Last Updated: 8:57 pm | Friday, April 11, 2008
He owes them his life
BY CLIFF RADEL |
COLERAIN TWP. - Kenny Vadnais believes he is alive today because of Robin
Broxterman and Brian Schira.
They helped him escape a fire's death grip.
But, don't call Vadnais lucky.
The 24-year-old part-time Colerain Town****p firefighter, with nearly four
years of service under his belt and two tours of duty in Iraq on his
resume,
lost his captain - Broxterman - and a fellow firefighter - Schira - in a
deadly house fire a week ago Friday.
.. Special section: Tragedy in Colerain
.. Video from the Wednesday funeral
.. Audio slideshow from the funeral
"I do not feel lucky in any way," Vadnais said Friday afternoon during his
first interview since the tragedy.
"I lost two friends."
All three went into a burning house. Through the front door. Down the
hall.
Past the living room. Past the dining room. Into the kitchen. They took a
180-degree turn - with a fire hose - and went down the basement steps.
All three went into the smoke-filled basement. Vadnais saw no objects. No
furni****ngs. No plants, no orchids, no marijuana.
All they saw was the eerie glow that can only come from one source - a
fire
that wants to kill.
They fought the blaze. But, something happened. No one has been able to
put
all the parts together yet to explain why.
This is what is known: The fire suddenly grew in intensity. The
firefighters
' battle plan changed.
Broxterman gave the order to get out.
All three tried to follow her order. They made it up the steps.
But only one made it out.
Hamilton County Coroner O'dell Owens ruled Friday that Broxterman and
Schira
died from breathing super-heated gases.
The coroner believes the first floor gave way and the two firefighters
"fell
into the heart of the fire."
Vadnais was there. But he cannot confirm or deny the coroner's belief.
After he left through the front door, Vadnais looked back "and I could not
see anything."
Except smoke. And a fear that he would never see his friends again.
Vadnais took a deep breath and looked down at his folded hands as he told
his story. He sat in Colerain's Fire Station 25. For a few seconds, on his
first day on the job since the fire, he was alone with his thoughts.
"Robin and Brian were great individuals," he said after regaining his
customary military composure. His Marine training is readily apparent. In
conversation, he's all "yes sir" and "no sir."
"Yes sir, I was proud to work with them."
His mournful brown eyes, however, gave away the emotions he's feeling.
He's
coping with the loss of friends while wondering why he survived.
"I haven't asked myself: 'Why me?' " he said. He's been too busy "trying
to
give their families as much sup****t as I can."
Try as he does to offer sup****t, he keeps re-living the morning of April
4.
Memories of that rainy Friday are at once vivid and hazy.
He remembers re****ting for work. He pulled into the parking lot of Fire
Station 102, in the town****p's Dunlap neighborhood, just before 6 a.m.
"Had only been there for 12 minutes," Vadnais said. "We just checked our
gear when the call came in."
Fire alarms were going off at 5708 Squirrels Nest Lane, the home of Matt
and
Sharyn Cones.
"Me and Brian were pretty excited," Vadnais recalled. "There's not too
many
good ones around here."
He winced. He realized that didn't sound right.
So, he explained: "There was a possibility for a fire where we go into the
interior (of the home), we mask up and do what we're trained to do. We
weren
't happy somebody's house was on fire."
The blaze was a short drive from the fire house. Four firefighters hopped
onto a pumper. Broxterman sat in the front commander's seat next to the
driver.
Sitting in the backward-facing seats, Vadnais and Schira served as what
firefighters call "roughnecks." They would man the hose and its
connections.
Vadnais sat behind the driver. Schira hunkered behind the crew's
commander.
At the driveway, Vadnais said, "the homeowner told us there was a fire in
the basement."
He did not hear anyone say no one was in the home.
"I was getting dressed," Vadnais said. "She (Broxterman) was much closer
to
him (Cones)."
After talking with Cones, Broxterman slid open a window in the pumper's
cab
and gave orders to her two roughnecks. Vadnais would get off at the top of
the long driveway that led to the house on the wooded lot. He would
connect
a five-inch yellow hose to the hydrant at the top of the drive.
"I got a little bit more experience than Brian," Vadnais said. "So, I let
him have the nozzle. A majority of the guys like that the best. He stayed
on
the truck. And they advanced to the fire."
No smoke or flames could be seen from the road.
After connecting the hose, Vadnais walked down the drive. At the house he
saw "zero flames. I could see smoke. But you can't really tell how thick
it
is in the dark."
Broxterman evaluated the scene. A decision was made to go in and fight the
fire. Nothing was said about searching for occupants. There was no chit
chat.
"We had our game face on," Vadnais. "Everybody had a job to do."
Broxterman and Schira went in through the front door. Vadnais followed. He
made sure there were no kinks in the hose.
Since the firefighters' deaths, one question has been asked over and over:
Why did they go into an unoccupied house that was on fire?
Vadnais supplied a simple answer.
"We don't want our citizens to lose their homes and the belongings. We try
to keep fire damage as minimal as possible," he said.
"We have a job to do."
This firefighter's grandson intends to keep doing that job.
"I want to honor Robin and Brian by getting back on the truck," Vadnais
said.
He owes it to them. They saved his life.
------------------------------------------------------------
Last Updated: 10:38 pm | Friday, April 11, 2008
Deters to discuss fire
BY KIMBALL PERRY |
The Hamilton County prosecutor could announce Monday whether criminal
charges will be brought against the owners of the Colerain Town****p home
that caught fire April 4, resulting in the deaths of two firefighters.
Prosecutor Joe Deters plans a Monday press conference about the issue.
"He'll have what (evidence) we have if he doesn't already," said Steve
Barnett, Hamilton County Sheriff's office spokesman.
The sheriff's office was one of several agencies investigating the deadly
fire.
R. Scott Croswell III, the attorney for Sharyn and Matt Cones, owners of
the
$224,000 home, has said the fire started due to an electrical problem with
equipment the couple used to grow orchids in the basement.
The Ohio Fire Marshal's office released a preliminary ruling Monday that
the
fire was accidental. That determination was based on physical evidence
gathered - by the sheriff's office - at the scene of the four-bedroom
house
on Squirrels Nest Lane.
A Fire Marshal's spokesman said Friday he was unaware when a final ruling
would be made.
The Colerain Town****p Fire Department didn't return Friday calls about its
investigation.
Hamilton County Coroner O'dell Owens on Friday revealed more details about
the deaths of Colerain Fire Capt. Robin Broxterman, 37, and Firefighter
Brian Schira, 29.
Owens said the two fell into the basement and the "heart of the fire" when
they tried to get out of the house. They died after falling into the
inferno
and inhaling superheated gases and smoke.
Broxterman and Schira were in the basement of the house, apparently
waiting
for water to be pumped through their hoses, when they went up the basement
stairs to the first-floor living room.
The floor didn't hold their weight because the fire already had burned its
crossbeams. That was the "catastrophic structural failure" fire officials
referred to at the scene last week.
"It collapsed like a slide," Owens said of the floor, demonstrating with
his
hands, "and they (slid) into the basement.
"They fell into the heart of the fire," Owens said.
That resulted in the firefighters' masking coming loose, allowing the
superheated gases created by the fire to sear their lungs.
"It immediately does damage to the pulmonary system," Owens said.
They died within minutes, Owens said.
Owens believes Broxterman breathed in more of the gases because she had a
higher level of carbon monoxide than Schira.
Normally, Owens said, a carbon monoxide level of 10 is dangerous.
Broxterman
's level was 22; Schira was eight.
"This was a very intensive fire," Owens said. "There was a lot of melting
(of fire gear found on the pair)."
His office was unable to tell how much the bodies burned while still
alive,
but said tattoos remained on both bodies.
"The gear was very protective," Owens said.
The result was the bodies showed more thermal burns - burns caused by
heated
gases - than burns caused by fire.
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