A funeral procession was held in Nescopeck and Berwick, PA on Sunday afternoon honor Dale Baker, one of the victims of a house fire who was a volunteer firefighter
Posted on 08/14/2022 5:32:03 PM PDT by lightman
As the funeral parade of fire trucks passed beneath an enormous U.S. flag suspended over the roadway, the citizens of the twin towns of Berwick and Nescopeck were dealing with tragedies that seemed out of proportion for such a small population.
Sunday afternoon’s procession – going down Nescopeck’s main throughfare, across the Susquehanna to Berwick, and back – was for Dale Baker, 19, whose funeral was held alongside that of his sister, Star Baker, 22, earlier in the day.
The siblings were two of the 10 victims of a house fire in Nescopeck on Aug. 5. Dale was an up-and-coming firefighter.
But before the community could finish grieving the fire victims, a bizarre and tragic twist occurred Saturday evening, when a car slammed into the crowd at a benefit for the fire victims being held at a Berwick bar.
One person is dead and 17 others were injured and taken to local hospitals, according to police; five victims at Geisinger Medical Center Danville are in critical condition, the hospital chain told WBRE/WYOU.
The suspect in the crash, Adrian Oswaldo Sura Reyes, 24, of Nescopeck, is also accused by police of killing his mother shortly after running the car into the fundraiser crowd.
“People are sick. They’re sick about it. They can’t believe something like this could truly happen,” said Carole Phillips, whose son owns Bob’s Subs and Pizza, located a block away from the Intoxicology Department, the bar where the vehicle plowed into the fundraiser attendees who were gathered outside.
Phillips was at the sub shop when it happened, she said.
“There were motorcycles running all over the place trying to catch him,” Phillips said of the aftermath. “They worked on somebody for so long in the middle of the road, trying to give them CPR.”
Mass casualty events are things that the residents of Berwick and Nescopeck are used to reading about happening in more populous places, Phillips said. Berwick, in Columbia County, has a population of just over 10,000, according to the U.S. Census; Nescopeck, just over the river in Luzerne County, has slightly more than 1,600.
That two such events would happen barely a week apart, in a pair of small towns that have precious few people for such tragedies to happen to, seems almost impossible.
“That it happened to a small town” is what seems to be on everyone’s mind, said Jason Holloway, past chief of Reliance Fire Company in Berwick.
Dale Baker, a junior firefighter with the Nescopeck fire company, had planned to join the Berwick firefighters after he became fully qualified, Holloway said, noting that Baker had been involved with the local fire departments for a decade, since he was a child. Nescopeck funeral procession
Dale Baker’s father, Harold Baker, was among the firefighters who responded to the blaze that killed several members of his family.
“It’s shock, and not understanding why,” said Ken Carey, chief of the neighboring Espy Fire Company.
Given the circumstances, the best thing to do for many is to keep their focus on honoring those lost, even if the tragedies seem to keep coming.
“What we’re doing here today is honoring Dale, nothing changes that,” Carey said.
“All these little small towns have been close-knit communities,” he continued, and will continue to be.
Those closest to the situation are clearly still struggling. At a post-funeral gathering Sunday afternoon, Nescopeck’s police chief said the first responders and family members in attendance weren’t up to speaking further with the press.
Speaking outside the bar on Sunday, Intoxicology Department’s owner likewise declined to delve into what had just occurred.
In one of many shows of solidarity throughout the community, locals had helped clean up the bar’s property earlier Sunday after police had cleared the scene.
“We pitched in and helped clean up,” said Tammy Laubach, owner of the Berwick Family Restaurant, located down the block from the Intoxicology Department. “That’s what you should do.”
Many in the community seemed to still be processing what had happened, Laubach said. One of her own relatives had been injured in the Saturday vehicular assault.
“We’re usually slammed on a Sunday,” Laubach said, but her restaurant was nearly empty. Everything was quiet, Laubach said, as if the downtown streets themselves were still stunned.
With such a small population, it’s hard for anyone in Berwick and Nescopeck to not know someone impacted by the events of the last ten days.
“Just compounding the situation from last week onto this everybody knows somebody,” said Kurt Slusser, manager of Cole’s Hardware in downtown Berwick, whose marquee now reads “pray for our community.”
Slusser said one of his sister-in-law’s nephew’s children suffered a broken leg after being struck at the fundraiser. Many residents are still trying to piece together how many victims they know, and how they are doing – on top of wrestling with those lost to the fire.
“They’re in a shock-type situation,” Slusser said. “It’s still setting in.”
A funeral procession was held in Nescopeck and Berwick, PA on Sunday afternoon honor Dale Baker, one of the victims of a house fire who was a volunteer firefighter
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The perp looks illegal and resembles Kellyanne Conways husband.
I saw this ..
Can’t believe that with a firefighter in the family, he lets them live with such fire dangers in the house.
“All these little small towns have been close-knit communities, and will continue to be.”
Don’t bet on it. The old families are dying out, or their young are moving out.
I’m in central PA, a short drive from Berwick. Like most other such towns in the region, it’s changing fast, and not in a good way.
As for house fires, they are common occurrences, though usually not in August. Old houses, electric substandard, heating issues, mostly.
And lately, yes, a few seriously crazy people make the news. Bizarre things are no longer infrequent in the news.
Well they have said that the house fire investigation is a “complex criminal case” so how that plays out down the road should be of interest.
Since I lived and worked in Berwick years ago I’m familiar with the community. But the population has decreased considerably since I lived there and I undeerstand it’s not what it once was.
Don’t get mad, get even. Vote the Democrats out of office who have created the horrible latter senseless tragedy. We all grieve with you though, as we should. May the Lord visit your town to assist with your healing process.
“All these little small towns have been close-knit communities, and will continue to be.”Don’t bet on it. The old families are dying out, or their young are moving out.
Cars should be outlawed.
He looks like some kind of freak.
When you bring low IQ and impolite “tribal fighting” people into your community, your community becomes less polite and soon more distant from each other. There is no sense of belonging and after a couple of episodes of extreme violence, people start locking doors as they lose trust in their neighbors. Then there are no more local get-together’s or community events and the chasm widens. No one knows their neighbors anymore and their is no coherence, no trust, and people are no longer willing to put their life on the line for anyone as they were for the neighbor they had known since kindergarten.
Destroying rural local communities is by design and that’s why the current administration is shipping those who are likely destroy those communities into the those areas.
The former United States of America has dissolved into a chaotic nightmare of permanent violence, terror, evil, and several other consequences of the, now completed, imposition of communist tyranny...
It is the precursor to civil war or revolution or the next 998 years of darkest tyranny...
We were warned many times during the past 70 years...
Almost no one listened...
Now, all our descendants will pay the heavy price...
“complex criminal case” may be code wording for illegal, dangerous, non-code, electrical work.
Pennsylvania does not require licensing of residential electricians other than the $600/year home improvement contractor license required of all trades.
Diversity is our strength.
You are so right. He does resemble the Hunchback of Notre Dame.
“...He does resemble the Hunchback of Notre Dame...”
He looks most like the Lon Chaney, Sr. characterization of 1923 but Charles Laughton also projected a dwarflike posture in the 1939 film. Anthony Quinn seemed too tall in some scenes of the 1956 version.
Kill them before they can kill us. I’m afraid it will come to that.
My late father lived in Emmaus, PA. Some fifteen years ago, there abouts, a whole s**t load of Mexicans moved into the town and in short order the town of Emmaus was overwhelmed by this human garbage you very accurately described.
Crime, violent crime the town have never before experienced
went through the roof. In one fell swoop almost the entire Emmaus PD resigned in a single night.
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