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FDNY Live, New York Fire Department, NYFD, FDNY

FDNY Live, New York Fire Department, NYFD, FDNY

FDNY Live, New York Fire Department, NYFD, FDNY

FDNY Live, New York Fire Department, NYFD, FDNY

FDNY Live, New York Fire Department, NYFD, FDNY

   

No Forgetting The 'Forgotten Fire'

Steve Spak Photo

NY Daily News 1/26/09

He honored two uniforms.

He died in one of them.

The other one will be retired by St. Francis Prep on Friday night.

There is a plaque on the wall of Woodside's Ladder 163 for Firefighter John Downing, who died at age 40 on June 17, 2001. A wall collapsed on him and fellow Firefighter Harry Ford, 50, following an explosion in a paint store blaze in Astoria.

A third firefighter, Brian Fahey, 46, also died in the basement of that inferno. Combined, eight kids lost their fathers in that tragic Father's Day fire, which some people call the "forgotten fire" because the grief was soon dwarfed by the enormity of Sept. 11, 2001.

But at Ladder 163, they do not forget.

Ever.

"Every year, we have a memorial mass at St. Sebastian's for the men we lost that day, and all the others this house has lost over the decades," says Capt. Jim Hay. "This year, the mass will be on April 25 at 9 a.m. There's a feeling of loss in this house every day for all the men who made the ultimate sacrifice. You can just feel their spirit in the room. We never forget. The plaques and photos are there to remind us of their sacrifice, and that it could be any of us. But it is particularly gratifying to see that St. Francis Prep, where John Downing played high school basketball, has not forgotten him either."

And never will.

Downing's uniform, bearing No. 34, will be permanently retired Friday night in honor of this alumnus of the Class of '79, a 6-foot-5-inch forward/center.

"We would like to invite all our former basketball players, alumni, classmates and friends of John's to join with his family in honoring John's memory," says Brother Robert Kent, alumni director of St. Francis Preparatory School in Fresh Meadows.

One friend who will be there is Robert O'Neill, a firefighter who still chauffeurs a rig out of Ladder 163 and who misses his big buddy every day.

"John was born and raised in Woodside, one of seven kids from parents from County Kerry, Ireland," says O'Neill. "He has two brothers, who are cops, another a firefighter, and three sisters, who all worked for Con Ed, like their father, before getting married. John was a bear of a man, and when he spoke, people listened. He attended St. John's University, was well-read, and self-taught in plumbing and electrical, a perfectionist. A great guy and a tremendous firefighter. He married a beautiful girl named Anne from County Down, Northern Ireland. They had two kids. His family was everything to him."

Downing was working his final tour before leaving for a vacation in Ireland that day, and in firehouse tradition, which often involves symbols of life amid the human loss, he bought lunch for the rest of his firefighting brothers.

Then came the bells.

They would be the last bells John Downing would ever answer. The fire at Long Island General Supply on Astoria Blvd. and 14th St. was fierce, flames roaring, paint cans exploding, chemical fumes and intense heat radiating into the street as Downing and Ford worked to rip off a gate from an exposure wall. A small explosion detonated, followed by a ferocious blast. The wall smashed on top of Downing and Ford. It would be their last Father's Day.

In all, five rescue companies, 46 engines, 33 ladders, 16 battalion chiefs, two deputy chiefs and 245 firefighters would answer the five-alarm job, trying to locate and free Firefighter Fahey, who was trapped in the cellar. Alas, his kids would never call Fahey "Daddy," again either.

People who attended John Downing's funeral mass remember that his 8-year-old daughter, Joanne, held her father's FDNY hat as she followed her father's coffin out of the church. Outside on the steps, one mourner remembers that an orange Monarch butterfly circled the heartbroken little girl a half-dozen times before landing on her shoulder like a celestial messenger.

"John's son, Michael, was 2 when John died," says O'Neill. "It got worse for Anne when little Michael was diagnosed with stage-four neuroblastoma, a childhood cancer that took him from her in 2003. The grief was overwhelming. But Anne believes that she will someday be reunited with John and Michael in Heaven. Anne will be at St. Francis Prep to see John honored."

These are the moments when citizens can say, "thanks" to these first defenders who always show up when danger strikes. A lot of times, they die making sure we don't. The least we can do is remember them, the way they will remember John Downing at St. Francis Prep on Friday night. The way his buddies of Ladder 163 will remember him at the St. Sebastian's memorial Mass on April 25.

dhamill@nydailynews.com

For information on the St. Francis Prep event, e-mail ndestefano@sfponline.org or call

(718) 423-8810, ext. 259.

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