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But there are still professions whose members I unconditionally admire. I have enormous respect for the servicemen in the Coast Guard, especially those who work in rescue helicoptors. Dispatched to the scene of boat and ship sinkings, their job is to save the lives of people cast adrift in the water, and sometimes the water doesn't cooperate. If it's night, and the seas are rough, and there are high winds, then sometimes it's necessary for a man from the helicoptor to dive out into the water to help the victims to use the harness on the helicoptor's hoist. And sometimes when they do jump in, they don't come back. Every time I hear of that happening, I mourn inside. But I'm proud to know that their fellows keep doing it, though they know that this could happen. I am a big fan of rodeo, and most events in rodeo are relatively safe for the cowboys. (All the events are safe for the animals; it is exceedingly rare for an animal in rodeo to be harmed, and you'll see a hundred cowboy injuries for every animal injury.) There's one event in rodeo which is extremely dangerous for the cowboys and is probably responsible for three quarters of their injuries, and that's bull-riding. Bulls are strong and mean and they don't just want the cowboy off their back: the bull wants the cowboy dead and the bull is strong enough to get its way. There's no graceful way off the back of a bull, and during the first couple of seconds after getting thrown off, the bull has all the advantages. So there are three men out there, who used to be called "clowns" and now are generally called "bull-fighters" whose job is to distract the bull and keep it from attacking the cowboy as he lays on the ground. Despite the clownish clothing and the face makeup, they're not in the comedy business, and what they're doing is deadly serious. Sometimes the clowns get hurt, and in the course of a career nearly every clown is injured more than once. These are brave men doing a tough job, in order to keep others (the riders) safe. I watched rodeo on TV tonight, and one cowboy got his hand caught after he was tossed; a clown had to jump in and help loosen it. (A few years ago in a similar situation I saw a clown get his jaw broken.) On another ride, the bull headed for the cowboy on the ground and that same clown jumped in the way and let himself be tossed by the bull in order to give that cowboy an extra second to move. Occasionally a clown is actually killed, and again I mourn. Perhaps the consistently bravest of the selflessly brave are the firemen, the only ones of my childhood heros to have made it to adulthood untarnished. Yes, there are stories of firemen who are also pyros, but this is extremely rare. Most of them are men who risk their lives to save others, and risk they do because fires are always dangerous. And occasionally their luck runs out, and some of them are killed. This happened today, and I am mourning for the three who died. A major hardware store was burning and a huge explosion blew the front off the store. It is very sad when this happens, because these men didn't risk their lives for crass personal gain; they were doing it to serve us all and keep us all safe. There are easier ways of making a living. A hardware store is a bad place for firemen to fight a fire, because most hardware stores are loaded with inflammable materials. There are plastics and paints, and they often stock paint thinner and other solvents, and if they have a sporting goods section they'll have tanks of propane (which are bombs just waiting to go off) and sometimes even ammunition. This is not a good thing -- but the fire has to be put out. Three men died today fighting such a fire, but if there's another fire tomorrow at a different hardware store in NYC, the firemen will respond. This is true heroism. (discuss) Update: this report confirms my suspicion: the explosion came from tanks of propane. This is just about the last thing that firemen want in a fire; even dynamite would be better, because dynamite burns fiercely in a fire rather than exploding. But if you have a stack of propane tanks and one lets go, it will burst all the others and they'll all go at once. No wonder it took out the front of the building. |
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