QUEENS, NY - Queens firefighter Robert Moore is only on the job two years, and he has already made a lifesaving rescue. And he did it alone, while off duty. Moore, 26, grabbed a 15-year-old boy and the teen's Lhasa apso dog from their smoke-engulfed home, getting them out a second-floor window as he perched on the top of a ladder. ...

COLORADO - State legislators are beginning to challenge one of the ironclad tenets of public pension policy: that states cannot legally reduce pension benefits for current and future retirees. Lawmakers in Colorado, Minnesota and South Dakota voted earlier this year to limit cost-of-living increases they previously had promised to thousands of current and future retirees, who courts historically have protected from ...

WASHINGTON - A group of sweaty and red-faced runners from Australia and the U.S. arrived on foot at a D.C. fire station Tuesday afternoon as part of a 4,600 mile cross-country journey. The 36 emergency responders are running cross country to honor firefighters, police and EMT's who died in the terror attacks of September 11th. They began their run in Santa ...

HAMILTON, VA - It wasn't the most inconspicuous of vehicles to choose. But the lure of a fire engine apparently proved too much for a volunteer firefighter in Hamilton, Virginia, who allegedly took four colleagues on a drunken joyride at the weekend. Sean Swanson, 27, was arrested after he nearly crashed into a police patrol car as he sped down the ...

ALLENTOWN, PA - Allentown's aging East Side Fire Station is crumbling and sinking into the ground, posing a health risk to firefighters, according to a recent assessment by the city's top firefighter. "The station is literally falling apart at the seams and sinking," Chief Robert Scheirer told the federal government last June. "We are now at the point where the station ...

SAN DIEGO — Hours before he was fatally struck by a car while setting up flares around a highway traffic accident, emergency medical technician Esteban Bahena made this post to his Facebook account: “Just transported a patient coming off a jet plane. Love my job.” Bahena, 24, died about 8:30 a.m. Thursday after getting hit on state Route 163 south of ...

A retired city firefighter who spent two months toiling at Ground Zero died of lung disease Tuesday, his wife said. William Quick, 55, a veteran of 23 years with the FDNY, survived 9/11 - but he could not escape Ground Zero's toxic dust. "He was there when both towers came down," his wife, Lisa Quick, said last night, her voice trailing ...

COLUMBUS, OH - The construction worker who showed up at the Hilltop fire station was nonchalant. He thought an underground gas pipe had been punctured on W. Broad Street and asked firefighters to take a look. Firefighters respond to gas leaks every day, and most don't amount to much. But this one, less than a block from Fire Station 17, was ...

BRAZIL - Like a special effect from a Harry Potter film, a tornado of fire rises from the ground as if enchanted. This rare phenomenon then swept through burning fields and stopped traffic in Brazil as bush fires spread across the country. The whirlwind of flame, several metres high, was caught on camera in Aracatuba, in southern Sao Paulo state. It ...

STATEN ISLAND, NY - A 14-month-old boy was hospitalized on Saturday after falling into a backyard swimming pool at his family’s home on Staten Island, officials said. The boy, Vincent Fougere, somehow wound up underwater in the pool behind his house on Brehaut Avenue in Tottenville shortly after noon, the police said. It was not immediately clear how long the boy ...

LEWISTOWN — Lewistown Fire Chief John Spotloe said an inaccessible road thwarted firefighters who responded to a barn fire Wednesday. "When we turned onto Otto Road we were met with a big orange sign which said 'Road Closed,' " Spotloe said after fire destroyed a barn at the Jewel Bucy residence, 7601 N. Otto Road. Jewel and Janis Bucy lost their ...

ATLANTA - An investigation of video taken of a Griffin woman just moments after she was killed in a car accident will continue in hopes of identifying the second voice captured during the recording, officials said Friday. Related A Spalding County firefighter was notified Thursday that he will be terminated for using his cell phone camera to record the image of ...

CHICAGO - A Chicago firefighter was killed this morning after a he fell from a ladder while fighting a grease-chute fire at a West Looprestaurant. He's been identified as 31-year-old Christopher Wheatley of Chicago. He was pronounced dead at 1:19 a.m. Chicago Fire Department Commissioner spoke outside Stroger Hospital this morning. He said the firefighters were at Avec Restaurant at 615 ...

YORK, PA - More than anything else, Joyce Farrington remembers her stepson as selfless. Since he was little, he naturally wanted to help people. Delta-Cardiff Volunteer Fire Co. President Douglas Farrington died Monday. Joyce Farrington, his stepmother, said officials told her Doug died from a massive heart attack. He would have been 45 in October. "Everybody in the world knew him," ...

ROODEPOORT, South Africa - If there's a crisis in Roodepoort's Durban Deep, don't expect paramedics to turn up to help. Paramedics are under siege, fearing whether a callout may be an ambush, following the weekend rape of an ambulance crew while tending to a child. At Station 21, where the two paramedics are based, colleagues were still shaken from the incident. ...

PUYALLUP, Wash. -- A fire official says an off-duty firefighter pulled over Tuesday when he spotted a Puyallup house fire and rescued the wheelchair-bound woman inside. Central Pierce Fire Assistant Chief Randy Stephens tells The News Tribune that the unidentified woman suffered minor smoke inhalation but was otherwise unhurt. Stephens says the Graham, Wash., firefighter was driving by after picking his ...

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – A retired firefighter from San Leandro won big when he visited a local casino this week. Dale Valentine was making one of his regular visits to Twin Pine Casino in Middletown on Tuesday when he hit a jackpot of approximately $8,430,301.44 on a statewide California Megabucks slot machine. “Our tribe has been committed to providing great success in ...

WAYNESVILLE - A fire in Waynesville early Thursday morning has displaced several families and put two people in the hospital. It could have been a much different story if paramedic Mike McCart hadn't acted quickly to save them. Mike McCart is a jack of all trades. He is not only a paramedic, but a former volunteer firefighter and a member of ...

UK - When Julia Sbardella's chip pan caught fire, the last thing on her mind was marriage. Her only concern was for the safety of her young children as she tried to battle the flames until the fire brigade arrived. But it was an emergency which would lead to her walking down the aisle after she was quite literally swept off ...