"FIREFIGHTING: THE LATEST RAGE"

I want to be a fireman when I grow up has uttered out of the mouths of hundreds of little boys for decades.Louis Renzo Jr. wasn’t one of those little boys even though his own dad Louis Sr. was a proud dedicated volunteer firefighter in Hawthorne FD, NJ for 54 years. Renzo himself, now a veteran with 26 years of service behind him loves his job and doesn’t consider it a job at all.

A day at the Station can be an unpredictable waiting game uncertain of how many calls in the day they’ll have. Calls can deal with anything from a child falling off their bicycle to car accidents to a major fire, and “anything that people don’t know who to call.” He’s even gone as far as to save a man’s cockatiel in a tree.

Every situation is different and each one is handled professionally. However, depending on the circumstances you always have to be prepared to expect the unexpected as things can seriously go wrong in an instant. Renzo says, “With fires you try not to create another victim. If the situation is hopeless you don’t go in there and do the impossible. Most people die from smoke inhalation long before the flames get to them.”

It is also standard practice that they accompany the ambulance to numerous medical calls and all car accidents. Renzo says, “Medical stuff is tough sometimes since having a grandson hits home a little more. It’s hard when we’re doing CPR on somebody and the victims’ family has hope but we know they’ve checked out. We still go through the motions for the people. We’re not heartless.”

He can never forget a car crash that happened 20 years ago and how it could have ended in tragedy but fortunately didn’t. “A drunk driver had entered on the wrong side of the parkway through the exit ramp. She was going northbound on the southbound side and hit a Cadillac head on. It had minimal damage compared to her Hyundai and he had only suffered a cut to his hand. It took one hour to cut her out of the car and she thought she’d loose her legs. One year later she walked into the firehouse and thanked us for saving her life.” It’s moments like these that also make the job a very rewarding one.

When asked how he separates himself from his job Renzo says, “I don’t know how I do that but I’ve been able to leave all that at work. We meet people at the worst times of their lives. If I cried every time I saw a dead person I would have floated away by now. I’m not scared about anything about the job, which scares me sometimes because it’s kind of gruesome. I can go back to the firehouse and have dinner after a call and just resume where I left off before we went out.”
He also doesn’t feel that the movie Backdraft was an accurate portrayal of firefighters. Renzo says, “It was a joke to a point where it was ridiculous. It was a very unrealistic movie that tried to glamorize firefighting.” However, he did praise the movie Ladder 49 and says, “It was the most realistic portrayal of firefighters. It showed a lot of the antics and practical jokes we do to each other around the firehouse. How close the guys get to one another like a real family. The way we live together, eat together 24 hours a day.” He’s seen a lot of things change on the fire department since he started but wouldn’t change a single thing had he done it all over again.

Besides, it made him feel good when he asked his four year old grandson Thomas what he wanted to be for Halloween this year and his reply was, “I want to be a fireman like you because I love you.” But that dream was short lived when he seen a photograph of a chef in a magazine and said he wanted to be that too. Renzo laughingly says, “Been an interesting 26 years for sure, been an interesting 26 years indeed.”