Three years and two months after he helped raise a torn American flag over the fiery ruins of the World Trade Center, Chris Engeldrum called his Bronx firehouse from wherever his Army National Guard unit was operating in Iraq.
"I asked him how it was going," Fire Lt. Mike Owney recalled yesterday. "He said, 'So far, so good.' Keeping his head down, keeping the faith. 'Hopefully, I'll see you in a year.'"
At the memory of those words, Owney's voice caught. A power tool whined and he looked up to where two workmen in a tower ladder bucket were drilling holes in the brick above the firehouse entrance. The holes were for the screws that would hold the funeral bunting.
"He is the 344th casualty of the terrorist attack," another firefighter said.
"True," Owney said.
The power drill whined again. Owney went inside the firehouse that is home to Engine 66/Ladder 61. The firefighters had fashioned a kind of altar at the back that included a photograph of Engeldrum at the scene of the 9/11 attack, where 343 members of the Fire Department perished. The photo showed Engeldrum and three other firefighters hanging an American flag from a lamppost in the wake of the worst attack in our history.
Engeldrum also was a sergeant in the National Guard, and on another September day three years later, his comrades took him to a Yankee game as a farewell before he left for his final training on the way to Iraq. Two weeks ago, this veteran of the searingly sudden attack in downtown Manhattan called his firehouse from a faraway and seemingly endless war.
"Same Chris. Same sense of humor. Still upbeat," Owney said.
On Monday, the firehouse phone rang again. This call brought word that Engeldrum had been killed in a Humvee carrying five soldiers, the same number as on a fire truck.
Much the same impulse that caused Engeldrum and the others to hoist the flag at the World Trade Center prompted the firefighters of Ladder 61 to remove the flag from the rear of their truck and pin it to the back wall. They then hung up the turnout coat and fire helmet that had been waiting for Firefighter 11745 to return. The coat bore the name "Engeldrum." One of the gold angels that were handed out after 9/11 was stuck in the helmet band.
"You tell him to go to Iraq, he's going to go," Owney said yesterday. "The same way you tell him to go into the Trade Center, he's going to go. He's not going to say no."
Owney turned into the kitchen and joined the talk of a fallen comrade who stuck right with you in a fire no matter what. Firefighter Eddie Reardon said Engeldrum had been the one who came up with the nickname "Co-op crew" for this firehouse in the shadow of Co-op City. Engeldrum also had been the one who always brought them together and kept them laughing and made them all proud to be exactly who they are.
"A good man," Owney said. "He will be sorely missed."
A firefighter came in from out front.
"They got the screws in," the firefighter said.
Owney went back out past the turnout coat and the flag on the wall. Firefighter Mark Klingner emerged with a white cardboard box marked "BUNTING." Klingner climbed into the tower ladder's bucket along with Mike Schiraldi, Steve Turcotte and Anthony Ferrante.
The hydraulic arm hoisted four of Engeldrum's closest comrades up to where the work crew had installed a row of nine screws. The firefighters began by untying a banner inspired by those that had hung outside firehouses throughout the city after 9/11 thanking the citizenry for their support. This banner had gone up after their friend headed off to war.
"WE SUPPORT OUR TROOPS
FR. ENGLEDRUM L-61
NOW SERVING"
A firefighter appeared in the upstairs window and the four in the bucket handed the banner to him with the same kind of rough-handed tenderness witnessed in the rescues of children. The four then began hanging the black and purple bunting, a long scroll on either side of the entrance and three drapes across the top.
The other grieving firefighters stood so silent on the pavement, you could hear the ratcheting of the socket wrench as it tightened the final screw. The wind rippled the bunting marking the loss of a 344th member of the FDNY in a war that seems to claim only the very best.
Originally published on December 1, 2004