Like something out of the scene from a movie, a low murmur began to move across the room. As the services for our recently departed brother, Dan Wolfe, drew to a close it became apparent that something was happening back in the city.

There was a fire, and it was on a street that was more than familiar to all of us. This fire though, immediately felt different.

As members of the Bureau Of Fire filed out of the funeral home, unaware of how soon we would be returning to that very place, more information was coming to light. This was evolving rapidly into one of ‘those’ fires. One of those that will stay with you forever.

Guys started to listen to the fire on their phones. The transmissions they were hearing were stressed, the conditions were becoming apparent. Heavy wind driven fire, kids trapped, firemen putting it all on the line.

Unaware that a chain of events that we couldn’t stop was already in motion guys began leaving the funeral home to head into their stations and cover the department recall that had been issued.

At the fire, members of the B platoon were heavily engaged in a battle to save the lives of children who only moments before were playing in their home. Only moments before, the battery of a hover board was just charging on the homes first floor.

Several blocks away a car sat idling in the parking lot of a store and a choice was made by a young woman, high on PCP, to take that car, from that lot. A decision that would change lives forever.

Firefighters worked desperately to control the fast moving fire and locate the missing children. Companies were pushing hard to find those kids. Ladders were thrown, hand lines advanced and searches conducted until they were driven out of the building. The fire continued to grow in intensity and the efforts of the men grew in their determination and desperation.

Family members, trying to get in the building. Neighbors upset by the horror unfolding before their eyes. Police trying to keep people back so the firemen could work and EMS tending to the victims and awaiting the missing.

Across the city firemen moved toward their stations grabbing their gear and heading in to staff the reserve apparatus. Incoming officers organizing the recall personnel, preparing for whatever their assignment might be.

At Station 2, Fire Lt. Dennis DeVoe stopped by to let them know he’d be right back with his gear and if he missed them for whatever reason, he’d meet them at the scene. Something we know now, would never happen.

Recall officers reported to command at the fire, “recall is filled, what do you need?” The answer was simple, “Get up here.” The now staffed reserve rigs immediate began moving toward the fire.

A block away, Lt. DeVoe made his way down Walnut St. toward Station 8, hoping to retrieve his gear and join the firefight. As he entered the intersection of North 14th and Walnut, worlds collided as the stolen car didn’t stop for the stop sign and entered the intersection at 50 miles per hour. Worlds that couldn’t have been more different, came crashing together, changed forever in an instant.

Our brother’s life cut short by a person who’s choices robbed both of them of potential and opportunity and futures that were now anything but what they had been planned to be.

One by one firefighters located and rescued the victims, overcome by smoke, burned and gravely injured. Immediately passed to awaiting EMS and taken to area hospitals. The fire beat into submission by the unwavering efforts of the firemen on scene.

There was work to be done, opening up, knocking down fire, figuring out how this scene even unfolded. The firemen fought not only the fire but the wind and the bitter cold. The scene, originally dangerous from smoke and fire, now covered in ice with weary firemen trying not to slip while finishing their work.

Then the moment came, a radio transmission that was out of place, a request that was unfamiliar, “all Harrisburg firemen report to the Camp Curtain fire station (an old station at the end of the block) immediately and without exception.”

This was something that simply was not normal. Something was up. And it couldn’t be good. Had someone become lost in the building? Was someone missing or injured? By this time the scene was not chaotic, the crews were not rushed, what was going on?

Once all personnel had reported the chief of the department acknowledged the herculean effort put forth by the men on this night.

While the sentiment was appreciated, those who had been around for some time knew, the timing was off, there was something else.

And then it hit, “while you put forth such a great effort to control this fire and rescue those kids, one of our brothers was severely injured in a vehicle crash while coming in for recall.”

What? That couldn’t be, how could that have happened. Who was it, so many were here already...

The next three words, delivered the pain, like a punch to the face or the sudden ending to a fall.

“Lt. Dennis DeVoe.....” That was it, there was no more discernable sound, there was only light, light that seemed so bright, noises but nothing that sounded like anything. Muffled, distant sounds, lights flashing and pain.

What did he just say? There is no way it is true. This simply could not be happening.

There was work to be done, a lot of work. Crews took some time, regrouped as best as they could and went back to finish the fight they had begun.

But there was a numbness. An emptiness. Our brother was fighting for his life, a life that we couldn’t yet know was slipping away and never coming back, but we had to complete our obligation to those who were

suffering what would be the eventual loss of two beautiful children and the life they had known as a family.

This had to stop, it had to change, how could we continue to deal with this, but the hits kept coming, like round after round of mortar attacks.

Brothers and sisters raced to be at the hospital. Word trickling back initially led to some hope that maybe, just maybe there was some hope.

But it wasn’t to be. As quickly as hopeful information came in, it was replaced with the word that our brother Denny could not survive the injuries he’d sustained.

It was the knock-out punch.

One of our most respected leaders and friends, gone. Two beautiful little girls, gone. Our brother Dan, gone.

Why, how, for what?

The events of that night haunt us all. They will always be there. They will never go away. Not for us, Dan’s family, not for Denny’s family, not for the family of Ashanti and Savannah, not for the family of the girl who stole that car.

There is no sense to be made of this. Because what happened that week, that night, will never make sense. It will never be resolved. It will just live within us and ask the same question over and over, why?

If one thing, just one, could have been different, this cruel collision course of lives might never have occurred. The hundreds of people intimately involved might have their loved ones, their lives as they had hoped they would be.

Instead they will have the memories of our darkest days.