaths. Days later I saw photos of the tributes to Wilson at his funeral and I thought to myself….at least he was never alone.

Except that he was. He was lost in a building that was being pounded by water from ladder pipes above it. He died alone because nobody could find him. He died because he should not have been in that building—and even knowing the limited amount of information about firefighting tactics that I do, I knew that. And I no longer felt OK with it. 

I wanted to know how it happened. Who didn’t take care of Stanley Wilson? Who might let my husband down next time he’s walking into a structurally compromised and burning building? Jenny Wilson, Stanley Wilson’s wife, wanted to know what happened. She deserved to know what happened. She lost her husband of 21 years. Her boys lost their daddy. And they weren’t supposed to, because a firefighter is never alone.

Instead of giving Jenny Wilson an answer, she was stonewalled by the very people that were supposed to protect her husband. And my husband. And all the other men and women of Dallas Fire- Rescue. She waited 16 months to find out what she already knew: somebody messed up. Badly. And she waited 16 months, all the while trying to pick up the pieces of her and her boys’ lives, to hear Chief Louie Bright say this on September 19, 2014:

"There is no one person that bears all responsibility for what occurred on May 20^th of last year. This investigation revealed that DFR firefighters took or failed to take actions that possibly contributed to Stanley Wilson perishing in this fire”

And then:

“Our firefighters are given the authority to weigh the risk of any orders given, and if there are any actions that place firefighters in unnecessary jeopardy everyone has the authority and duty to speak out and consider alternatives”

No one will take responsibility. The incident commander made a horrible decision, did not follow any recognized protocol, and then relayed an accounting of the incident during the ensuing investigation that was wildly contradictory to every other version of events given. And then the top leadership of the department condoned all of those things by leaving that commander in a position where he will maybe one day compel my husband or someone else’s husband or wife or mom or dad or brother or sister to walk into a burning and structurally unsound building. More incredibly, Louie Bright told the men and women of Dallas Fire-Rescue and their loved ones that Stanley Wilson died because he didn’t question an order. Nobody should be OK with that. 

Dallas Fire-Rescue made a promise to us—to the men and women of DFR and to their loved ones—that their firefighters will never be alone. That promise is what keeps me from staying up all night worrying about my husband, or from panicking every time I heard about a fire on the news. These days, my stomach bottoms out every time severe weather approaches or I see a reporter on Twitter mention a blaze in the city. I don’t trust the department with my husband’s well-being.

And they owe me my husband’s well-being: the families of firemen sacrifice a lot—which seems almost silly to say in the aftermath of Jenny Wilson’s loss. We don’t have a normal family life. The odds of divorce are staggering for fire service families: we have to work hard to keep things together. We have to handle crises, small and large, while our loved ones serve the City of Dallas. And we understand: that’s just the job. And many of us really love the job. We are proud that our loved ones do what they do. The fire department is a  big part of our lives--because it has to be. Because my husband is my life. Because he is my kids' life. 

I kiss him goodbye on shift mornings and see him walk out the door to join his co-workers in facing the unknown. That may sound unnecessarily dramatic because sometimes the day is quiet and the unknown is so very mundane: is there time to work out? Will the lieutenant bring in some of the fish he caught for dinner? Sometimes, my husband and his station mates run non-stop and whether or not they’ll even get to eat dinner or get any sleep becomes an unknown. Sometimes, the unknown presents itself as a situation that I cannot even fathom: burning buildings; traumatic EMS calls. But he is never alone. Right?

I don’t know anymore. Jenny Wilson does. She knows that Stanley Wilson was alone; that the Dallas Fire-Rescue administration has abandoned her…and that it probably won’t be the last time something like this happens. Case in point: Scott Tanksley’s widow is still waiting for an investigative report into what happened the night her husband fell off an icy overpass in early 2014 while assisting stranded motorists. What could possibly take so long? Dallas Police Department issues reports on officer-involved shootings within a matter of weeks—if not days. Why can’t DFR give these families what they owe them? And why can’t they give all the rest of us what we need—which is simply to feel confident in the fact that our loved ones will never, ever, be alone.

I won’t even touch the organizational breakdown that this incident portrays—the fact that the top administrator of a command and control organization just told his entire command that they should always question their leadership in a critical incident. I won’t go into the many ways that such a statement could cause absolute chaos and low morale. But I what I will say is that it causes a great unease in the hearts of the families of Dallas Fire-Rescue officers. That it scares us. That it makes it plain to all of us that one morning, we might be getting ready for work when the phone rings. And then we will be alone.

Stanley Wilson (photo: Dallas Fire-Rescue)