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Elgin Fire Department news

Mar 2

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Elgin firefighters and residents were honored for their quick thinking and efforts to save lives in the past year.

There were several instances last year when firefighters — honored with the department’s highest award, the Phoenix — helped bring back to life patients who were in full cardiorespiratory arrest. While that may be part of firefighters’ jobs, it’s important to recognize positive outcomes, Fire Chief Dave Schmidt said.

Two residents whose lives were saved attended the ceremony and were given keychains marking the date and time of the events.

The fire chief’s award went to a team from Mathers Clinic who helped a woman unexpectedly deliver a baby, as well as Streamwood Firefighter Chris Tierney, who helped in a March accident involving an overturned limo on I-90, when a woman died.

The department also honored several residents. They included:

• Edier Fernandez, a laundromat employee who extinguished a dryer fire.

• Kurt Engle, a retired firefighter who helped a neighbor extinguish a stove top fire.

• Mary Richardson, who called 911 and performed CPR on her boyfriend until paramedics arrived.

• Tyrone Strother guided two boys to safety during a home fire just before Christmas, when firefighters rescued the boys’ two sisters.

• Four-year-old Sebastian Reyes alerted his mother and siblings when he smelled and saw smoke coming out of the basement in May.

• Four members of St. Thomas More Church, including Lieutenant Chris Clausen, performed CPR and used an automated external defibrillator to save the life of a priest who collapsed after Mass in August.

Firefighters were honored for performing CPR on a patient who was stricken while on the roof of a home and for a lengthy extrication of victims after an SUV drove into the rear of a semitrailer on I-90 in August, when Michigan nurse Susan Walthall, who was driving by, also helped.

Firefighters in August revived a man who crashed his bicycle and landed on railroad tracks, severely injuring his neck.

Hoffman Estates Firefighter Evan VonQualen called 911 after seeing smoke come out of a house and helped a resident get outside.

Streamwood Firefighter Eric Casey pulled a man out of a burning car after an accident in December on Route 20.

Tags: Edier Fernandez, Elgin Fire Department, Elgin Fire Department presents awards to firefighters and civilians, Fire Chief Dave Schmidt, fire department awards ceremony, Hoffman Estates Firefighter Evan VonQualen, Kurt Engle, Lieutenant Chris Clausen, Mary Richardson, Sebastian Reyes, Streamwood Firefighter Chris Tierney, Streamwood Firefighter Eric Casey, Tyrone Strother

Elgin FD awards ceremony

Feb 21

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Excerpts from the DailyHerald.com:

From an 11-year-old who alerted his family to a fire to firefighters who performed emergency lifesaving procedures in the field, the Elgin Fire Department’s awards ceremony on Tuesday evening honored dozens.

This was the first such formal ceremony in at least a decade thanks to the efforts of a newly reorganized committee led by Lt. Dan Wagner, Fire Chief John Fahy said.

The committee sifted through hundreds, if not thousands of pages of documents detailing actions by the fire department, which responds to up to 12,000 calls per year, Fahy said and that “Many of the honorees went above and beyond their call of duty. They did that extra thing to make it right.”

Several people got the fire chief’s citizens award, including Nathan Pagnoni, 11, who acted quickly when he discovered a garage fire and alerted his grandmother. “I was really scared,” Nathan recalled. As for the ceremony, “it was really cool to get up there and take photos with the firemen.”

Dawn Stoner of Advocate Sherman Hospital was project manager for a large-scale terrorism training involving 12 fire departments and other agencies at the hospital’s Center Street location.

Father-and-son duo Don Michael Bush and Michael Sean Bush were honored for helping extinguish a kitchen fire in a home across the street and assisting the affected family with a fundraiser.

Nurse Angela Flintz helped use automated external defibrillator pads on a man who lost consciousness during an Elgin Township Triad meeting both were attending. Andrew J. Robinson helped extinguish a fire with a garden hose, while Burlington Coat Factory employees Nohemi C. Farfan and Jasmine Becerra swiftly responded to a fire in a store clothing rack.

Several firefighters were honored with the department’s first Phoenix awards for helping save the lives of patients who were in full cardiorespiratory arrest.

One team took care of a man who had overdosed on heroin while another team helped a man who stopped breathing at a nursing home.

Company awards were given to a team that performed an emergency cricothyrotomy — or surgically opening the throat to insert a breathing tube — on a gunshot victim, and another to firefighters who saved the life of an infant who was choking.

Two Meijer grocery store employees who couldn’t attend the ceremony, Joseph A. Kearns and Sean R. Markwood, were honored for performing CPR and using an automated external defibrillator on someone who went into cardiac arrest.

The department’s active shooter committee and its strategic planning committee got unit citations. Also recognized were 28 department members — out of 133 total — who served in the U.S. military.