Wednesday Morning – Don't Leave Anybody Behind
The Gnome Handler, Steve passed along an article the other day addressing an occurrence that seems to arise about every six months in one place or another. I'll just reprint one brief paragraph from it and you will get the gist immediately of what I'm talking about this mornng:
The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner said on Thursday that the body found in June 7 was that of 61-year-old Henry McMullen. The body was found after a May 27 fire, when the debris from the blaze was being removed.
It's always sad to hear about these things. Not just because it's embarrassing for the FD involved, but especially for the distress it adds to an already-grieving family and the loss of dignity that the deceased person deserves. As I mentioned, we hear about this once in a while and most of the time it's just one of those things that happened despite the firefighters' efforts to be thorough. Most often it's because nobody knows that someone is missing in the first place and a careful, determined effort to locate them doesn't take place.
But once in a while it does happen due to the lack of proper diligence of the fire department. Not long after I started this blog, just over four years ago, I posted a story about a situation in New Mexico where a fire had destroyed a mobile home located in an isolated area in the desert. The firefighters just knocked the fire down, cooled everything off and took only a cursory look inside the totally destroyed trailer. It was about two weeks later when the victim's friend came by and started poking around that the body was discovered and it wasn't even hidden. That was just inexcusable and careless.
Most of these situations happen despite the firefighters' best efforts, though. And yet the body is still left behind, usually buried under the debris inside the house. I'm bringing this up now as a means to remind you about the possibility of this happening anytime, any place, even though you take a reasonably good search around. Always take time to check with neighbors, etc., to see if there is a chance that someone is unaccounted for. And then take another look just to make sure anyway. "Oh, the family's away on vacation…" Yeah, but sometimes an older teenager stays behind to watch the house and relish their first experience at freedom from the parents, for example. I've seen that happen. So please, always make the effort to make sure that you don't leave anybody behind.
Now let's make the effort to get this equipment checked out. I am definitely in need of some more coffee, so I'll get that started. See you later in the day room.
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